Busy art weekend: Gwinnett gallery opens, Art Party, last lap for High's 'Cars,' Art Papers exhibit, more

Spanish artist Jesus Navarro's A Delightful Treat is included in the inaugural exhibition at R Alexander Gallery in Peachtree Corners, "New Roots: A Celebration of New Beginnings."

Credit: hpousner

Credit: hpousner

Spanish artist Jesus Navarro's A Delightful Treat is included in the inaugural exhibition at R Alexander Gallery in Peachtree Corners, "New Roots: A Celebration of New Beginnings."

Gwinnett County gets new art gallery -- garden, too

Atlanta’s northern suburbs gain another art gallery as R Alexander Fine Art in Peachtree Corners celebrates with grand opening receptions 6:30-10 p.m. Thursday and Friday.

Though the location is new, partner Robert Harris has been an art dealer for three decades, specializing in an array of international work.

The debut exhibition’s title, “New Roots: A Celebration of New Beginnings,” alludes to its artist introductions but also to a newly installed 2.5-acre botanical garden intended to make R Alexander a Gwinnett County attraction. The garden features a waterfall overlooked by a nearly one-ton Marton Varo marble sculpture.

Regional artists in “New Roots” include Atlantans Pat Hobaugh and Alice Williams, Gail Foster (Chattahoochee Hills), Noah Desmond (Palm Coast, Fla.) and Brad Robertson (Mobile). International artists represented include Alvar, Pietro Piccoli and Jesus Navarro.

Through Oct. 11. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays. 5650 Peachtree Parkway, Peachtree Corners. 770-609-8662, www.ralexanderfineart.com.

Other notable art shows this weekend:

Contemporary throws Art Party

Atlanta Contemporary Art Center opens “Exquisite Exhibit: Parlour Games from the Studio Artist Program” during Art Party, 7 p.m.-midnight Saturday. Curated by Joey Orr, the exhibit showcases collaborations by 21 artists from the last decade of the Contemporary’s Studio Artist Program. Art Party features entertainment, food and drink and an opportunity to tour the Contemporary’s galleries and 14 artist studio spaces.

11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays (until 8 p.m. Thursdays). Through Oct. 11. Art Party tickets: $50 when purchased online by noon Friday; $60 at door. 535 Means St. N.W., Atlanta. 404-688-1970, www.thecontemporary.org.

Final lap for ‘Dream Cars’

The High Museum of Art extends its hours this weekend for the final days of its popular design exhibit “Dream Cars: Innovative Design, Visionary Idea.” Featuring concept cars, along with conceptual drawings and scale models, by automakers such as Ferrari, Bugatti, Porsche and General Motors, it will be on view 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Friday, 10 a.m.-8 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Sunday.

$19.50; $16.50, students and seniors; $12, ages 6-17; free, ages 5 and younger 1280 Peachtree St. N.E., Atlanta. www.high.org.

Still from Cécile B. Evans' "How Happy A Thing Can Be" 2014, HD video, part of the Art Papers exhibit,

Credit: hpousner

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Credit: hpousner

Art Papers organizes 'Movable Types'

Art Papers, the Atlanta-based independent critical voice covering contemporary art and culture in print, online and through public programming, is now an exhibitor, too. It has mounted the exhibition “Movable Types” at Ponce Gallery at Ponce City Market through Sept. 28.

The exhibit features seven artists recently commissioned to create projects for the pages of Art Papers magazine and website: Rosa Aiello, Jennifer Bonner, Budd Dees and Galen Olmsted, Cécile B. Evans, Jill Frank and Fernando Pessoa.

Curated by Art Papers editor and artistic director Victoria Camblin, the exhibit is intended to function as the equivalent of a magazine fold out, connecting these artist-contributors to the Atlanta exhibit-going community.

Art Papers positions “Movable Types” as "both a return to our roots and an exciting move forward with the scope of our public programming." The publication was launched in 1977 by the Atlanta Art Workers Coalition, which curated a nonprofit gallery space and used its offices as a gathering space where arts issues near and far were the topic of community conversation. “Movable Types” represents Art Papers' effort to build community through a different way of communicating about contemporary art.

