BOX SOCIAL underground comics exhibition
October 6 through November 8
At Secret Project Robot 210 Kent Avenue, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, NY 11211, at the very end of Metropolitan Avenue, on the water
Opening reception on October 6th from 6 - 10.
Secret Project Robot is a gallery space located in Monster Island, a converted warehouse building located right on the waterfront at Kent Avenue, in Williamsburg Brooklyn. It houses several arts organizations and hosts regular exhibitions and events.
Rachel and Eric, the partner directors of the space, are kind enough and enthusiastic enough to hand over one room for our show/experiment.
Please see the Secret Project Robot mission statement to better understand the honorable social, community and cultural considerations and their ideals concerning the current arts environment as it relates to consumerism, capitalism and democracy.
Our group is made up of a small cluster of comics artists/creators who steadily produce our individual works, keep seperate day and night jobs, attend classes, teach and often struggle to make a decent living in a city which is becoming increasingly decadent and expensive. It is hard to keep on top of new comics, art, books, movies as everything is becoming more expensive. We are luckily, currently in the early stages of a new golden age of printed matter; comics and graphic novels being one driving force in this locomotive of mass production of the written word, the drawn image, the photograph, the essay, the short story and so forth. The sheer volume of new material in the form of magazines, newspapers, and books of every conceivable genre, which flow in and out of towns and cities every day is staggering. We have seen an impressive increase of available comics titles at the large bookstores and an equally impressive availability of graphic novels, artists books, experimental books, and reprints at small, local arts centered shops. We have the forum now to produce, print and distribute all of the works we do, as there is an audience for every different type of work.
With this golden age of printed matter, we have wittnessed a great arts scene in New York develop over the past decade, one which embraces the outsider, the underpaid, underprivileged and the underaged. We who produce the art are the audience, the buyers, the shop keepers and gallery owners. It is a kind of community and time which is reminiscent of an era when folks were willing to barter, contribute to a common cause, give away possesions and so forth. The great 60's comes to mind. The arts being produced represent all media and mediums and some forgotten and overlooked materials are being used in great ways. The raising of drawing to a high place in the arts world within the past 7 or so years has contributed to the acceptance and notoriety of many young artists and their work. Comics has risen with drawing to become a sought after, cool, collected form of expression which tells a story with words and pictures. People are seeing this for the first time and getting hooked.
The purpose of the Box Social underground and self published comics exhibition is to celebrate all that is happening in the vibrant, vital community and self made industry of self published comics*.
We consider this event a kind of open mind of the artist and writer, a democratic forum. This is an opportunity for aspiring creators and respected artists alike to present work, sell books, discuss finer points with fellow creators and to participate in the first Box Social gathering.
Those good folks who would like to contribute work, books for sale and display, posters, prints etc., please contact us at the email addresses given below. After the first contact we will send out a message which explains the process of getting work to the space, having it shipped, paid for, and having it returned safe and sound.
*Self published comics is a general term which I use as a way to sum up a kind of movement of creators who seek to fully control the direction of their work and get small print runs of books out to people quickly and inexpensively with photocopies, hand prints and other self produced methods. Self published comics artists are also known for producing and distributing "Mini comics" which are very small books printed on plain photocopy paper often.____________________________________________________________________________________
Curators>>
Jason Estrin fraspin1@hotmail.com
Sarah Glidden sarahglidden@gmail.com
Julia Wertz juliawertz@hotmail.com
Ronald Davis Brandt ronaldpdbrandt@gmail.com
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Contributing artists/writers/creators>>
