Here’s where the openings are on First Friday and over the weekend:
Ann Marie Auricchio, "Interpello," 2023, acrylic on canvas, hand-painted theatrical scrim.
Ann Marie Auricchio, courtesy of Michael Warren Contemporary
Ann Marie Auricchio, We Are All Heroes
Michael Warren Contemporary, 760 Santa Fe Drive
Through December 2
Opening Reception: Thursday, November 2, 5 to 8 p.m.
Auricchio Artist Talk: Saturday, November 4, 10:30 a.m. to noon
Wiggins Artist Talk: Saturday, November 18, 10:30 a.m. to noon
Michael Warren Contemporary starts November with a home run. The double-header showcases painter Ann Marie Auricchio and conceptual performance artist Sherry Wiggins, who works as a team with Portuguese photographer Luís Filipe Branco.
Auricchio’s abstracts begin with densely marked acrylic canvases sparked by movement, but sometimes the paintings go through some changes when layered over with fine theatrical and repurposed fabrics. She can also go a step further by deconstructing her basic abstract designs into wildly active installations that fill a room with explosive expressions.
Wiggins, well known here in Colorado, tells stories of mythical and historical characters through performative poses shot by Branco. Her brave portrayals in this show powerfully channel Sappho, Helen and Aphrodite in stunning posed tableaux.
Vinni Alfonso, from Through Flesh to Infinity.
Vinni Alfonso
Union Hall, the Coloradan, 1750 Wewatta Street, Suite 144
Through January 6
Opening Reception: Thursday, November 2, 6 to 8 p.m.
Artist Talk and Curatorial Tour: Thursday, December 7, 6:30 to 7:30 p.m.
A Grix and Vinni Alfonso share space at Union Hall for Through Flesh to Infinity, an exhibition determined to unwind the complexities of being human, whether torn by inner violence or clear-eyed in the realm of epiphany. Alfonso’s chaotic paintings are tempered by Grix’s sculptural installation of intertwined ceramic shapes (described by the artist as “not quite vessels, not quite bodies, not quite sculptures”) that span the dualities of experience. Want to understand the concepts more thoroughly? The Thursday, December 7, artist talk and gallery tour is just the ticket.
Catie Michel, Lauren Ruark and Zara DeGroot: Harmony in Hues, Art Gym Gallery
Coleen Hennessy, Many Definitions of Home, Leyden Jar Gallery
Art Gym, 1460 Leyden Street
Through December 3
Opening Reception: Thursday, November 2, 6 to 9 p.m.
Art Gym members Catie Michel, Lauren Ruark and Zara DeGroot show new works in the main gallery of the artists’ co-working facility, while member Coleen Hennessy, a former Peace Corps volunteer in Honduras, explores what makes a house a home wherever you land. Another reason to go: Ratio Beerworks is providing beverages for the reception.
Don Sahli—Colorful Friends
Center for the Arts Evergreen, 31880 Rocky Village Drive, Evergreen
Through December 2
Opening Reception: Thursday, November 2, 4 to 7 p.m.
CAE prefaces the holiday season with a solo exhibition by traditional Evergreen plein air artist and private art instructor Don Sahli, whose heavily impastoed, impressionistic landscapes and still-life oil paintings stick to the Russian school of painting he learned from colorist Sergei Bongart. The show will also include work by Shaun Horne and Dawn Cohen.
Laurel Nakadate's "Lucky Tiger #48," one of the many works that make up the complex American icon of the cowboy.
Courtesy of the artist and Leslie Tonkonow Artworks + Projects
MCA Denver at the Holiday, 2644 West 32nd Avenue
Thursday, November 2, 7 p.m.
Tickets are $5 to $20
Get new background on the Cowboys exhibition at MCA Denver when artist, writer, graphic novelist and podcaster R. Alan Brooks goes deep with Amanda Hunt, former associate curator at the Studio Museum in Harlem, whose 2017 exhibition Black Cowboy centered on specific African-American communities with long histories of keeping and training horses. As a Colorado tie-in, the conversation takes a side trip to Dearfield, the Black Colorado town on the plains where Brooks recently set his historical graphic novel that is also included in the current show.
Día de Muertos Art Crawl and Street Party
40 West Arts District
Friday, November 3, 6 to 9 p.m.
40 West Arts District, West Colfax Avenue corridor between Lamar Street and Wadsworth Boulevard, Lakewood
Along with Pirate’s decades-old annual Muertos celebration, all of 40 West will pitch in with a district-wide art crawl and street party that coincides with First Friday. Aztec dancers and fire dancers will perform in the streets, some galleries will host Día de los Muertos exhibitions (Pirate's will be up all weekend, as well as the following weekend), and a candlelight processional will take off from Casa Bonita to march throughout the art district. In the meantime, get your face painted, buy Muertos handmades and chow down at the food trucks. Find out more here.
Paulus van Horne demonstrates the Oracle of AI at PlatteForum.
