SARAH SMALL

Sarah was born into a family of musicians, writers, and psychoanalysts. She spent her young childhood concocting gibberish sounds and songs around the house, dancing, and playing cello. She became enraptured by photography when she was thirteen. Small spent her high school years photographing her close friends and her younger red-headed sister, Rachel, wandering the streets of her hometown, Washington DC, equipped with her Pentax K1000.

After graduating from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2001, Small moved to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where she currently resides. Small’s photography and performances have since appeared in Vogue, LIFE, Rolling Stone, and The New York Times, The New Yorker, and have been shown in galleries throughout the United States, as well as in China, Taiwan, Korea, Madrid, Hungary, Germany, France, Italy, Great Britain, Australia, and the Netherlands. In 2008, Small was named by American Photo Magazine as one of the top 13 emerging photographers working today.

In partnership with creative and social enterprise Contaminate NYC, Small and her team are producing a Global Tour of her Tableau Vivant of The Delirium Constructions performance, with the associated hybrid documentary/fiction film expected to release late 2015.

Small sings and composes vocal scores with her two a cappella trios, Black Sea Hotel and Hydra, born from collaborations with Tableau’s musical director Rima Fand and vocalist Yula Be’eri. Black Sea Hotel has appeared on NPR, topping charts on iTunes International, and recently, late 2013, has released their second album, The Forest is Shaking and Swaying. Also in late 2013, Small released to the public a decade of vocal and instrumental soundscape sketches (project currently entitled Jessica Brainstorm), which to date has been a private escapade; Small is currently searching out collaborators to refine and produce this material.  

Most recently, Small has become unexpectedly enraptured with film acting while collaborating with friend and director, Josephine Decker, as lead actress in her fantasy/horror psychological thriller, "Butter on the Latch". Sarah is currently pursuing other such thrilling acting opportunities.

At home in her neighborhood in East Williamsburg, Small is renovating a four-car garage in into a photography+film studio, performance event space, and community center for local artists of all disciplines, expected to launch Spring 2014.

TANINO LIBERATORE. L'ingorda

SAMANTHA FRENCH Today Special

My current body of work is focused on swimmers underwater and above. Using vague yet consuming memories from my childhood summers spent immersed in the tepid lakes of northern Minnesota, I attempt to recreate the quiet tranquility of water and nature; of days spent sinking and floating, still and peaceful.

BRUNO WALPOTH-Eerie wood Sculptures-

SCOTT G BROOKS

                                                     Love Is In the Air

                       

                                                      Chosen

                                                         Family Way

       Driven By Attraction

                        Founding Fathers

                                              Nativity

                                           Proliferation

                                                      Leda and The Swan

                                           We The People

                          Food Chain

                                                   Maternal Instint

                                                         Breaking Up Is Hard

                                                      Sickness and Health

                     Strategic Negotiations

Scott G Brooks lives and works in Washington, DC. His paintings are primarily figurative, and range from simple portraiture to intricate narratives. Often using humor, he depicts scenes using social, psychological, and political issues. Anatomical distortions separate the figures from the photographic ideal, which gives him the freedom to create his own distorted reality. His work is described as twisted and offbeat, sentimental, and disturbing.

"My work, like the world and people that inhabit it, is multifaceted. Raw, uncomfortable narratives not talked about or socially acceptable attract me. Social, political, and psychological dramas play out on canvas or paper, and in the process I learn more about myself, and search for insight into what motivated those around me.

There is the facet that is voyeuristic. I intrude and invite the viewer to intrude as well. I peek behind closed doors, into the hidden lives, and private moments of my subjects. Delving into the psyche and physical appearance of the subject being represented, I examine them up close, and then expose them for everyone to examine for themselves.

Humor is important, and used both as a means to an end, and as an end in itself. It softens the blow of tragic circumstances, or creates a sense of irony. Humor draws people in, an endearing quality in otherwise uncomfortable circumstances. The resulting juxtaposition of humor and tragedy often causes confusion and anger. Even in my most severe pieces, humor exists on some level, if only as a reminder not to take ourselves too seriously.

My work is figurative. It is accessible and facilitates communication. It’s an understandable language, and like dance, a narrative is created without words. The stories told in the infinite number of faces, gestures, and bodies I see around me are inspiring and provide me with an endless supply of source material to work from.

Anatomical distortions emerge at the earliest stages in the process, separating the figures from the photographic ideal. The abstraction allows me to get up close and create my own reality. Without the distractions of perfect anatomy, I explore the figure, shape and light on my own terms. The distortions I apply to the figures are recognizable, but more familiar in a different context.

Through my work I strive to understand and create a dialog with the world around me. I present to the viewer my interpretations of what I see and understand as truthful."

Scott G. Brooks