www.aroundphilly.com
Before You Leave the City: First Friday And More
by
R.B. Strauss

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If Pop Art is your bag, then check out Mixed Company, 60 North Third Street, a joint that's always got the goods. The roster of artists here ranges from Philly to Manhattan and they always guarantee everyone an eyeful.

Jenie Moore turns out the bomb. That said, she slaps together paintings that grab a little bit from the bright, eye-catching graphics of candy bar wrappers, cute chickadees that reference Japanese animation, covers from cheesy, sleazy tough pulp novels form decades ago and her own take on funky logos of products that don't exist.

The first time I saw John Pompetti's work, I swore it was silkscreen art--only to be proven wrong. Blinding bright primary colors are slathered on canvas to create paintings that run their own con through sheer technique and tight precision. Here, form and palette superceded all else through images that are downright radioactive.

The future is now, though mushed into a mess with the past, thanks to the medium that Jeff Schaller uses is in work, which is encaustic, a process where molten wax is mixed with pigment. The finished work, images superimposed atop images, leaves a sensory overload arrayed to assault all five senses--and beyond!

Chances are good that all of you have run across John Stango's paintings somewhere since next to Philly's murals and public sculpture, Stango's work can be found everywhere else. From Madonna to Al Capone, Lady Liberty to Muhammad Ali, Stango's portraits are letter perfect excursions that meld exact form with a piercing palette.

This place has also got furniture for the jetsetter on the go, plus other items to suit anyone's fancy.


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