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Beginning in the 1950s, the New York School represented a multi-discipline movement that shifted the focus of the art world from France to America. Influenced by surrealism and the Russian Avant Garde, poets, jazz musicians, Action Painters (such as Willem de Kooning) and Abstract Expressionists painters (such as Jackson Pollock) constituted the core of this group.

While exploring different themes, materials and techniques, the New York School’s manifesto was one of freedom of individual expression.

Co-curated by Chip Tom and John Friedman, the artworks of these five young artists weave a similar tale showcasing the works of a new generation which is experimenting with bold media combinations while investigating poignant emotional and universal terrain.

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Samuel T. Adams

Samuel T. Adams’ work is a gesture of representation and a culmination of imaginative imagery.

His paintings are unique in their realization of familiar, yet strangely obscure ideas, powerfully hinting at the significance found in natural disaster, moral irresponsibility as well as the concepts of judgment and identity.

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When the Levee Breaks, 2007 Ink, Acrylic, and Acetate on Panel 55 x 48 x 2 in.

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Peter Gerakaris

Peter Gerakaris explores themes of nature and culture through his pictorial approach to painting and drawing. He constantly presents the viewer with new perspectives relating to their personal relationship with the natural world. Using oil paints and contemporary mediums, his surreal visions of reprocessed cosmologies are vibrantly displayed.

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Floating Garden (Royal Reception), 2008 Gouache, Pen and Ink on Paper 80 x 80 in.

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Krisjanis Kaktins-Gorsline

Krisjanis Kaktins-Gorsline focuses on the production of figurative oil paintings through a process of psychic auditing and intuitive exploration. It is his intention to short circuit painting’s traditional appeal towards transcendence, yet remain serious in the technicality of production and the conceptual exploration behind his work.

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Untitled, 2008 Oil on Canvas 60 x 48 in.

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Jessica Mein

Jessica Mein’s videos and drawings are strongly influenced by personal childhood memories.

Her exploration of the physicality in the digital medium helps to express these experiences as obsessive, repetitive actions juxtaposed against the effect of slowing time. She is continually recognized as an innovative contemporary artist, able to penetrate the realm of normalcy into a distorting synthesis of excessive detail.

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Escada Caracol II, 2007 Ink and Collage (Video Stills) on Paper 38 x 26 in.

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Alyssa Pheobus

Alyssa Pheobus’ graphite drawings present bold interpretations of explicit text, song lyrics and poetry representative of the rural Americana subculture and the harshness found in feminine subjectivity. Her aggressive black typefaces and barbed scar-like motifs offer a macabre rendering of the traditional craft of embroidery; forcibly present the viewing public with blatant masculine projections of phallic desire.

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I’m on Fire II (Hey Little Girl), 2008 Graphite on Cotton Rag Paper 37 x 70 in.

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ARTIST BIOGRAPHIES Samuel T. Adams

Jessica Mein

EDUCATION MFA candidate, School of Visual Arts, New York, NY BFA Columbus College of Art and Design, Columbus, Ohio; Magna Cum Laude

EDUCATION MFA Hunter College, New York, NY BFA Duke University; Durham, NC

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS 2006 Personified Assemblage, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts Gallery 51; North Adams, MA 2005 Drawing as a Catalyst, Coffman Art Gallery, University of Minnesota; Minneapolis, MN 2004 Press, Push, Pull, Contemporary Artists Center; North Adams, MA

Peter Gerakaris

Alyssa Pheobus

EDUCATION BFA College of Architecture, Art & Planning, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY

EDUCATION MFA Columbia University, New York, NY BA Yale University, New Haven, CT

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS 2007 Natural Selection, Kathleen Cullen Fine Arts Project Space, New York, NY 2007 Spectrumorphosis, Wave Hill Glyndor Gallery Project Space, New York, NY

Krisjanis Kaktins-Gorsline EDUCATION MFA Columbia University BFA Honours, Double Major: Painting/Video, University of Manitoba SELECTED EXHIBITIONS 2007 A Warmer Lot, Katharine Mulherin Contemporary Art Projects,Toronto 2006 Myoclonic Jerks, Katharine Mulherin Contemporary Art Projects,Toronto

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SELECTED EXHIBITIONS 2008 Simon Preston Gallery, New York, NY 2007 Hunter MFA Thesis Show, New York, NY

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS 2009 Bellwether Gallery, New York, NY 2008 Columbia MFA Thesis Exhibition, Fisher Landau Center for Art, Long Island City, NY