Banner image: Le&oacute;n Valencia Currie, push/ through (detail), 2024. Ink on paper, 35mm film, bullets, prescription medication bottles, milk crate. All photos by Drew Arrieta, courtesy of Public Functionary.

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&ldquo;Prioritizing the detritus&rdquo; &mdash; the things that feel unimportant, and the sketches that didn&rsquo;t lead to anything &mdash; expands what could be potential material. A group exhibition on view at Public Functionary,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.mplsart.com/events/your-hands-were-making-artifacts-in-the-corner-of-my-mind" target="_blank">Your Hands Were Making Artifacts in the Corner of my Mind</a>, centers&nbsp;the work of artists who&nbsp;&quot;turn toward their practices as fertile soil,&quot; as the exhibition text says. While committing to daily practice and acknowledging the intense pressure to complete a work,&nbsp;&ldquo;These artists move from particular to particular, changing one&rsquo;s mind, and keeping what remains. Akin to the act of drawing, they approach their work not founded in logic but made up of contingencies, paradoxes, stray parts, and overflow.&rdquo;&nbsp;

For Public Functionary&rsquo;s five year anniversary of the PF Studios program, printmaker &amp;&nbsp;mixed media artist <a href="https://jonathanherrerastudio.com" target="_blank">Jonathan Herrera Soto</a> was invited to curate their annual group show. In addition to setting the exhibition space, Herrera Soto was a quasi curator-in-residence, visiting from New Haven, Connecticut multiple times this year to engage intensely with the 22 artists preparing for the show. Herrera Soto probed them to look beyond the work. One of the themes in his own practice that came through in his methodical curating style was the integrating of porousness. In seeking &ldquo;porous edges,&rdquo; the handwritten notes, the strings, and b-sides that are usually left in the periphery of the studio space and cast aside so as not to contaminate the work at hand instead become indispensable. Consequently, the artist&rsquo;s self begins to dapple the work. Herrera Soto&rsquo;s concerns prompted material exploration, causing the artists to consider texture, habit, and their own lived-in material. Bridging the gaps between the art and life outside of the art practice, there was an honoring of personhood in the exhibit, with the site-specific bits folded in.&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<img alt="Framed artwork in a gallery" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/b97bd69e-e2dc-45c4-b22c-eed2864a067d/b97bd69e-e2dc-45c4-b22c-eed2864a067d.full.jpg" /><img alt="A fabric collage hanging in a crowded art gallery" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/06015fc0-714a-4854-9138-c64fbab24119/06015fc0-714a-4854-9138-c64fbab24119.full.jpg" />Top: Whitney Terrill, Abstracted Emotions #1 &amp; #2,&nbsp;2024. Printmaking. Bottom: Hawwa Youngmark, In God&rsquo;s Hands, 2024. Varied textiles, embroidery floss, posca pens, alcohol markers.&nbsp;Drew Arrieta/Public Functionary.

&nbsp;

Herrera Soto had the artists read Amy Sillman&rsquo;s &ldquo;<a href="https://www.amysillman.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/OG14_MoMA.pdf" target="_blank">Further Notes on Shape</a>,&rdquo; and encouraged them to see what exists outside of what they&rsquo;re making and choose to include it. Through embracing permeability, they began to &ldquo;include the negative,&rdquo; as participating artist Jelani Ellis described it. Including the negative means viewing composition as a multifaceted thing, and asking if the coherence of one finally put-together piece is truly important, or if a work&rsquo;s contents can spill beyond its predicted container. Of course there is a precarity there, because too much porousness will make things fall apart. Therefore each artist took a gamble at testing boundaries and ultimately at striking balance.

In Genie Hien Tran&rsquo;s work, Here, Together, there is specifically a glossy dollar store ribbon and assemblage of knots constructing the shape of a heart. The particularity of the material and its attunement to something sentimental hovers around a photograph of Hien Tran as a kid. The photo is tucked into the corner of a frame which is woven into the center of the heart. This &ldquo;tuck&rdquo; was a gesture Herrera Soto and Hien Tran found significant &mdash; that tender slipping of a photo in the crotch of a picture frame, another precarious thing that is both site-specific and potentially cross-cultural, like clutching the shiny ribbon of a balloon in one&#39;s hand.

&nbsp;

<img alt="Visitors at an art gallery look at artwork shaped like a large blue and red heart" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/a19189df-ba4a-457d-af3f-8d0f325d8af3/a19189df-ba4a-457d-af3f-8d0f325d8af3.full.jpg" />Genie Hien Tran, Here, Together, 2024.&nbsp;Plastic twine, frames, and polaroid photo.&nbsp;Drew Arrieta/Public Functionary.

