UNPREDICTABLE PATTERNS OF BEHAVIOR Artists Set for Panel Discussion at ArtCenter/South Florida Tonight

ArtCenter/South Florida's "Unpredictable Patterns of Behavior" will host a Panel Discussion tonight, July 8th 7:00 p.m. in the Richard Shack Gallery: 800 Lincoln Road (at Meridian Avenue). Curator Ombretta Agro moderates a panel discussion about the exhibition featuring artists Felice Grodin, Eric Goldemberg from MONAD Architects, and Gustavo Matamoros from PUNTO and Miami Subtropics.

Panelists represent the three disciplines of the exhibition: visual art, architecture and sound composition. They will discuss their works in the the exhibition, their art practice, and how they are influenced by patterns.

ArtCenter/South Florida's new exhibition "Unpredictable Patterns of Behavior" opened June 5th at both its Richard Shack Gallery (800 Lincoln Road) and at Project 924 (located upstairs at 924 Lincoln Road) and will be on view through July 28, 2013.

ArtCenter has invited Ombretta Agró Andruff to curate this exhibition. She is an art visionary, originally from Italy who recently relocated from New York to Miami Beach. This is the first exhibition that Ms. Agró curates in Miami.

"Unpredictable Patterns of Behavior" is a sequel to her 2012 New York exhibition, "(Un) Folding Patterns." The New York show focused on the relationship between mathematics and the visual arts. This sequel explores how creative minds interpret patterns across the artistic disciplines of the visual arts, sound and architecture.

For her debut exhibition in Miami, Ms. Agró conducted extensive studio visits throughout Miami during the past four months. Her goal was to bring together a collection of artists tied to local residency programs (including ArtCenter/South Florida, Fountainhead Residency and Studio Program, and the Deering Estate Residency Program).

Most of the artists in this show have ties to these residency programs (with the exception of MONAD Architects and Anne Spalter).

"Since our early childhoods, we all instinctively absorb and enjoy patterns through all of our senses, even via our thinking," says Ms. Agró.

"We live our lives constantly surrounded by a kaleidoscope of patterns.

These artists, composers and architects relate to patterns in distinctive ways.Some extrapolate natural patterns, thereby integrating them into their process.

Other artists in this exhibition play with geometrical patterns, or create their own patterns inspired by man-made landscapes and invented systems.

The goal here is to transcend the aesthetic enjoyment of their artworks, and to experience the patterns that inspired them," adds Agró.

Says ArtCenter's Executive Director, Maria Del Valle: "ArtCenter's new course upholds our pioneering legacy of championing the vital role of the arts in Miami Beach."

"As we approach our 30th anniversary year in South Beach," adds Maria Del Valle, "ArtCenter's renewed direction aims to open up our spaces further. To broaden our capacities, provide venues for new voices, and connect the worlds of contemporary art to a wider diversity of audiences."

About the artists:

Ramon Bofill (ArtCenter Resident Artist, Miami-based)
Themes of childhood, chaos and structure inform Bofill's work of repurposed fabrics, traditional painting media, tapestry and sculpture. Bofill explores personal issues of identity and cultural heritage as well as themes of manual labor, aesthetics and social class. ramonbofill.com

George Goodridge (ArtCenter Resident Artist, Miami-based)
Goodridge examines the concrete world through the creation of new forms. Intentionally ambiguous, his three dimensional works are both figurative and abstract, blurring the lines between sculpture, painting, architecture and installation. georgegoodridge.com

Felice Grodin (Fountainhead Residency Alumna, Miami-based)
Grodin's work is informed by her training as an architect and the natural and man-made disasters in the cities where she has lived (San Francisco, Miami, New Orleans, Venice and New York). By exploring through the grain, Grodin attempts to map trajectories. Her work posits a contemporary interpretation of the space we live in today - a contradictory world that is simultaneously global and territorial. felicegrodin.com

Peter Hammar (ArtCenter Alumnus, Miami-based)
Hammer's work is in Flux and the status of the work is fragmented and dislocated, mixing found objects with traditional practices. Multiple shaped collage canvases by Peter Hammar morph into hybrids in an attempt to re-address an ongoing query regarding the visually apparent and the embodied. peterhammar.com

