1990 In early May SoHyun Bae IL showed Grace I (2011, acrylic on canvas, 72 x 30") in Art New York, Pier 94 at Nikola Rukaj Gallery in NYC, where she lives.
IDENTIFYING INGREDIENTS Brooklyn-based textiles designer Lauren Garfinkel 91 AP admits that the 2016 US presidential campaign was tough to stomach. But even before she knew how upsetting it would get, she managed to find a good outlet for her frustrations and a natural “way of participating in the political process.” Starting in the summer of 2014, Garfinkel began sharing her Edible Government series of political commentary on Instagram, using a wild assortment of foodstuffs to amplify the identity of the leading candidates. Early in the campaign, she portrayed Bernie Sanders using sticks of chewing gum, Jeb Bush as a baked potato and Hillary Clinton made of raw mushrooms. In the summer of 2015, she posted her take on Donald Trump as a circus peanut — the right color, she says, to capture the president-elect’s signature tanning salon skin. NPR’s food blog, The Salt, soon caught on to her provocative political portraits, as did Lucky Peach, which invited her to do a monthly Edible Trump column for the last six months of the campaign. Garfinkel first began creating politically poignant food art a decade ago when then-President George W. Bush put his foot in his mouth by prematurely praising FEMA head Michael Brown in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. His comment, “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job” led to her first piece — a silhouetted person on a rooftop made from brownies trying to escape the chocolate syrup pooled below.
Kimberly Becker TX (Waltham, MA) participated in Fiber in the Present Tense 2016, a juried exhibition showcasing fiber work by members of the MA/RI chapter of the Surface Design Association. The show was on view from early September through early November at Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watertown, MA. A Fox Appears, a book of poems by Jennifer Stewart Miller that features artwork by Franklin Einspruch IL, won Best in Category for Poetry at last May’s New England Book Show awards ceremony in Boston, where the artist lives. The new video piece Franklin, Painting by Stephen DiRado focuses on his work.
1991 As the 2016 campaign devolved over the summer, Garfinkel found in Trump endless fodder for her raw take on reality. She recreated his mug and signature mop using hotdogs, baby carrots, a chunk of grilled steak, table scraps, Chuckles candy and more. Shortly before the election The Atlantic ran a piece pointing out that Garfinkel’s work follows in a fine tradition of political cartoons and absurdist art full of biting commentary. In the end, she said, she spent every free moment she had literally making ridiculous faces as her own way of trying to understand how “individual choices” end up making an incalculable impact on us all.
Original artwork and prints by Alicia Sterling Beach PT of Burbank, CA are now available through ArtLifting, a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting artists with disabilities. In September Melissa Conroy PT (Philadelphia) released The Lowcountry Coloring Book (Algonquin Books), a collection of 44 detachable line drawings of scenes from Savannah, GA,
Andrew Jay Rumpler 91 ID Tatum’s Lounge (2010), built from recycled piano keys, resin, glass fiber and steel, was included in On the Edge of Your Seat: Chairs for the 21st Century, a juried exhibition that ran from early May through mid July at the Center for Art in Wood in Philadelphia. Andrew is based in Brooklyn.
As the political climate in the US reached a boiling point in 2016, Lauren Garfinkel 91 AP kept her cool creating portraits of key players exclusively using edibles. Her fishy Trump, nachos-inspired Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and squid-slimey NJ Governor Chris Christie offer a taste of her repertoire. For more visit instagram.com/ediblegovernment.