&nbsp;

&ldquo;I think this is where cultural specificity meets the material and the conceptual,&quot; said the curator. &quot;Something I really tried to talk to the residents about was material strategies and display strategies.&rdquo; Wanting to avoid using fishing line for installation purposes, Herrera Soto pushed the artists to find twine-like materials that further conveyed their pieces. They began to not only think about the porous edges in their work but ask, &ldquo;How does the work function? Stripping it of its image and its meaning making, how does hanging something high, hanging something low, and having it be part of the space contribute to the compost of its meaning?&rdquo; Orientation was a concern in the space as well. Instead of the gallery feeling like a conveyor belt, with visitors walking from start to finish, there are pieces displayed in less predictable places, such as Whitney Terrill&rsquo;s Abstracted Emotions #1 and Hawwa Youngmark&rsquo;s quilted comic In God&rsquo;s Hands, respectively creating additional walls and prompting more circular, in-the-round movement through the gallery.&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<img alt="Framed photos hang from chains in an art gallery" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/e4b74f14-3a31-4941-a46f-ab534efaca75/e4b74f14-3a31-4941-a46f-ab534efaca75.full.jpg" /><img alt="Abstract clay sculpture on a pedetal" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/194af506-a306-47a6-b434-c7c1372e95ca/194af506-a306-47a6-b434-c7c1372e95ca.full.jpg" />Top: Godfree Manley-Spain, Ms. Bessie&rsquo;s Big One,&nbsp;2024. Digital photographs. Bottom: Margaret Vergara, sing it again, though,&nbsp;2024. Acrylic, linocut wheat-pasted on plywood, ceramics.&nbsp;Drew Arrieta/Public Functionary.

&nbsp;

In Arn&eacute;e Martin&rsquo;s piece You Can&rsquo;t Go Home Again, Martin worked a laborious knitting technique on mesh to create an image, the source being a family photo that would remain unrevealed in a layer beneath. They used a computer software to map out by number what colored thread would go where. Challenging this idea that what galleries wanted was a large, complete, labor-intensive work, Herrera Soto encouraged Martin to make an additional research piece for the gallery space and display the two small pieces on opposite sides of a column. The research piece showed the numbers printed on the mesh before any thread was brought in, and the view to the family photo was still opaque but discernible this time. This choice was aimed &ldquo;to point towards the impossible predicament of being a studio artist,&quot; according to the curator.&nbsp;&quot;There&rsquo;s so many beautiful things that happen upstairs in the studios, but unfortunately we don&rsquo;t have access to that, so how do you embed that truth in the space?&rdquo; Often in the final stage of exhibition we don&rsquo;t see the iterations a piece embodied before that final one, and there is loss there for the viewer.

In Jelani Ellis&rsquo; work (Untitled), I&rsquo;m reminded of mood boards and early teen years spent ogling over neatly curated Pinterest boards. This is another piece that plays across one of the columns permanently situated in the gallery, and it is a study of composition, as elements of the piece sprawl from its epicenter, a work that is cohesive yet given islands to swim between. The peripheral seeped through the edges of Ellis&rsquo; piece &mdash; a mood board in itself, stray parts building the real thing, the chaff reclaimed to help build value, scale, and equilibrium.&nbsp;

Each piece in this show is expansive and spreading, like moss on a forest floor, or roots mingling, gathering nutrients from soil. Where does one piece end and another begin? It&rsquo;s obvious Herrera Soto challenged and brought about something new in each artist. &ldquo;What is my purpose as a teacher?&rdquo; Herrera Soto inquires. &ldquo;To construct conditions in which we learn from our work and our practice.&rdquo; By helping artists peer into their processes instead of their finished work, Herrera Soto reminds them how to become unstuck by welcoming the fallible yet fecund watering hole of lived material back in to creative practice.&nbsp;◼︎&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<img alt="A panel of 7 people with microphones talk and smile in front of a crowd" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/ef6bcc9f-290d-4e94-82d4-56c638b5a919/ef6bcc9f-290d-4e94-82d4-56c638b5a919.full.jpg" />Left to right: Le&oacute;n Valencia Currie, Jonathan Herrera Soto, Hawwa&nbsp;Youngmark, Nafyar, Grover Hogan, Elyse&nbsp;Lodermeier, and Jelani Ellis&nbsp;at the panel discussion earlier in November. Drew Arrieta/Public Functionary.

