Immersion & Emergence

Exhibition by Ellen Peckham

Guttenberg Arts Gallery is pleased to present High Strangeness, an exhibition of work by artist Matt Barteluce. This exhibition will be on view from November 7th - November 29th, 2020 at the Guttenberg Arts Gallery. To promote social distancing Guttenberg Arts Gallery is currently open by appointment only and virtually on their website.

The upcoming exhibition High Strangeness consists of a series of prints, paintings and ceramics that are playful explorations of all things paranormal and unexplainable. Barteluce finds inspiration in far-fetched theories and illustrates them through a variety of mediums including 2-color silkscreens, woodblock prints and etchings. From UFOs and Bigfoot to theories such as hollow earth, this body of work is invites viewers to let go a little and embrace the weirder, more mysterious side of the world we live in.  He has taken much of his inspiration from the artist Albertus Seba and his book the Cabinet of Natural Curiosities.  Like Seba, Barteluce is documenting these modern day mysteries and like all things preternatural, he’s hidden clues and deeper mysteries within each print.

Matt Barteluce is a New Jersey native and amateur ufologist.  He is an artist, illustrator and graphic designer who received his BFA in 2003 from Maryland Institute College of Art and his MFA in 2010 at the School of Visual Arts.  Until 2014 he worked as an art director for Young & Rubicam Group, a worldwide advertising agency.  During that time he co-founded ‘Carrier Pigeon’, a quarterly fine art and literature magazine with a group of peers.  He is currently director of Guttenberg Arts, a 501c3 non profit arts organization. As Guttenberg Arts director he acts as an advocate for artists helping them achieve their fullest potential.

Exhibition: Nov. 7th, 2020 - Nov. 29th, 2020; Opening Saturday November 7th by appointment only.

Guttenberg Arts Gallery is pleased to present Eyedrop, an exhibition of etchings by artist Bruno Nadalin completed during the years 2018 to 2020. This exhibition will be on view from October 3rd - November 1st, 2020 at the Guttenberg Arts Gallery. To promote social distancing Guttenberg Arts Gallery is currently open by appointment only and virtually on their website. Patrons can schedule their visit or view the virtual gallery by going to www.guttenbergarts.org/exhibitions.

Nadalin’s work focuses primarily on the grotesque and monstrous as an avenue towards expressing and exorcising social and personal anxieties. His art is primarily narrative in approach, although the conditions of these narratives tend to be ambiguous and undefined. Often, there is a lack of grounding context as figures fill a nebulous space, which highlights the disquieting nature of their interaction. His pieces are inhabited by twisted souls who trip over their own humanity. The body is often a scene of grotesque comedy, exploding in joy or hidden in shame. Iconography from Medieval art often serves as a departure point for Nadalin’s work.

In his working process, he strives to forgo sketching and planning for a more direct approach which allows him to fully engage and revel in the fluctuation of consciousness which he experiences during the composing process, during which his hand alternately seems to move of its own power, the line becoming an independent agent, and at other times tightens in self-consciousness before a crucial graphic decision. Nadalin often find himself working in a space of tension between the spontaneous and the exacting.

Etching has been the primary medium of his recent work; its reliance on line as the main means of expression engages the artist on a visceral level. Printmaking forms the bulk of his artistic expression, and he is well versed in techniques of linocut, monotype, drypoint, and silkscreen. 

Nadalin explains: “Exhibiting these works at Guttenberg Arts is particularly resonant for me, for it was here at an introductory workshop in 2018 that I learned the basics of the medium. Since then, I have been ceaselessly experimenting with etching, trying out new techniques and materials, learning from and incorporating unexpected results, and allowing the particular characteristics of the medium to guide my ideas and composing process more and more. These works trace this development and experimentation, charting the tension between a straightforward rendering and a less restrained approach, two tendencies between which I alternate. These tensions find some unity through the subject matter and the character of the ink.”

Bruno Nadalin is a Jersey City based artist and educator.  He has a Masters degree from the Fashion Institute of Technology in illustration and teaches printmaking at the Jersey City Art School. He has recently exhibited work at the Manhattan Graphics Center in NYC, Eonta Space in Jersey City, Galleri Heike Arndt in Berlin and the Plaxall Gallery in NYC.  You can see his work online by visiting www.brunonadalin.com. 

Exhibition: Oct. 3rd, 2020 - Nov. 1st, 2020; Opening Saturday October 3rd.

MADE HERE: WINTER 2020 GROUP EXHIBITION

LUCAS ALMEIDA / JASON ROBERT BAUER / VASSILINA DIKIDJIEVA / CHARLOTTE MASSIP / ADAMS PURYEAR

ON VIEW AUGUST 1ST - AUGUST 30TH