The Gagosian Gallery in Beverly Hills, recently held an exhibition showcasing photographs and sculpture by filmmaker John Waters. Entitled, Rear Projection, the name is derived from the term as used to describe a special film effect in which a background is projected onto a screen behind actors in the studio. This now dated method began in the 1930s, showing characters driving in cars and scenes when motion, without variability, was necessary. For this show, Waters photographed and edited scenes from existing films. He manipulates his photos in a way that exploits general perceptions of Hollywood. For example, Children Who Smoke, presents us with child stars, like Shirley Temple, with a cigarette in their mouths. The bizarre humor and satire we expect from Waters is present in the subject matter and perspective of these works.

John Waters was born, raised, and inspired by the city of Baltimore, where his films are still shot on location. He has become a cult figure in the film community. Waters has always insisted on addressing taboo subjects like sexuality, drugs, and religion, in what some may call a callous manner. His most popular films include Pink Flamingos (1972), Hairspray (1988), and more recently Pecker (1998).

Marion Peck‘s first solo show in New York, entitled Ladies & Clowns, is currently on view at Sloan Fine Art on Rivington Street. While the exhibition’s title isn’t the most subtle, it’s a good indicator for what you’re getting into with Marion Peck’s new paintings. The darkly comedic renderings of jovially surrealist scenes, including lederhosen -donning peasants dancing and art history referencing portraits of ladies, are both whimsical and highly disturbing. If you’re one of the many Americans who list clowns high atop your list of fears, then you’ll surely feel a chill down your spine seeing Peck’s sad clowns wandering around Northern Renaissance-invoking landscapes or frowning pie-eyed in portraits. Ladies & Clowns is on view through June 13th.

Marion Peck earned her BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and did MFA studies at Syracuse University in New York and Temple University in Rome, Italy. Her work has been exhibited internationally, including at La Luz de Jesus Gallery in Los Angeles, Mondo Bizzarro Gallery in Rome, Galerie de Magda Danysz in Paris and Davidson Galleries in Seattle. She currently lives in Eagle Rock, CA.

On view at David Patton Gallery in Los Angeles until May 30, is Jeff Jamieson’s latest exhibition, Sculpture. This marks the second solo show at the gallery for the San Luis Obispo based artist. Both Jamieson’s history and the history of sculpture are visually present in the works, reminding the viewer of the importance of the past.

Opposing forces are at work, the artist juxtaposes the unique attitude of West Coast art with that of the East Coast. Jamieson currently lives and works in California, but was once an assistant to Donald Judd and a maker of Judd furniture. Together, these experiences have shaped his approach and method. The presentation of these clean-lined sculptures resting on the floor recalls that of Judd’s later, renowned minimalist work. Jamieson’s choice of material includes wood and metals like the minimalists, but departs in his choice of color, employing intense blues and yellows. Minimalism sought to present forms as a whole, or unit, while these pieces suggest the human form, and emphasize its parts. The artist’s process intentionally reveals a hand-made quality, without drawing attention to the fact. The pieces are situated in a manner that urges the viewer to investigate the surrounding space, and ultimately themselves.

The opening for 1000 DAYS in Culver City was huge success last night. Thank you to all of the people that came out to show their support for DailyServing.com. Below are just a few images from the show. Visit the Scion Space website over the next few days for a full list of installation and opening night images. Here’s to the next 1000 days!!

-Seth Curcio

Publisher / Editor, DailyServing.com

Opening tonight at the Scion Installation Space in Culver City, CA is the DailyServing exhibition 1000 DAYS. In the exhibition, painter Caleb Weintraub will present 3 large-scale paintings and two small sculptures, which feature his signature surreal narrative. This work along with the others are not to be missed. If you are in the Los Angeles area this evening, please join us for the opening!!

In the world of a Weintraub painting, it is clear that something has gone terribly wrong. Stern-faced, costume adorned children run rampant with no apparent boundaries, tracking down the last remaining adults and turning them into wall-mounted trophies of the hunt. Weintraub explores potentials for the future of humanity through large-scale hyper-colored narrative paintings, which are saturated with information and describe a world where morals have fallen and children act without consequence.

In Weintraub’s new body of work, the children are up against a new enemy, paint itself. The new piles of paint are presented as an amorphous blob, which act as proto-versions of the children as well as a metaphor for the state of painting itself, in its death or perhaps its afterlife.

The artist is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and is currently an assistant professor of painting and drawing at Indiana University. He has completed recent several solo exhibitions including, Whatever Shall We Do With These Piles and Piles of Paint at the Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, All the Way Home at Projects Gallery in Philadelphia and Cloudy With a Chance of Apocalypse at Jack the Pelican Presents in Brooklyn, NY. Weintraub will participate in an upcoming group show titledSigns of the Apocalypse/Rapture this summer at Hyde Park Art Center in Chicago.

Opening tomorrow evening in Culver City, CA is the DailyServing curated exhibition 1000 DAYS. Artist Matt Phillips will present 3 large scale paintings in the show, representing sound through the medium of painting. In the painting shown below, titled Guitar, the artist creates an oscillating mathematical rhythm, creating the illusion of movement as the patterns collide in the center of the work.

Phillips approaches painting and collage as both object and illusion, often creating images that explore the relationship between light and sound. The artist’s work synthesizes information into an entirely graphic language, starting with the formal concerns of surface, composition, color and tension, while introducing a range of subtle contemporary references and symbols. The resulting works unite a methodology, which folds the formal concerns of Modernist painting into the intimacy of folk art.

Since completing his MFA at Boston University in 2007, Phillips has exhibited works at Mehr gallery, Place Space Gallery and Jack the Pelican Presents, in New York City. He has also exhibited with Redux Contemporary Art Center in Charleston, SC and SPACE Gallery in Portland, Maine. The artist currently teaches painting at Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts.

Julie Henson‘s drawings explore the breadth of religious extremism in the Southern United States. The Charleston, South Carolina native examines historically significant religious rituals and the ways in which the modern South maintains these practices. The work often depicts subjects united in spiritual ecstasy, while undergoing the transcendent religious acts of holding snakes, placing one’s hands in fire, speaking in tongues and the laying of hands for miraculous healing. As a Southerner, the artist tracks both religious and historical traditions that merge to construct a long history, which is full of dark secrets and strong bonds.

Henson is a graduate of the School of the Arts at the College of Charleston and is an MFA candidate at the California College of the Arts. Her work will be featured in the upcoming issue of Beautiful/Decay Magazine. She has exhibited throughout the Southeast, including several shows with Redux Contemporary Art Center.