&nbsp;

<a href="https://publicfunctionary.org/news/pfstudios-annual-exhibition" target="_blank">Your Hands Were Making Artifacts in the Corner of my Mind</a>&nbsp;is on view at Public Functionary through November 30. Gallery hours are&nbsp;Thursday &ndash; Saturdays, 12 &ndash; 6pm, and the gallery will be closed&nbsp;Thursday, November 28. Follow the gallery on Instagram <a href="https://www.instagram.com/pfunctionary/" target="_blank">@pfunctionary</a>.

You can see more of Jonathan Herrera Soto&#39;s work on <a href="https://jonathanherrerastudio.com" target="_blank">his website</a> and on Instagram <a href="https://www.instagram.com/produce.work/" target="_blank">@produce.work</a>.

PF Studios is also celebrating their fifth anniversary with a book release, available for purchase through <a href="https://public-functionary-gr7w.squarespace.com/book-release-1/in-here-out-there" target="_blank">their website</a>.

PF Studios celebrates its 5th year while curator Jonathan Herrera Soto positions us “within the active composition of our lives” in a group show at Public Functionary

In Regard to the Fringe: Composition as a Multifaceted Thing

Banner image: Jayce the Maker,&nbsp;My Left Pocket.&nbsp;Polymer clay.&nbsp;Photo by&nbsp;Travis Abaddon.

&nbsp;

Sometimes you have to create the right time.

<a href="https://www.instagram.com/dee_and_dee_and_dee/" target="_blank">Danielle Pebbles</a>, who co-founded the <a href="https://www.oacmn.com" target="_blank">Otherworldly Arts Collective</a>&nbsp;with fellow artists Jon Reese (<a href="http://www.instagram.com/pseud0ersatz/" target="_blank">@pseud0ersatz</a>) and Renee Chartier (<a href="https://www.instagram.com/opaquepastels/" target="_blank">@opaquepastels</a>), had thought about opening a gallery later in life. She&rsquo;d seen artists take that path as they got older and finally had time and space. But a series of events in her and fellow collective members&rsquo; lives prompted the group to reevaluate last year.

&ldquo;We met one day and I was like, &lsquo;I don&rsquo;t want to be at the end of my life before we start doing something like this,&rsquo;&rdquo; Pebbles recalled. &ldquo;Let&rsquo;s try it. If it fails in two years, okay, but I don&rsquo;t want to be at the end of my life still waiting for it.&rdquo;

It had been a difficult period for Pebbles&nbsp;and many of the collective&rsquo;s permanent staff, no less because everyone was coming off of the height of the pandemic, which Pebbles&nbsp;calls a zombie apocalypse. After a few years of scaled-back shows and events &mdash; including annual themed exhibitions Gods &amp; Monsters, SafeWord,&nbsp;The Unicorn Art Show, and&nbsp;the&nbsp;Drop In Skate Deck Art Show&nbsp;at various locations &mdash; the time felt right to look for a permanent home.&nbsp;

The group opened its gallery, called ALTR, last month in the Strong Scott Building. Bustling on the Saturday of their most recent opening, the building is also home to Norseman Distillery and several other studio spaces in Northeast Minneapolis.&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<img alt="Skeletons and candles in an altar lit with red light" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/157ced45-7d45-4883-963a-e6d8eb924f60/157ced45-7d45-4883-963a-e6d8eb924f60.full.jpg" /><img alt="Visitors in an art gallery point at works on the wall" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/31dea6fd-2995-4c59-be69-d1ed7cb6660f/31dea6fd-2995-4c59-be69-d1ed7cb6660f.full.jpg" />Scenes from Beyond the Veil in late October,&nbsp;Otherworldly Arts Collective&#39;s opening exhibition in their new space, featuring a group show and a seance to benefit the Ladies of the Lakes, a 501c3 who bill themselves as &quot;a razzle-dazzle gaggle of drag nuns that strive for inclusion and love in our community.&quot; Photos by Travis Abaddon.

