Month of Photography 2021, which takes over Denver in March, is already gaining steam with showcases of both traditional and experimental works. Meanwhile, MCA Denver has brought in a Keith Haring stairway mural, cut into thirteen transportable panels that are now reinstalled in the museum, along with new work from a host of working Colorado artists. And the Dikeou Collection is reopening after a year in the dark, with the Devon Dikeou survey that was meant to run in 2020.
Here's what's hip in Denver galleries this weekend:
Mirror, Mirror
Union Hall, 1750 Wewatta Street, Suite 144
Thursday, February 25, through March 20
As part of its three-exhibition Rough Gems series showcasing new curators, Union Hall gives the team of Mary Grace Bernard and Genevieve Waller an opportunity to gather together photographic artists Román Anaya, Paula Gillen, Stacy J. Platt, Gabby Recny, Emily Van Loan and Lauren Winges for a deep dive into racial and gender politics. Sticking to the title’s fairy-tale cue — Mirror, Mirror — the show upends the notion that being the “fairest of them all” isn’t necessarily the ultimate compliment. To drive home the story of what we find in our own reflections, this unusual show now has an interactive element: Bernard and Waller have put out a public call for mirror portraits to be included in a digital zine at the Union Hall website. Send your high-resolution digital photographs by email to [email protected] with the subject line: "Mirror Mirror Zine,” by March 5.
Colorado in the Present Tense: Narkita Gold, Rick Griffith, Nathan Hall, and Maia Ruth Lee
Keith Haring: Grace House Mural
Jaime Carrejo: Waiting
MCA Denver, 1485 Delgany Street
Saturday, February 27, through August 22 (members-only preview February 27-28; public opening March 2)
MCA Denver turns over a new leaf for spring with three fresh exhibitions. Graffiti master Keith Haring’s Grace House Mural, a rescued parade of classic Haring figures painted nearly thirty years ago in a defunct Catholic youth center in NYC, is sandwiched between two shows focused on Colorado artists. Colorado in the Present Tense looks at homegrown craft and creativity through the eyes of photographer Narkita Gold, designer, printer and Afrofuturist Rick Griffith, composer Nathan Hall and sculptor and installationist Maia Ruth Lee, a relative newcomer to our state; and Jaime Carrejo explores the pensive crossroads of stasis and anticipation in Waiting, an installation of personal space that layers the familiar with a sense of the unknown.
30 Over 50: In Context
Center for Fine Art Photography, 321 Maple Street, Fort Collins
Friday, February 26, through April 30
What separates anyone with a cell phone from a fine-art photographer? It’s a tricky combination pairing patience, a good eye and a bit of good luck, too, with technical knowledge and trust in the unknown. Like good wine, it's a combination that improves with age. The Center for Fine Art Photography (C4FAP), a fine photo gallery in Fort Collins, offers viewers a good reason to visit in 30 Over 50, a group showcase of photographers who are still making relevant work and are what curator Arnika Dawkins describes as being “seasoned through perspective and wisdom.”
C4FAP is also partnering with Artworks in Loveland for Pelting Mangoes, a lovely solo by Renluka Maharaj, whose brightly colored mixed-media canvases begin with found photos and are then overlaid with paint and sometimes glitter or rhinestones. That show is up online now, with a live official opening at the Loveland gallery space on March 12.
Lighting Our Way: Virtual Tour and Artists' Talk
Saturday, February 27, 6:30 p.m., via Zoom at us02web.zoom.us (Passcode: 486791)
Gayla Lemke, Wynne Reynolds, Stephen Shugart and Faith Williams, who teamed up to create Lighting Our Way at Edge Gallery, a complementary synthesis of sculpture and light in four separate styles, will virtually lead you through the show, which ends Sunday. Hear their thoughts about the process and the experience, then toss out a few questions for the artists, who will do their best to answer them.
Sonia Soberats, Light Painting
East Window, 4949 Broadway, Unit 102-B, Boulder
Monday, March 1, through March 31, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily
For an interesting side trip in Boulder, three astonishing examples of Sonia Soberats's archival pigment prints are free to see daily through the glass from outdoors, but you’ll want to spend some time, considering that Soberats is blind and fashions her shots through a combination of touch, long-exposure settings and a second sense for who and what she’s photographing. Remarkably, Soberats didn’t take up photography until after glaucoma robbed her of her sight.
SaveArtSpace: In a Time of Change
Billboards in various Denver Locations
Monday, March 1, through March 31
In partnership with SaveArtSpace, a Brooklyn-based nonprofit known for placing socially conscious art on billboards in cities across the U.S., curators Samantha Johnston and Benjamin Rasmussen have selected ten artists whose work will be installed on billboards around Denver beginning March 1, remaining on view through the rest of the month. Find a map of billboard locations on the SaveArtSpace website.
Women in Their Infinite Forms
Dairy Block, 1800 Wazee Street
Monday, March 1, through March 31
Art Strut: Saturday, March 13, 4 to 6 p.m.
Denver nonprofit the Athena Project, an organization promoting creative women in the arts, tasked eleven local female artists with the challenge of decorating blank mannequins on the theme of Women in Their Infinite Forms. You can start spotting the results inside Milk Market and other Dairy Block businesses throughout March, or wait for the March 13 Art Strut, which includes a pop-up market showcasing the participating women, both inside and out in the mixed-use development’s cozy art alley.
Devon Dikeou, Mid-Career Smear
Dikeou Collection, 1615 California Street, Fifth Floor
Reopens Monday, March 1, by appointment
Devon Dikeou’s high-rise gallery space awakes from a deep sleep to reopen Mid-Career Smear, a thirty-year survey curated by Cortney Lane Stell, first scheduled to open a year ago. The exhibition includes carefully staged, sophisticated installations, some of which resemble design-magazine spreads. Appointments will be available Wednesdays through Fridays; email [email protected] or call 303-623-3001 to set up a date and time to visit.
Interested in having your event appear in this calendar? Send the details to [email protected].