Paulus van Horne, courtesy of PlatteForum
PlatteForum Annex Gallery, 3575 Ringsby Court
Friday, November 3, through November 28
Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 6 to 8 p.m.
Multimedia artist Paulus van Horne worked with PlatteForum’s ArtLab teens for the exhibition The Oracle of AI, which presents like performance while leaving audience members to make up their own minds on the subject of AI and how much it can be trusted. At the reception, the spheres van Horne uses as oracles will invite a style of divining not unlike that of a Magic 8 Ball: Viewers can ask questions, and then judge AI’s algorithmic answers.
Paul Jacobsen, “The Invention of Nature (with Caspar David Friedrich),” 2023, oil on linen.
Paul Jacobsen, courtesy of David B. Smith Gallery
Anthony Sonnenberg, In a Time of Make Believe
David B. Smith Gallery, 1543 A Wazee Street
Friday, November 3, through December 2
Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 6 to 8 p.m.
Artist Paul Jacobsen is showcased in the main gallery at David B. Smith, with sculpture by Anthony Sonnenberg in the Project Room for a First Friday opening. Jacobsen, a Colorado native based in New York, resets romanticism in copies of paintings by the Hudson River School artists he admires, but with new attention to the properties of light and, as in the painting, “Invention of Nature" (inspired by Caspar David Friedrich’s 1811 painting “Wanderer above the Sea of Fog”), an infusion of bright, cool blue and purple highlights on a painted-on false picture frame. Sonnenberg’s rococo sculptures start with a base of stoneware embedded with ceramic tchotchkes, then enveloped with porcelain and lustrous glazes, in a decorative reflection of his queer identity.
Frank Kwiatkowski: Blueprints — From Takeover to Makeover
Alto Gallery, 1900 35th Street, Suite B
Friday, November 3, through November 26
Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 6 to 10 p.m.
One of the first artists to show work at Alto Gallery, Frank Kwiatkowski returns with a new solo exhibition of his signature cone-cut prints. Using a process similar to a linocut relief, he carves the designs onto the cut-up orange skins of plastic traffic cones. As DIY as it gets, Kwiatkowski, who has type 1 diabetes, is an advocate for diabetic rights and clean needles; he's also a voice for people on the street — subjects that show up in his prints, which visually recall the woodcut protest posters of the early labor movement.
DILF (Damn I Love Frogs): A Group Show About Frogs
Dateline Gallery, 3004 Larimer Street
Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 6 to 11 p.m.
The revived Dateline Gallery sings the praise of frogs in November with Damn I Love Frogs, a show by twenty artists with an obvious theme. To show that their hearts are where the frogs live, Dateline artists will give a portion of the proceeds to the Northern Colorado Herpetological Society, a nonprofit that specializes in conservation, rescue and education involving all things amphibian (and reptilian).
Claudia Borfiga, “Meadow,” pulp painting.
Claudia Borfiga, courtesy of Bell Projects
Bell Projects, 2822 East 17th Avenue
Friday, November 3, through November 26
Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 6 to 10 p.m.
DIY is imprinted in Claudia Borfiga’s practice, which sticks to uncomplicated visuals, rich or symbolic in color, and occasionally serves a functional role. Screen-printed textiles, quilted elements, roughly hewn floral cotton pulp paintings and unglazed clay shapes in earthy lichen colors are all areas where Borfiga, who must love to get her hands dirty, is currently dallying.
Blake Street Block Party
Backyard on Blake, 3040 Blake Street
Friday, November 3, 5 to 9 p.m.
Eight artists working in the Studio on Blake — StudioMelyB (Melissa Benavidez), Charlotte Greenwood, Eric Ronshaugen, Beth Sands, Starr Tucker-Ortega, Beth Lockhart, Emily Rowan and Brandon Proff — take advantage of First Friday and Denver Arts Week by hosting open studios full of new works. Free beer from Our Mutual Friend, a food truck and live music will set the block-party tone, and nearby shops will be open for browsing until at least 6 p.m.
Mud Club, Flora and Fauna
Tenn Street Coffee and Books, 4418 Tennyson Street
November 3 through December 7
Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 6 to 9 p.m.
A whole group of local ceramic artists, most of them women, get together once a year to create a show in memory of their dear friend Marie Gibbons, who kept a studio and taught clay classes at 44th Avenue and Tennyson Street. Later, she moved farther west to Wheat Ridge, still creating one-of-a-kind sculptures and wall pieces, and sharing her wisdom as an artist and as a friend. Flora and Fauna at Tenn Street is a tribute to the late artist’s style, sense of humor and wild ideas. On opening night, the focus will be on a pop-up sale of small, affordable and giftable works.
The Holiday Show
Urban Mud, 530 Santa Fe Drive
Friday, November 3, through December 23
Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 5 to 8 p.m.
Some of the 55 ceramic artists at Urban Mud will contribute clay art, both functional and for art’s sake, along with original paintings and collages by studio owner Mary Mackey.
Scot Lefavor
Middle State Coffee, 212 Santa Fe Drive
Friday, November 3, 6 to 9 p.m.