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<h2>A new space for new worlds</h2>

ALTR began its first line-up of programming with a seance-themed show for Halloween, and is currently home to MiniARTure, an exhibition of small-scale work curated by Jackie Platt. As OAC settles into its new home, the focus has been on doing shows that spark joy during a busy time for the collective&rsquo;s members.&nbsp;

&ldquo;All of us were burning the candle at both ends with our shows going on outside of this space and the shows we were planning for this new space,&rdquo; said Pebbles. &ldquo;We were thinking about, &lsquo;How do we do this without overwhelming ourselves and becoming resentful of this space?&rsquo;&rdquo;&nbsp;

Platt, who also works as the group&rsquo;s accountant, says miniature art has become a special interest lately.&nbsp;

&ldquo;Everything that&rsquo;s in scale is super interesting to me. The question is, how do I take this object and recreate the same level of detail as if it were full scale?&rdquo; To showcase the many different ways that artists approach this quandary, the show hosts a group of over 40 artists all working in various miniature formats.&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<img alt="Mini model bedroom with Christian Slater posters on the wall" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/84c5f91a-ee85-4faf-ba99-b6cfd4fa67a0/84c5f91a-ee85-4faf-ba99-b6cfd4fa67a0.full.jpg" /><img alt="Miniature model bedroom on pedestal with magnifying lens." class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/9b60167d-f3d1-4a54-97fb-f4ca8a337401/9b60167d-f3d1-4a54-97fb-f4ca8a337401.full.jpg" />Jenna McLeod,&nbsp;Totally Outrageous Sleepover.&nbsp;Mixed media. Top photo by Travis Abaddon; bottom photo by Bridget Kranz.

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It&rsquo;s fitting that one of the first shows in the new gallery space &mdash; a home for OAC&rsquo;s immersive style of curation&nbsp;&mdash;&nbsp;is home to small worlds of its own. Not all of the work in the show is three-dimensional. There are miniature drawings, paintings, and embroidery hung on the walls. But there is a fair amount of sculptural work, creating fantastical worlds at a small scale that the viewer can get down and peer into.&nbsp;

The show, at its core, is fun. There are small prints of made-up mythological animals. There&rsquo;s an itsy bitsy spider with legs peeking out from under a cowboy hat. On the second night of its opening, people of all ages were in the gallery and even the youngest visitors were enjoying the show.&nbsp;

&ldquo;Fun&rdquo; is also how OAC member&nbsp;Juan Garcia describes the feeling of opening ALTR. &ldquo;Seeing everyone&rsquo;s faces while they&rsquo;re looking at everything is so much fun,&rdquo; he said, looking around the crowded room while helping visitors at a dedicated merch table that sold artists&rsquo; creations alongside the work on the walls.&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<img alt="Sculpture of a felt mouse reading a book inside a clock" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/36603fd5-b7f9-469b-a781-c235a2973b3e/36603fd5-b7f9-469b-a781-c235a2973b3e.full.jpg" /><img alt="Diorama of cartoon animals" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/8324e38b-8dc6-4de4-9fc7-ad86dd981732/8324e38b-8dc6-4de4-9fc7-ad86dd981732.full.jpg" /><img alt="People looking at artwork in a gallery" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/f7da3555-27c2-4db4-9065-fa0a8cf42323/f7da3555-27c2-4db4-9065-fa0a8cf42323.full.jpg" />Top: Work by Jenna McLeod. Middle: Work by Jen Van Kaam. Bottom: Visitors getting up close to enjoy the work&nbsp;in&nbsp;MiniARTure. Photos by Travis Abaddon.&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<h2>Getting comfortable and prioritizing access</h2>

Comfort and accessibility were two of the group&rsquo;s priorities when creating their new home. Accessibility was at the top of the list, partially due to Garcia&rsquo;s personal experience navigating inaccessible spaces while recovering from a serious injury. It narrowed the search quite a bit, as many buildings open to artists are older and may not be ADA-compliant.&nbsp;

On top of being in an accessible building, the group wanted to create a space that was comfortable for all visitors. The hope is that people will venture out to explore shows that may be new to them without the often added discomfort of getting used to an entirely new place.&nbsp;

&ldquo;My joke is that Minnesotans are really uncomfortable when we can&rsquo;t find parking. I feel like it&rsquo;s a leftover of getting your car towed and going to the impound lot,&rdquo; said Pebbles. &ldquo;Once you experience that, you need to know where you&rsquo;re going to park. If it&rsquo;s not easy, people will just leave.&rdquo;

Luckily, there&rsquo;s plenty of parking both on and off the street at the new location. Beyond the parking and elevators, balloons and signage welcomed people to the building and the event.

&nbsp;

<img alt="Woman holding baby dressed as a pumpkin" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/03208d67-2be7-4e30-9aea-ed4ea481dfd9/03208d67-2be7-4e30-9aea-ed4ea481dfd9.full.jpg" /> 
Danielle Pebbles and her niece at Beyond the Veil. Photo by Travis Abaddon.

