PREVIEW: Beacon @ Gauntlet Gallery [SF]

Back in March we posted a preview for a group art exhibit titled 12×12 that was hosted by Gauntlet Gallery in San Francisco.  This year was the third annual installment of the show and the concept behind it was fairly simple, a selection of artists were given the freedom to produce a piece of visual art utilizing the medium and subject matter of their choosing, as long as it stayed within the required 12-inch by 12-inch dimensions.  Is that a lazy approach to creating a “themed” art exhibit, especially one that is now being promoted as an annual event?  Not really.  As I stated in the preview for that show, the approach is actually incredibly refreshing.  Rather, what I said, specifically, was “By focusing too much on themes when group exhibits are assembled, it makes for great marketing hype, but it doesn’t always provide enough of an opportunity for many of these up-and-coming artists to present their own voices unfiltered and it can pigeonhole them into the operating within unnecessary parameters.”  I like the simple structure behind the 12×12 exhibit additionally, because smaller pieces aren’t buried under the more massive or instantly more eye-catching and flashy ones; they are all presented in equal scale.  It provides a focus to work within, but it takes the chains off, so to speak, allowing the artists to present works that are still quintessentially themselves, not simply relying on interpretations of pop-culture themes and the like to be heard or noticed.

This Saturday, September 12th, Gauntlet Gallery will be presenting another group exhibit with a foundation built on a similar spirit.  This new show will bring together 30 different artists, some of which were featured in 12×12, all creating work inspired by a simple word/term, which is also the title of the show: “Beacon.”  This simple guide/reference is enough to loosely unite the pieces, while each of the individual interpretations of that theme is enough to allow for some genuine variety and range to be presented through these pieces without muting the voice of their creators.

The gallery elaborates:

“We are pleased to present a group exhibit titled BEACON in our G1 space at Gauntlet Gallery. We have hand selected thirty of our favorite artists to create new work with the loose guideline of the word BEACON to steer them in their creative process. In doing so, each artists has created a unique vision through their work that exemplifies hope, warning, celebration, and guidance.”

ARTIST LIST:

Aaron Nagel, Adam Ziskie, Alec Huxley, Alex Garant, Bec Winnel, Bennett Slater, Bri Cirel, Chris Curtis, Daniel Segrove, David Cooley, Emilio Villalba, Famous When Dead, Graham Curran, Hilary White, Hollis Brown Thornton, Ian Reynold, Jason Thielke, Johannah O’Donnell, Kieran Collins, Lie, Martine Johanna, Matthew Grabelsky, Michael McConnell, Rebecca Adams, Sean Norvet, Syd Bee, Tom Bagshaw, & Trey Barnett.

Check out preview images for the exhibit below the following event details…

WHAT:

Beacon
Group Exhibit

WHEN:

Opening:
Saturday, September 12th
7:30pm-10pm

WHERE:

Gauntlet Gallery (G1)
1040 Larkin St,
San Francisco, California 94109

ADDITIONAL INFO:

Opening is ALL AGES w/NO COVER
Show on view until Saturday, October 3rd
Gallery hours: Tues – Sat. noon – 6pm
Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/770030603114687/