Urban artist, graphic designer and illustrator Scot Lefavor opens a show of paintings on signs and custom Hot Wheels inspired by memorable vehicles from television and the movies. Think "Yellow Volvo 245 DL Wagon from Beetlejuice," and you’re on the right (Hot Wheels) track.
First Friday Pop-Up Art Gallery
The Source Hotel and Market Hall, 3330 Brighton Boulevard
Friday, November 3, 6 to 9 p.m.
Free, RSVP at Eventbrite
Art pops up at the Source on First Friday with works by fluid painter Shaylen Broughton of SAB Art Studio, urban artist Adam Toksoz and Steven Morrell, who is known for his paintings of active bodies suspended in space. Live music, DIY cookie decorating, delish bites and hand-mixed beverages by the culinary artists of the Source will be at your fingertips.
Fall 2023 MSU Denver BFA Thesis Exhibition
Center for Visual Art MSU Denver, 965 Santa Fe Drive
November 3 through December 8
Opening Reception: Friday, November 3, 6 to 8 p.m.
The next batch of Metropolitan State University of Denver’s fall Studio Art and Communication Design BFA candidates are ready to show their best stuff to the world. The seventeen-student thesis exhibition opens on First Friday of November as they prepare to graduate and move into further studies or chosen fields.
My Kid Could Do That
Emmanuel Gallery, 1205 Tenth Street Plaza, Auraria Campus
Saturday, November 4, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
CU Denver’s Emmanuel Gallery brings back one of its best little ideas ever with the return of My Kid Could Do That, a one-day exhibition of art by kids of all ages and abilities. With help from their parents, the young artists hang and display their own contributions, and when Mom and Dad say it’s time to go, they can swipe back their art and go. Come take a look at the art stars of the far future. Looking for parking? Try the metered spaces at the Holly Parking Lot facing Curtis Street.
12X12 ARTS!ball
Arts Hub Lafayette, 420 Courtney Way, Lafayette
Saturday, November 4, 7 to 10 p.m.
Admission: $50 ($125 VIP)
Auctions or sales of original art of a uniform size are all the rage these days for fundraising at nonprofit arts organizations like ARTS!Lafayette. This version, which peaks during the November 4 event at Arts Hub Lafayette, is the 12x12 ARTS!ball, an evening of dance, music and theater performances, eats and drinks, and a silent auction of the aforementioned 12-by-12-inch artworks, which are already open for bidding online at biddingowl.com, with prices beginning at $50.
New Works by Danyl Cook
My Essential Objects (MEO), 445 South Saulsbury Street, Unit F, Belmar Block 7, Lakewood
Saturday, November 4, noon to 6 p.m.
Artist Danyl Cook, also the co-owner of art, design and vintage shop My Essential Objects on Block 7 in Belmar, is claiming honorary participation in Denver Arts Week for his Lakewood business, where he will be selling original new whimsical drawings, paintings and clothing all afternoon on November 4. Plus, it’s the only place to find Cook’s “BADass Babies” artwork, prints and gift items.
Women's Caucus for the Arts: Taking Up Space
Curtis Center for the Arts, 2349 East Orchard Road, Greenwood Village
Saturday, November 4, through December 22
Opening Reception: Saturday, November 4, 6 to 8 p.m.
Juror’s Talk: Saturday, November 18, 2 p.m.
The Colorado chapter of the Women's Caucus for the Arts has a new gallery show brewing at the Curtis Center in Greenwood Village under the theme of Taking Up Space. It’s a wry way of saying that it’s all large-format art, as well as a metaphor for women artists claiming their place in the art world. Don’t miss the jurors’ talk on November 18, with the interesting pairing of wood sculptor Autumn T. Thomas and artist and curator Genevieve Waller, who is also the founder and editor of the local art journal Daria: Denver Art Review, Inquiry and Analysis.
Autumn Art Fest
Globeville Riverfront Art Center (GRACe), 888 East 50th Avenue
Saturday, November 4, 3 to 8 p.m.
The Globeville Riverfront Art Center (aka GRACe), a facility housing more than 75 artists and creative businesses, opens its studio doors to the public for another seasonal art festival and open house. The event includes a formal group gallery showcase, artist demos and a chance to purchase art direct from the maker, which is a good deal all around for buyers and small businesses.
Interdependence
SeeSaw Art Gallery, 5 West Radcliff Avenue, Englewood
Saturday, November 4, through January 8
Grand Opening Reception: Saturday, November 4, 6 to 9 p.m.
The new SeeSaw Gallery opens with a six-artist exhibition of works by Clarissa Fortier, Rochelle Johnson, Christine Nguyen, Savanna LaBauve, Sophie Hill and Mila Rossi, all women artists exploring the intersectional, feminist aesthetics, female experience through art. The junctions of nature and science, the Black body, personal meditations and culture mingle throughout the diverse show, which includes landscapes, beadwork, sculptural installations, photo-based mixed media and studies of the human figure, to name a few directions taken.
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