SPIRIT IN THE DARK:
A group exhibit at Prism Arts Philadelphia
Join as we celebrate with the soulful dj vinyltap215
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
EPHRAIM ASILI is an internationally-acclaimed artist, filmmaker, DJ and traveler, whose work focuses on the African diaspora as a cultural force. Often inspired by his day-to-day wanderings, Asili creates art that situates itself as a series of meditations of the everyday. His 16mm film American Hunger (19 minutes) will screen on a continuous loop throughout the duration of this show. The film oscillates between the Odunde street festival in Philadelphia, the slave forts and capital city of Ghana, and the New Jersey shore—exploring the relationships between personal experience and collective histories. In addition to the film loop, Spirit In The Dark will exhibit Ephraim Asili’s book Measuring Time, which compiles the artist’s Polaroid photographs, collages, plus a vinyl record (45 RPM, 7-inch) which he produced and inserted into the back cover. There will be a listening session of this record in the gallery on May 3, 2024 at 9:00 PM. Asili’s work is in the permanent collection at Whitney Museum Of American Art. He is Director of the Film and Electronic Arts Program at Bard College.
MAKEBA “KEEBS” RAINEY is a Harlem-native, self-taught, accomplished artist, and best known for her digital collage portraits of contemporary and historical Black icons. The entrance to Spirit In The Dark will display two, different digital collage portraits of Aretha Franklin, by KEEBS. Guardian angels. Her creative practice focuses on building community. For her, community is an extension of family. By centering her work around social justice, specifically in regard to Black Americans, community becomes the key to liberation. Her artwork merges “the old” with “the new” by re-envisioning the ancestors through new media, and creating space for young creatives to build and sustain themselves. KEEBS is the 2020 Creative Action Fund Awardee, along with the Create Change Fellow in 2017 with the Laundromat Project, a 2018 member of Vox Populi gallery in Philadelphia, a 2018 CFEVA Fellow, a 2018 Season III NARS resident Artist, and an Absolut Art artist. Spirit In The Dark will be a farewell sendoff for KEEBS, who announced that she is leaving Philadelphia, PA after 10 years, and moving to The Gambia in West Africa. This will be her last show before leaving Philadelphia.
ANTHONY CARLOS MOLDEN will install light sculptures from his series Love Light In Flight, which recently showed inside Philadelphia International Airport. Light is an integral component to Molden’s sculptures. Embedding illumination adds both color and motion to the pieces. Light brings the work to life. Molden creates totem-like reliefs by repurposing found materials, sourced from construction sites, trash piles, and tips from his community about available debris. Calling it “creative cleanup,” he instills discarded items with renewed energy. Inspired by the ancestors, he is influenced by the materials themselves—the textures, shapes, and forms. Molden’s sculptures are meant to stimulate peoples’ wonder and spiritual centers, while offering an artistic blessing for safe travel. The artist lives and works in the Germantown section of Philadelphia.
In KARA MSHINDA’s household growing up, magazines like Ebony, Jet, Essence, and Black Enterprise held a certain sacredness. For Mshinda, they were artifacts of Black American material culture. Through adolescence, she did not recognize their aesthetic and titular value as objects of socialization. As an adult, she realized the content was partly illusory, partly suggestive, and did not wholly reflect her identity. Part of Mshinda’s process as an artist and visual anthropologist is to disrupt familiar, visual narratives and create new ones. The artist combines free-hand drawing with photographs. She also uses alternative photography methods like scanography and collage to create reconstructed images. These materials and techniques enable Mshinda to shift the focus for a viewer. Her current work involves digitally scanning overlapping transparencies of Polaroids, film negatives, self-portraits, and photographs. Kara Mshinda is currently part of the artist-in-residence program at Cherry Street Pier in Philadelphia. She is also Adjunct Professor Temple University, Tyler School Of Art.
JON ECKEL has been painting consistently for the last 25 years. His recent series of paintings Inner-Outer Space, was created through tumultuous times. This work focuses on vast, open space, color-field, minimal abstraction, futurism, and strong, sharp color. There are no overt references to the pandemic period. However, these dream-like, surrealist paintings explore the impact of our “new reality” on the artist’s visual language. His work is included in many public and private collections, including the permanent collection of the Woodmere Art Museum, the U.S. State Department Art Bank Program and the Ballinglen Contemporary Museum of Art in Ireland. The artist is also an emerging musician, member of Greene Street Artists Cooperative in Germantown, Philadelphia, and Assistant Director at Dolan/Maxwell, a gallery in the Rittenhouse section of Philadelphia.
ALBA JULIAO was born and raised in Panamá, She left for Miami, FL to pursue her BFA, then Seattle, WA, then Queens, NY, and now she calls Philadelphia home. Each move fueled her curiosity. Over the past decade and a half, Juliao has delved into visual storytelling—photography, film, and alternative printing/processing. Yet, it feels like just the beginning. She aims to ignite wonder and exploration through her lens, offering diverse perspectives that challenge, inspire, and dazzle. Whether understood, enjoyed, critiqued, or fascinated, creating shared experiences that transcend boundaries fulfills the artist. Her work conveys mystery, subtlety and haunting beauty.
JESSE GLOCKNER is an emerging local Philadelphia artist and musician, from three generations of artists. Painter, sculptor, multi-instrumentalist, videographer, model, mystic, and more. He makes mammoth-sized oil paintings, with bright colors, and stark darkness. Having survived a near-death experience, his paintings explore the duality of hyper-bliss and total dread. Emerging from a coma, then bed-ridden for over a year, he defied the doctors’ grave expectations. This experience crystallized his focus on connection and compassion. Jesse Glockner is a light that escaped serious darkness. His spirit epitomizes the collective Spirit In The Dark.
MARMAR collages with gouache paint, drawing tools, rubber cement, and various cut-outs, from a life-long collection of found papers. The process is to pick up the pieces and make a new piece. These selections are part of an ongoing series Gods & Demons. This recent set of artwork was inspired by a real-life encounter with a fire-breathing demon. The creative procedure that emerged behind this project became integral to survival during dark times, while navigating powerful energy. Gods & Demons references internal and external forces, communicating with the spirits and visioning unseen worlds. Bluring lines between lifeforms. Timeless, ancient, futuristic, alien-like, mysterious, and haunting portraits. There is an endless fascination with the contrast between bright light amid endless darkness. For inspiration, Gods & Demons is fueled by Aretha Franklin’s song Spirit In The Dark, which guided the curation of this show.
Open to public
Private appt only May 11th - May 30th
Final day open to catch this wonderful exhibit will be during the closing reception Friday May 31st, 5.30pm - 9.30 pm. Join as we celebrate with the soulful dj vinyltap215