MONAD Studio
MONAD Studio is a design research practice with focus on spatial perception related to rhythmic effect. For this exhibition MONAD has created a digital fabrication that echoes the multi-layered attachments found in the strangler fig trees' root systems. monadstudio.net

Temisan Okpaku (Fountainhead Studios Resident, Miami-based)
Nomadic in nature, Temisan's work is a response to our contemporary world of interrelations, superpositions and boundary transgressions. In this site-specific installation he surrounds us with patterns of energy created by stretched guitar strings that create geometric patterns of their own. temiokpaku.com

PUNTO
Founded by composers Gustavo Matamoros (ArtCenter Resident Artist) and Armando Rodriguez, PUNTO is an outlet for controlled experimentation with sound and other media. Its objectives are to set up sound-based situations that give way to the creation of new art forms. Matamoros curates ArtCenter's sound art Listening Gallery, and is the Artistic Director of Miami's Subtropics Art Sound + Experimental Music Festival.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PUNTO_Experimental_Music_Ensemble

Ryan Roa (Fountainhead Residency Artist, New York-based)
Ryan's work consists of sculpture, installation and video. In this exhibition he creates one of his largest installations from the 'Space Drawing' series in which he draws a third-dimension by joining bungee cords anchored to the floor, ceiling and walls to create delicate patterns. ryanroa.com

Matt Sheridan (Fountainhead Residency Artist, Los Angeles-based)
Videos and paintings made concurrently are complementary in Sheridan's practice. The paintings are hand-painted actions spliced together on canvases originating from film editing techniques. The "painting in motion" videos are projected onto architectural sites, exposing how bodies of information collide into selection, ideology, movement and lack. msheridanstudio.com

Anne Morgan Spalter (Rhode Island-based)
Spalter is an artist, author and educator with a long-standing goal of integrating art and technology and is recognized as a new media pioneer. Traffic Circle is a series by Anne Morgan Spalter of geometric landscape video paintings generated from footage shot in traffic, high-rise apartments, airports, planes and the highway. annespalter.com

Alex Trimino (ArtCenter Alumna, Deering Estate Resident)
Trimino creates illuminated fiber-based sculptures and installations that re-contextualize lo-tech crafts, crochet, knitting and weavings while probing social views regarding civilization, technology and gender. Trimino's usage of embroidery and technology create a connection with her past and her present. alextrimino.com

Sarah Walker (Fountainhead Residency Alumna, New York-based)
Structures found in technology, nature and architecture are the inspirations for Walker's layered paintings. In each layer the artist insets delicate patterns, allowing spaces to emerge, transform and then decay, always leaving behind traces of residue in the final painting. sarahwalker.org

About the Curator: Ombretta Agró Andruff is a Miami and New York-based freelance curator, consultant and writer originally from Italy. Since her move to the US in 1998 she has curated solo and group shows in Europe, the U.S. and India collaborating with museums, art festivals, commercial galleries and art fairs such as Artists Space, GAle GAtes et al., Queens Museum of Art, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, The Armory Show, Art Basel Miami Beach, The Downtown Arts Festival, D.U.M.B.O. Art Under the Bridge Festival, Esso Gallery, Dorsky Gallery Curatorial Programs, 2006 Winter Olympic Games, and the Religare Arts Initiative.

The cultural epicenter of South Beach's Lincoln Road, ArtCenter/South Florida welcomes more than 100,000 visitors every year. Since its founding in 1984, ArtCenter has been home to more than 1,000 resident artists. Counting down to its 30th anniversary in 2014, the organization provides subsidized studio and exhibition space, plus teaching opportunities for emerging and career artists. ArtCenter also offers over 100 studio and artist development classes per year at its South Beach location and satellite venues.

The mission of the ArtCenter, a non-profit 501(C)(3), is to advance the knowledge and practice of contemporary visual arts and culture in South Florida while providing affordable programming and work space for professional artists. More information is available by calling 305/674-8278 and online at artcentersf.org.

Pictured: Ryan Roa at work on his installation: Space Drawing #32.