Peekskill Artist Club celebrates time together with group exhibition
Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art (HVCCA) will present The Power of Place, an exhibition of works by members of the Peekskill Artist Club, holding an opening reception with the artists on Sunday, Jan. 27, from 5 to 7 p.m.
The Peekskill Artist Club is a group of emerging artists from the Hudson Valley region who have been meeting monthly at HVCCA for dialogue and critique, eager to continue the growth found through discourse that characterized their time in art school. Though disparate in style and artistic medium, varied in esthetics and gallery representation as well as years of artistic practice, they share a common passion to grow and improve.
The Peekskill Artist Club had its first meeting in May of 2010, bringing together a group of young artists hailing from such art programs as Yale, RISD, University of Chicago, SUNY Purchase and SVA, among others. With the knowledge that Livia and Marc Straus had helped establish a similar group in Manhattan, several artists appealed to HVCCA as a venue. The idea was congruous with HVCCA’s mission to enable emerging artists, foster creative growth and experimental projects, as well as to help establish the reputation of the Hudson Valley as a place for important contemporary art.
Growing through invitations from current members, the group’s size has been in flux as artists continue to migrate to the Hudson Valley. Attracted to the area for different reasons, whether to raise families or to escape the city, these artists convene here to create their own artistic community. Some artists come from Peekskill, but others hail from the greater geographic area — from New Paltz to Beacon and even as far as Rhinebeck and Connecticut — to take advantage of this group of peers who are facing similar struggles, attempting to navigate the art world and find their place within it.
Over two and a half years, their work has grown and morphed, gaining from group critique and constructive self-analysis. This exhibition is a culmination of their time together, a step along the path to greater artistic growth, self-knowledge and creativity.
Artists include Gulgun Aliriza (Westchester), Emil Alzamora (Beacon), Cristina Alvarez Arnold (Peekskill), Matthew Arnold (Peekskill), Andrew Barthelmes (Peekskill), Katrina Ellis (Cold Spring), Geoff Feder (Peekskill), Philip Hardy (Rhinebeck), Katherine Mangiardi (Croton-on-Hudson), James Mulvaney (Mahopac), Adam Niklewicz (North Haven, Conn.), Jason Repolle (Highland), Shara Shisheboran (Peekskill), Tim Smith (Peekskill), Ken Vallario (Rosendale) and Michael Zelehoski (Beacon).
Several artists involved with Peekskill Artist Club were chosen by the team of curators who assembled Peekskill Project V, HVCCA’s yearlong contemporary art festival, which stages rotating exhibitions and art events at HVCCA and throughout the City of Peekskill. Feder has a large sculpture on view at the Peekskill Waterfront in Riverfront Green Park, Shisheboran’s works are on view as part of a group photography exhibition at the Peekskill Coffee House through Jan. 31, and Zelehoski has a major work on view in HVCCA’s main exhibition, Peekskill Project V: The New Hudson River School, through July 28. Hardy and Mulvaney participated in Peekskill Project V’s Downtown Windows, a joint project with the Peekskill BID that featured 15 art installations sited in the City of Peekskill for the month of December.
Another Peekskill Project V artist, Asya Resnikov, recently joined Peekskill Artist Club when she relocated to Croton-on-Hudson. Although too recent to participate in this exhibition, HVCCA will feature five of Resnikov’s works as part of Peekskill Project V programming in HVCCA’s Video Room from Feb. 8 through March 3, with an artist talk on Sunday, Feb. 10 at 4 p.m. and a reception to follow.
HVCCA is located at 1701 Main St. in Peekskill and is open Friday 11 a.m. – 5 p.m., Saturday and Sunday 12 – 6 p.m., and Tuesday through Thursday by appointment. For more information, contact HVCCA at 914-788-0100 or [email protected] or visit their website, hvcca.org.
