Art Month, Sydney’s annual contemporary art festival, is now in its third year and bigger than ever. Featuring over 200 artists across more than 80 galleries, it is a smorgasbord of creativity to sate the appetites of art lovers and newcomers alike. Since 2010, Art Month has united commercial, public and artist run galleries to present an engaging program of exhibitions, talks, tours, performances and workshops, designed to appeal to a wide and varied audience of all ages. Art Month aims to bring artists and the public into closer contact, involving Sydneysiders in the rich fabric of Sydney’s contemporary art scene. 2012 Artistic Director, Eliza Muldoon says, “we want people to get excited about contemporary art and to make them feel both welcomed and involved”.
Festival goers will be treated to the best that Sydney’s art scene has to offer with exhibition highlights including, but not limited, to; Nike Savvas at BREENSPACE, Marco Fusinato at Anna Schwartz Gallery, Oliver Watts at Chalk Horse, Anna Madeleine at Paper Plane Gallery, Craig Waddell at Gallery 9 and Jasper Knight at Australian Galleries. In his third solo show with Gallery 9, Waddell will showcase his energetic, textural paintings, focusing on portraiture influenced by the works of such influential artists as Velasquez and Bacon. Jasper Knight will present ‘Total Recall’ with Australian Galleries, featuring his trademark vibrant mixed-media art that explores the contiguous relationship between surface and subject.
In addition to the extensive exhibition program, audiences will be able to gain an insight into the mind of the artist in ‘Conversations’, with a diverse line up of speakers ready to debate such topics as the eternally elusive question, ‘What is art?’, one of the many public events.
Art Month runs from March 1 to 25 in venues across Sydney. Check out the Art Month website for full details of the exciting range of events and exhibitions on offer throughout the month. www.artmonthsydney.com.au