Downtown Gallery
Related Events:
GIVE IT UP OR TURN IT LOOSE: Drawing Your Inside Out
A new-new age drawing workshop with artist Scott Hewicker
Thursday, June 23, 2022, 10 a.m. – 1 p.m.
Samek Art Museum Downtown Gallery,
416 Market St. Lewisburg, PA, 17837
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Do The Hustle with visual artist Cliff Hengst
June 23, 2022, 7 p.m.
Iron Front Event Space
434 Market St #301, Lewisburg, PA 17837
The Samek Art Museum is excited to bring visual artist Cliff Hengst to Lewisburg to install his exhibition You Never Know at our Downtown Gallery. Learn to Do The Hustle with Cliff Hengst, get a sneak peek at the exhibition before it opens. No dancing knowledge is required as Cliff wants to show you how to bust a move. After our dance party, a reception will follow in the Samek’s Downtown Gallery.
Curatorial Text:
Cliff Hengst is an artist, author, performer, and joker. His visual style makes use of underground cartoons, graffiti and street art, folk art, retro commercial graphics, drag culture and a thrift store aesthetic. Rooted in art communities of the San Francisco Bay Area since the 1980s, the tone of Cliff’s work echoes the tragedy of the AIDS epidemic, queer activism, and absurdist theater.
Cliff creates portraits of communities that portray their concerns and betray their foibles in the tradition of the classic satirists – but he is never cruel. His use of cast-off materials and DIY technique makes even charged political topics seem human and approachable. His pop culture references read as campy in a way that seems sincere instead of snarky – so the humor in his work connects rather than rends.
Cliff’s work is not mean, but it has teeth; his art is comedic and surgically incisive in ways that make me believe he may be one of the most serious jokers since M. Duchamp.
– Richard Rinehart, director, Samek Art Museum
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