Mike Stilkey is showing several new pieces at the Art San Diego fair during the long weekend in the LeBasse Projects booth (# B38).  Here’s a quick preview of the work which includes several of his signature stack of books pieces as well as something brand new — two large pieces painted on a flat mosaic of vintage book covers – a first for him.    If you’re in SD, check out  his new pieces and exciting new landscape work from Andrew Hem at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront adjacent to the convention center.

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Put August 14th on your calendar as LeBasse Projects will showcase a mammoth installation from SF based David Choong Lee. The exhibition will feature more than 500 pieces from Lee’s body of work and will take up the entire gallery space – a first for any artist in our gallery. Lee is coming off his solo exhibition in 2009 at the University of Arizona’s Joseph Gross Museum and will be showcasing work from that series along with new paintings from the last year.

Also keep a look out for LBP artists showing across the country. Andrew Hem, Nate Frizzell and Morgan Slade all take part in the Invitational show at Jonathan Levine NY this week. In early September you will see Yoskay Yamamoto and Edwin Ushiro in Seattle at RoqlaRue.

More news soon about upcoming fairs in San Diego and the return to LA by the German duo Herakut…

Opening on Wednesday August 4, 2010 are two new group exhibitions at Jonathan LeVine Gallery in New York: the 2010 Summer Annual Invitational and a collaboration with Choque Cultural Gallery, Two-Way Street.  The 2010 Annual Summer Invitational features work by thirteen emerging artists that offer a broad range of artistic styles and mediums.  Two-Way Street represents the new work of young street artists from Sao Paolo, Brazil.

Jonathan LeVine Gallery exhibits a genre of work influenced by illustration, comic book art, graffiti, street art and pop culture imagery. We represent a mix of emerging and mid-career artists with an emphasis on cultivating new talent and creating an environment where artists can further develop their work. Since 2005, the first year established in New York, Jonathan LeVine Gallery has remained focused on maintaining its mission of community, and commitment to providing our artists with a nurturing arena for experimentation and discussion.

For more info visit Jonathan LeVine Gallery and Choque Cultural Gallery.

Jonathan LeVine Gallery–2010 Summer Annual Invitational and Two-Way Street

Jonathan LeVine Gallery
529 W 20th St, 9th Floor
New York, NY 10011

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Saturday night was the kickoff of the 2010 calendar for many galleries and the neighborhood energy created an even larger than normal buzz around Andrew Hem’s opening at LeBasse Projects. Andrew put together a fantastic body of new work, featuring very personal paintings, some extraordinary charcoal drawings and a series of small sculptures all painted by Hem. The image above is a process picture of Hem working on a small mural in the gallery entrance.

The show will be up through the 13th of February so make sure to drop in if you missed the opening…or visit the work online here.

Also showing is Portland based artist Rebecca Artemisa Urias making a return to LA. Rebecca was also in attendance along with an entourage of family, friends and collectors who came to see her new work, which was featured in our Project Room.

More images after the break:

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LA based artist Andrew Hem will open his impressive One Leads to Another solo this Saturday, January 16th from 7 to 10 PM @ LeBasse Projects in Culver City. The show explores Andrew’s Cambodian heritage with an alternate history – one in which the Khmer Rouge never rose to power.  Dailydujour visited the gallery on Wednesday to watch Andrew create a mural installation and to get an advanced look at the show.

This quite likely Andrew’s strongest work to-date, many of the paintings are stunning combining his unique portrayal of people, well-rendered architecture, and seemingly spontaneous flourishes of color which echo his past as a graffiti writer. In addition, he will offer a series of smaller charcoal drawings  as well as several small sculptures.  Hit the jump for an extended look at the process of painting the mural as well as detail shots of many of the new pieces.

Andrew Hem / One Leads to Another
Saturday, January 16th 2009
LeBasse Projects
6023 Washington Blvd.
Culver City, CA 90232
310.558.0220

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As LeBasse Projects gets ready for Andrew Hem’s solo exhibition at the gallery, our neighbor blog “Erratic Phenomena” has run another in depth interview with the artist. Here is an excerpt from the rare well developed interview:

“Andrew was still at work finishing up a few sculptures for the exhibit when he sat down to tell me a bit about where he’s coming from right now.

Erratic Phenomena: In our last interview, you said, “I love creating worlds that do not exist. A world where people don’t care about others’ appearance, and nobody has to worry about fitting in or being an outcast. Where everyone is accepted… I’ve experienced and witnessed too many times where people are disgusted with the different.” Growing up as one of the few Asians in a Hispanic Los Angeles neighborhood was not a particularly pleasant experience for you, and you didn’t really find acceptance there until you began to paint graffiti in high school. Is this dream of a world without bias an idea you’ve contemplated all your life? Do you make a conscious effort to draw attention to our ingrained xenophobia in your work?

Andrew Hem: I just enjoy seeing different cultures in one image. Every time I’m in LAX, I spend extra time looking around in the international section. That’s the only place I know where you have so many races in one place. For some strange reason, I enjoy being there. Maybe it’s because everybody’s so busy trying to catch a plane that they don’t really pay attention to their surroundings. You could find any ethnicity at any time at LAX, and nobody looks twice. I just want to transfer that feeling into my work.”

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Prior to the Christmas holiday weekend I had the pleasure of dropping by Andrew Hem’s studio to check on progress for his upcoming solo show this January. Hem has been working on a new body of work focused on his memory and study of his native Cambodia. The show is titled “One Leads to Another” and is driven by the mythical “Butterfly Effect” – in which the theory goes that any action creates consequences and new actions from anyone and everything around it.

In this case Hem considers the possibility of lives transformed had the Khmer Rouge never taken power in his native country. The idea is fantastically executed in his series of dark blue hued paintings – where a sense of the emotional resonance behind each central figure and the detailed environments behind them is evoked at first glance.

Hem is still working on a series of sculptures that will balance the new paintings and I expect it to be an incredible body of work all around. You can see the show open on January 16th at LeBasse Projects.

Andrew Hem
‘One Leads to Another’
LeBasse Projects
Saturday January 16th, 7-10pm

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DD just got an email from one of our sponsors, the print edition house of Paper Tiger, letting us know of some recent releases and a holiday sale. Paper Tiger recently put out new prints from Andrew Hem, Mia, Joao Ruas and more – and now if you use the code “Holiday” at checkout you can get 15% off anything in the store through the end of December.

Paper Tiger also tells us that there might be some extra bonus gifts for orders as well, but you might have to just order to find out.

Get your prints now at: www.apapertiger.com and don’t forget to use the code: Holiday for your discount.

Last Friday Roq La Rue opened it’s first new show of 2009 with two solo shows by Stella Hultberg and Andrew Hem. Both shows looked great and both artists really made an effort to step it up for this show which was most appreciated. You can see the show here, and here is a little gallery of pics I managed to snap when not running around trying to be the hostess with the mostess at the opening!

Andrew Hem, one of DD’s new favorites is opening his show at Roq la Rue in Seattle tonight. We are told that Kirsten Anderson will be posting some show pics on her blog with us, but in the meantime here are some preview shots and a link to see the whole show if you are not fortunate enough to live in Seattle this weekend.

Opening Night: Friday, February 13
Show runs to March 07, 2009