upcoming grant deadline: 05/15/2024

upcoming grant deadline: 05/15/2024

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Two exhibitions by photographer Lori Waselchuk

Portrait of Lisa Barkley

AIRSpace Gallery and 40th St. Artists-In-Residence Studios, (4007 Chestnut Street), is proud to present two exhibitions by photographer Lori Waselchuk (LTA '14) based on her current documentary project, Them That Do, an ongoing portrait series and multimedia project about the Philadelphia’s block captains. AIRSpace Gallery will show Block Party, an exhibition of new work by Lori Waselchuk, October 11 – November 1. In conjunction with her solo show, Waselchuk created the public art exhibit, Windowishes, resulting from a two-month collaboration with five Philadelphia block captains and one block leader. Windowishes is a site-specific installation created for the storefront display windows on the west side of S. 40th Street, between Chestnut and Ludlow Streets in West Philadelphia. The six collaborators and Waselchuk will install a small environment in each of the bay windows inspired by their community stewardship and neighborhood histories. The block leaders and captains - Lisa Barkely, Mary Campbell, Carol Dubie, Freda Egnal, Elizabeth Waring, Renée McBride-Williams - will incorporate images collected and shot for the installations, personal and archival photographs, neighborhood objects, furniture, props and craftwork made by the participants.

Windowishes is truly a community project. Many hands, young and old, from the West Philadelphia community will have contributed to the displays. The children of Dubie’s block on S. 46th Street made flags for her display, “Legends of the Block”. Teens from Waring’s block of Powelton Avenue helped design and construct a four-foot tree for her display, “Our Trees”. Gordon Richardson, of Oberholtzer Custom Cabinetry, has donated time, expertise and materials as the project’s engineer and carpenter. Community organizations like the University City Arts League and Spruce Hill Civic Association supported the project as well.  Lori Waselchuk also received a Project Stream award from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.

A reception in the AIRSpace Gallery will celebrate the opening of both exhibitions, Friday, October 16th from 5:30pm to 8:30pm. Lori is a 2015 POST artist and her exhibitions will be on view during the Philadelphia Open Studio Tours October 17 and 18 from noon to 6:00pm.

Lori is a 2015 New Courtland Artist Fellow, a recipient of the 2014 Leeway Foundation’s Transformation Award, the 2012 Pew Fellowship for the Arts, the Aaron Siskind Foundation’s 2009 Individual Photographer Fellowship, a 2008 Distribution Grant from the Documentary Photography Project of the Open Society Institute, the 2007 PhotoNOLA Review Prize, and the 2004 Southern African Gender and Media Award for Photojournalism. Waselchuk was also a nominee for the 2009 Santa Fe Prize for Photography, a finalist in the 2008 Aperture West Book Prize.

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