Fountain Street gallery is excited to start off the New Year presenting our annual Core Artist Exhibition. “The Space for Maybe,” curated by Virginia Mahoney and assisted by Miller Opie, runs through February 13th. Events associated with this exhibition include a First Friday Art Walks on January 7th and February 4th from 5–8PM, and a Curator’s Q&A on Saturday, January 29th from 3–4PM, RSVP for the in person conversation or follow us live on Facebook. Event information can be found here.

In this blog post, Mahoney talks about the ideas behind the exhibition.

Kraft paper.

How many artists cover their work surfaces with it? How many wrap their work in it when they deliver it? Kraft paper follows our work from its humble and messy beginnings right into the exhibition space, arguably the height of its existence, and even to its forever home, wrapped for transit inside bubblewrap encased in a box within a box. The Space for Maybe focuses on the former, that vague, indistinct, obscure place where “openness to the spaciousness of serendipity” exists.

For this exhibition, artists were asked to submit, along with their artwork, “process artifacts” from their studios -- anything from inspirational objects to actual by-products or tools of their process. Along with these, they submitted statements pertaining to their own “space for maybe.” What follows is a series of excerpts:

“The new space I had made for myself …Maybe I could do this…choosing to find inspiration, to make the most out of the hand that was dealt. ..teeters on the edge of something…noncommittal… hints at a hidden agenda…You can never be sure...grew out of an accident…I noticed… two windows of possibility, two ways of looking at the same thing...new direction…celebrate my bravery…challenge myself…I do not yet know how it will manifest…imagine two possible realities…through experimentation and a lot of trial and error I discovered…lingers on the tips of our fingers...moment, object, or feeling that we can't quite seem to grasp…repetitive action was calming…constantly shifting and re-thinking…I could…as I played with scraps…started a thought process…welcome accidents…residue/leftovers are intriguing in their own way…a new place a place of doubt, and maybe new beginnings…a meandering journey of curiosity and discovery…personal to me…to produce in new and unexpected ways…to think differently and to push my imagination…big room for new ideas. The work seemed to make itself…what if I take it as far as it goes…not typically… burnt-out fireworks canisters… reminded me….extreme color…detritus of a party collide…”

Patty deGrandpre’s sketch of “Little Landscape, Blue Mountain”

Silvia Vander Sluis’ spent fireworks canister

Each told their own story in different words, affirming the singularity of this space for each artist. Yet we recognize a familiarity in every statement. All of us may not use kraft paper in the same way, nor may we even use it, but our Space for Maybe functions in a similar manner for all of us, despite the widely different ways that we approach our work.

The Space For Maybe: Kraft Paper