&nbsp;

<h2>What&rsquo;s next for OAC&rsquo;s annual shows</h2>

&ldquo;The first step is getting people comfortable with this space, over and over again,&rdquo; said Pebbles. &ldquo;By adding one of our bigger shows here,&nbsp;hopefully it will get people comfortable to come to maybe a show that they&rsquo;re less familiar with.&rdquo;&nbsp;

The collective is exploring if and how to transition these perennial events. Pebbles says Gods &amp; Monsters and Drop In will likely continue as is. The former has unique space requirements and the latter is an ongoing collaboration with Rogue Citizen and Modist Brewing, which hosts the event. The collective is exploring how to thoughtfully move SafeWord &mdash; which showcases a wide variety of erotic-themed artwork &mdash;&nbsp;into its new location, working closely with the building&rsquo;s owners, fellow tenants, artists, and a licensed sex therapist.&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<img alt="Skateboard painted with eyeball laying on field of clover" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/0104b38b-3ed2-455b-b9b9-4d68d4b914ce/0104b38b-3ed2-455b-b9b9-4d68d4b914ce.full.jpg" /><img alt="Painting of a horse with plane contrails in the air above to look like a unicorn horn" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/ec59166f-b93c-40e6-8229-736047fb7fe5/ec59166f-b93c-40e6-8229-736047fb7fe5.full.jpg" />Top: Work by Monica Helland from Drop-In Skate Deck Show. Courtesy of the <a href="https://www.instagram.com/otherworldlyartscollective/" target="_blank">OAC Instagram</a>. Bottom: Work by Emily Brown for The Unicorn Art Show. Courtesy of the <a href="https://www.instagram.com/imaoddduck/" target="_blank">artist&#39;s Instagram</a>.

&nbsp;

The collective&rsquo;s longest-running show, The Unicorn Art Show, celebrates its 10th anniversary this year. This year will also mark the last Unicorn Art Show, Pebbles says. It&rsquo;s been an integral part of the collective&rsquo;s programming for the past decade plus, and now feels like a natural stopping point.&nbsp;&nbsp;

&ldquo;The Unicorn Art Show is so large and it has had such a huge following for so long,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;We wanted to do the last show with Jackson Flats and their residents because they&rsquo;ve been with us for so long. We also have an outdoor aerial show that we do with it, we&rsquo;ve had mermaids in kiddie&nbsp;pools. It has its own community of fantasy enthusiasts and we may not be able to support it in this space.&rdquo;

&nbsp;

<h2>Coming up at ALTR</h2>

Another perk of the new space is that OAC can now host other arts collectives that don&rsquo;t have their own exhibition space. Rogue Citizen is putting on the next show, a one-night exhibition on December 13. Called Living Wage,&nbsp;the exhibition will showcase works created in an hour all priced starting at $23, the average living wage in the United States.&nbsp;

Pebbles also hopes to create a space for artists to socialize and share their skills, something she was involved in prior to the pandemic.&nbsp;

&ldquo;The goal is for Otherworldly to have a good presence in the arts community,&rdquo; said Platt. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re happy to have this space and we&rsquo;re excited to be able to host other people.&rdquo;

As visitors enjoyed the miniature characters and worlds created by the artists in MiniARTure, the collective continued building a new world of its own.&nbsp;◼︎&nbsp;

&nbsp;

<img alt="&quot;Living Wage&quot; art exhibition poster" class="img-responsive" src="https://storage.googleapis.com/mplsart-cdn-central/FileContainers/a1a5acfa-ea8d-4ca7-82f4-35225465659b/a1a5acfa-ea8d-4ca7-82f4-35225465659b.full.jpg" /> 
The next show at ALTR, Living Wage, in which six artists will show 40 paintings made in one hour each, priced at a minimum of the American living wage of $23.&nbsp;

 
MiniARTure is on view at ALTR with gallery hours November 14, 6&nbsp;&ndash;&nbsp;10pm, &amp; November 16, 12 &ndash; 5pm. The gallery is located in the Strong Scott Building at&nbsp;451 NE Taft St, Suite #22 in Minneapolis.

To learn more, visit&nbsp;<a href="https://oacmn.com" target="_blank">oacmn.com</a> or follow them on Instagram <a href="https://www.instagram.com/otherworldlyartscollective/" target="_blank">@otherworldlyartscollective</a>.

ALTR Gallery will be home to a variety of new exhibitions this year, as the collective also explores transitioning some of its perennial shows

Strange New World: Otherworldly Arts Collective opens gallery in Northeast

Looking for more?&nbsp;The Holiday Shopping Guide will be updated regularly throughout the season. Check back often for new events. Also, be sure to check out the&nbsp;<a href="https://www.mplsart.com/calendar/upcoming">upcoming exhibition calendar</a>. 
 
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