The only predictable thing about the annual
No Dead Artists expo
at the Jonathan Ferrara Gallery is that it is always unpredictable. One
never knows exactly what to expect, and this 19th iteration is no
exception. Although many of the memes, themes and tropes rooted in the
theory-based art of recent decades are sometimes, if not always
obviously, evident, many of the works by the twelve artists selected by
this year's jurors defy easy categorization and provide us with a
provocative intermingling of paradox and continuity. This is as it
should be, because
No Dead Artists functions as a combined
thermometer, barometer and seismometer that measures the vital signs
lurking below the art world's glossy, if often opaque, surfaces. As one
of the premier emerging artist venues,
No Dead Artists can be
oracular if occasionally arcane, and has proven over the decades that
its featured participants have had something significant, even
portentous, to contribute to the broader art world discourse at large.

Culled
from over 2500 art works submitted by over 500 artists, the over 40
works on view reflect something of the paradoxical nature of the present
moment, an epoch of digital atomization, conflicting subcurrents and
the shifting sands of individual and group identities. All of the above
can be seen in the colored pencil paintings of Michelle Ramin, top, who
has her subjects--fellow millennials, for the most part--wear ski masks
as she depicts them in playful, prosaic or poetic situations. Although
most appear to be West Coast, garden variety hipsters, slackers and the
like, their ski masks give them a sinister aura reminiscent of bank
robbers, or vintage terrorists, though her nudes can sometimes suggest
kinky parlor games. But the masks are more about the survival games
millennials play, and underlying it all are the not so subtle hints of a
generation adrift in an age of socio-economic uncertainty.Michelle Ramin, top, who has her subjects--fellow millennials, for
the most part--wear ski masks as she depicts them in playful, prosaic or
poetic situations. Although most appear to be West Coast, garden
variety hipsters, slackers and the like, their ski masks give them a
sinister aura reminiscent of bank robbers, or vintage terrorists, though
her nudes can sometimes suggest kinky parlor games. But the masks are
more about the survival games millennials play, and underlying it all
are the not so subtle hints of a generation adrift in an age of
socio-economic uncertainty.

All of which makes for a striking contrast with the more medieval
looking maskers in Herb Roe's meticulous paintings of the annual
Courir de Mardi Gras
festivities that take place in the rural Cajun hinterlands of southwest
Louisiana. Here harlequinesque men on horseback wear traditional
homemade costumes as they playfully reenact medieval French shrovetide
rituals passed along from time immemorial in rites that date
back to the Lupercalia and Saturnalia festivals of ancient Rome. What Roe and
Ramin share in common is a psychological sensibility expressed via
deftly executed modes of figurative realism.
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