Thursday January 22, 7pm
Artist Talk: Pop Forum
In conversation with Tracy Grayson
In-Person and Live-Streamed
Livestream from Microscope
The artist talk starts at 7:10pm ET. If not visible, please reload the page.
Q&A with the audience
Microscope is very pleased to present a conversation between artists Pop Forum and Tracy Grayson in connection with Pop Forum’s current solo exhibition at the gallery “I Wonder About Us Folks,” which is on view through Saturday January 24th.
The talk will focus on Pop Forum’s new series of paintings PSA (Public Service Announcement) in the show, which the artist describes as “a kind of cultural dispatch: part confession, part indictment, part warning.” Using as a starting point original photographs by the artist of real-life moments or choreographed scenes, the realistic, painterly oil paintings – inspired by the Dutch Masters, especially Frans Hals – offer social commentary through poignant compositions that do not shy away from implicating the artist as well.
Admission is free. The live-stream from the gallery will appear on this page on our website. No registration is required.
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Pop Forum is a painter whose work fuses figuration, text, and cultural critique to examine the intersections of race, politics, sexuality, and desire. Formerly working under the name Ibn Kendall, he has developed a visual language that draws equally from advertising, pornography, propaganda, and art history, distilling the noise of contemporary life into scenes that are both intimate and confrontational. His work has been exhibited internationally, with solo presentations at Ambacher Contemporary, Munich, Germany and NY Studio Gallery, New York, NY and group exhibitions at Exit Art , New York, NY, Amerika Haus, Munich, Germany, and 440 Gallery (Brooklyn), among others. Pop Forum is a working artist based in the New York City area. Born in Brooklyn, New York, he earned his BFA from the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, PA where he completed his undergraduate studies in fine art.
Tracy Grayson is a painter living and working in Brooklyn, New York. His work explores relationships between nature, technology, and economic systems through formal questions regarding representation and abstraction. After receiving a B.F.A. from UCLA, he had his first one-person exhibition at White Columns in 1985. Grayson’s work has been included in numerous solo and group shows, most recently at BravinLee Programs. He is the recipient of a New York Foundation in the Arts award.