Here is background on the artists, who "share a fundamental interest in multi-disciplinary research, experiment, discourse and production," provided by Art Papers:

  • Rosa Aiello is a Canadian artist and writer whose visual work often combines CGI and HD video, and has been shown at the New Museum in New York, the Modern Institute in Glasgow and in galleries and project spaces in London and Rome.
  • Belgian-American artist Cécile B. Evans was raised in Jacksonville and is now based between London and Berlin, where she works in a variety of digital and analogue media.
  • Jennifer Bonner is an Atlanta-based architect whose material investigations have been exhibited in institutions in London, Barcelona and Washington.
  • Budd Dees and Galen Olmsted maintain independent practices in Atlanta and Gainesville, Fla., respectively; their sculptures were first presented together in their collaborative exhibition "The Usual Mating Habits of Matter and Ground" (Georgia State University's Ernest G. Welch School of Art & Design Gallery, Summer 2014).
  • Jill Frank's work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including in a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. She is part of the photography faculty at Georgia State University.
  • Fernando Pessoa (1888-1935) was a prolific Portuguese poet, author and philosopher who wrote not only under his own name, but under roughly 75 heteronyms, each corresponding to a different figure of his own creation.

Camblin and the Atlanta-based artists will give a gallery walk-through at 2 p.m. Saturday.

Gallery hours: 1-6 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and by appointment (also 2-6 p.m. Sept. 28, in conjunction with Atlanta Streets Alive). 650 North Ave N.E., Atlanta. www.artpapers.org.

Seth Thompson’s ‘No Content’

“This Message Has No Content,” an exhibit of mass media-sparked work by Atlanta photographer-digital artist Seth Thompson, opens with a reception at 7 p.m. Friday at Sandler Hudson Gallery.

Through Nov. 1. Gallery talk by Thompson and High Museum of Art contemporary art curator Michael Rooks: 6 p.m. Oct. 1. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesdays-Fridays, noon-5 p.m. Saturdays. 1000 Marietta St. N.W., Suite 116, Atlanta. 404-817-3300, www.sandlerhudson.com.

Arles del R o's "Untitled" from the series "Esperando que caigan las cosas del cielo" ("Hoping That Things Fall from the Sky"). It's part of the exhibition "Stealing Base: Cuba at Bat, " opening Thursday at the Oglethorpe University Museum of Art.

Credit: hpousner

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Credit: hpousner

At Oglethorpe, Cuban artists find power in game

In Cuba, la pelota (baseball) is the true national pastime. In “Stealing Base: Cuba at Bat,” opening Thursday at the Oglethorpe University Museum of Art, 16 established and emerging Cuban-born artists living in the island country and in the U.S. explore the metaphoric power of the game.

“Baseball has played an important role in the impugning, critical, and revolutionary spirit that Cuban artists have demonstrated when faced with acts of dogmatism, official intolerance and censorship,” Havana-based curator Orlando Hernández writes in his exhibition essay.

A series of accompanying talks launches at 7 p.m. Sept. 17, with museum director Elizabeth Peterson discussing “Art, Activism and Social Justice.”

Through Dec. 7. Noon to 5 p.m. Tuesdays-Sundays. $5; under 12, free. 4484 Peachtree Road, Atlanta. 404-364-8555, museum.oglethorpe.edu.

8 artists plant seeds of inspiration in ‘Farm’ exhibit

Though famed for its immaculately restored antebellum homes, the town of Madison is the county seat of Morgan County, where the agrarian lifestyle not only survives but prospers.

"Farm," an exhibition giving eight artists' takes on farm living in Morgan County, continues through Jan. 4 at the Madison-Morgan Cultural Center.

The regional artists — Keith Bennett, Angelina Bellebuono, Shannon, Candler, Chris Cook, Elisabeth Guibert, Mary Leslie Hartman, Lynn Marshall-Linnemeier and Thomas Prochnow — each were paired with a Morgan County farm, interpreting the connection to the land of the people that worked there in two and three-dimensional works.

The participating farms were Charleston Allen Farm, Crystal Organic Farm, Full Circle Farm, Johnston Family Farm, Lambert Farms, Oak Haven Farm, Oak Meadow Farm and Serenata Farm.

434 S. Main St., Madison. 1-877-233-0598, www.mmcc-arts.org.