St. Claude at Jonathan Ferrara Gallery (photo by Michael Smith)

St. Claude, a multi-media group show featuring the work of thirteen artists 

who are active in the burgeoning St. Claude Arts District scene, saw a successful opening in conjunction with Whitney White Linen Night on August 4th, an event which brought an estimated 40,000 art lovers to the Julia Street galleries.

The St. Claude Arts District is a vibrant artist-driven group of exhibition spaces located in the St. Claude area of New Orleans.  Artist studios, collectives, cooperatives and performance spaces populate this area and offer some of the most innovative, experimental, and emerging art taking place in New Orleans. Organic and grass roots, the spaces on St. Claude draw thousands to their monthly (second Saturday) openings.  The spaces can run the gamut from very raw to somewhat refined, but they give young artists venues to showcase their creative visions, often for the first time anywhere.  The creative energy on St. Claude is palpable and these  spaces provide an essential breeding ground for the next generation of emerging artists as well as venues for more established artists to take risks that aren't possible in more commercial galleries. t.Claude, the exhibition will present  works, some that are well-known and others who will show for the first time on Julia Street.  

*Please note that the St. Claude Art Walk takes place the 2nd Saturday of each month.

to read full St. Claude

to view artworks from this exhibition

to view a list of St. Claude Arts District's events and openings, as well a the full list of St. Claude galleries

to right: Stephen Hoskins, floral sweater, 2012 gouache and colored pencil on paper, 29 1/2" x 22"

omissions, the new series of portraits by Stephen Hoskins, saw a successful opening in conjunction with  Whitney White LinenNight on Saturday, August 4. 

Stephen Hoskins is a native New Orleanian.  He received his BFA from Ohio Wesleyan University and his MFA from Washington University in St. Louis.  Stephen is a visiting professor at Saint Louis University since the Fall of 2009.  He is well-known for his ethereal portraiture, which capture essential truths about their subjects often by suggestion as well as rendering.

Hoskins says of this series:

In this series, omissions, I explore the visual identity of a person when the information that we rely on most-a subject's facial features-are missing. . . removing the subject's facial features curtailed my natural desire to address the figure as a whole and forced me to address the other more subtle details of the subject's representation. . . 

The viewer's emotional and logical response to portraiture is necessarily altered as he or she judges the visual information presented and that which is ostensibly missing.

Stephen Hoskins recently had a solo exhibition at The Ethical Society, St. Louis, and his work was included in the Juried Group Exhibition Irene Rosenzweig 2011 Biennial Exhibition in Pine Bluff, AR. His work is currently on view in Configured and Reconfigured: Transformations of the Body at the Acadiana Center for the Arts in Lafayette through October 13.

Artists Jonathan Ferrara and Sidonie Villere will be presenting new works in a dual exhibition at Isidore Newman School's Reynolds Ryan Gallery. Jonathan Ferrara will present an installation entitled Correlation II that features two major works: one is a 30 ft long by 3 ft high, 41 panel installation and the other a 20 ft high by 4 ft wide 19 panel installation. Both feature Ferrara's trademark style of manipulated minimalist pourings of a special mixed media material that dries sculptural.

Sidonie Villere's installation, Adjust, will feature a sculptural triptych titled "Veneer", a series of multimedia sculptural paintings which incorporates an array of materials including canvas, string, muslin, gesso, and wax on gesso board.  

Skylar Fein, GE, 2011

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