Implications of Nature

Contemporary Performance Art by: Nyugen E Smith, Essi Kausalainen, John Bonafede, Rebecca Jampol, Sindy Butz

Friday, May 4 9:00 Doors 9:30 Performances $10 Donation

Essi Kausalainen {Finland]

Essi Kausalainen (b.1979) has studied performance art and – theory in Turku Arts Academy (BA) and in the Theatre Academy of Finland (MA). Since 2000 her solo performances have been shown in international festivals and events such as Co-Lab (with Alastair MacLennan / Savvy Contemporary, Berlin 2011), ACTS (Contemporary Arts Museum, Roskilde 2011), Extensions –series (Grimmuseum, Berlin 2010), Open –festival (Beijing 2009), 7a*11d (Toronto 2008), Ensemble of Women (Santiago de Chile 2007), Future of Imagination #3 (Singapore 2006), and The National Rewiev of Live Art (Glasgow 2004).

John Bonafede [NYC]

John Bonafede was born in Long island, NY and began taking art seriously at a young age. Attending the New York State Summer School of the arts program in high school, Bonafede went on to study fine arts at Syracuse University. He then attended School of Visual Arts in New York City and studied a semester of painting abroad in Barcelona’s LLOTJA. He attended post BFA classes at Parsons School of Design (Book Making) and Tibet House (Tangkha Painting). He also studied Chinese Language at China Institute in Manhattan.

Nyugen E. Smith [Jersey City, NJ]

Nyugen E. Smith was born in Jersey City, NJ in 1976 to a Trinidadian mother and Haitian father. He spent his formative years growing up in his mother’s homeland-a tropical, former British colony where African customs and traditions are still woven in to the cultural fabric. Upon moving back to the United States to live with his mother, he and his brother were often taken to dance performances, art galleries, museums, Jazz concerts, and other cultural events which celebrated Black Heritage. This exposure would later prove itself to have been essential to Smith’s current artistic investigations.

Rebecca Jampol [Newark, NJ]

Rebecca Jampol runs the Solo(s) Project House in Newark, and has begun making Performance Art: ABOUT The Solo(s) Project House The original Latin and Greek roots of PROJECT mean “something that comes before anything else happens”, and that is precisely what Solo(s) Project House is in a nutshell; evolving projects around a completed one. A space where gallery and studio are elbow to elbow, where the rigors of creation are coupled with the satisfaction of completion. The gallery is a sound stage upon which the house residents can imagine their months of creativity displayed from beginning to end. A true partner in the exhibit process, the artists are commissioned with a curatorial role that gives the visitor a 360 degree view of the creators vision. Far from an original white walled space, SPH is a home for experimental installations, avante-garde performance art and a myriad of media art. With an ever evolving pool of artists from various cultural and personal experiences SPH is a true melting pot of artistic expression.

Sindy Butz [Germany/NYC]

Sindy Butz is a Berlin based Visual and Performance Artist currently working and living in New York City. She was born in East Germany and grew up in the suburbs of East Berlin.Her artistic background is Fine Art, Art Science and Interactive Telecommunications. As a multi- media artist and sculptress she likes to initiate discourses between fashion designers, scientists, technologist and artists to conceptualize new possible collaborations within the art; science and business world. Sindy enjoys exploring her art concepts as research inquiries. She mainly creates ceramic objects surrounding the human body in Installations, Performances and Sculptures. Her main approach is the investigation of making sculptures become wearable art. Her art works are pure; fragile; perfectionist; sometimes radical and questioning. They have the ability to engage the audience and give an invitation to reflect, dream and hope.

ABOUT GRACE EXHIBITION SPACE for PERFORMANCE ART

Grace Exhibition Space, since 2006, is devoted exclusively to Performance Art. We offer an opportunity to experience visceral and challenging performance works by the current generation of international performance artists, whether emerging, mid career or established.

Being a Brooklyn loft, our events are presented on the floor, not on a stage, dissolving the boundary between artist and viewer. This is how performance art is meant to be experienced and our mission is the glorification of performance art.

“Grace Exhibition Space is the sole gallery in this city that shows specifically, in its most intentionally narrow definition, Performance Art.” Patricia Milder, The Brooklyn Rail (May, 2011)

“Through such intimate encounters between performance groups and their guests, they could follow in the spirit of Yoko Ono’s Chamber Street loft or the Surrealist soirees of Paris.” Warren Fry, The Brooklyn Rail (August, 2007)