OnTheCusp.org

Thursday Night Openings

Christopher West Presents


Do-it-yourself Utopias
New work by Jeff Eisenberg


For his first solo exhibition in the Midwest, Eisenberg focuses on DIY architecture and the theory in biology called convergent evolution that describes the acquisition of similar or same biological traits in different species, such as wings in both bats and birds. Eisenberg sees something very similar going on in the buildings of disparate communities that, for different political or ideological reasons, choose to unplug from the grid and create alternatives to conventional society and it’s surrounds. The drawings that he creates to explore these observations depict imaginary structures with some sense of logic and order, yet no discernible use or purpose. A loose cosmology of hobo magic, paranoia, superstition, and a hippie can-do spirit permeates the work: Fetishes and feathered charms hang from branches nailed to boards that bar entrances; bric-a-brac building supplies precariously engineer dwellings that read both as friend and foe.

Eisenberg lives and works in San Francisco, CA and is currently serving as a Visiting Assistant Professor at Wabash College in Crawfordsville, IN. He received his MFA in Painting at the San Francisco Art Institute in 2005. He has exhibited his work extensively throughout the world including San Francisco, Los Angeles, Lisbon and London. This is his first exhibition with the gallery.


Opening Reception: February 4th, 5-8pm


Christopher West Presents
646 Massachusetts Ave.






Dean Johnson Gallery


The Secret Museum
Recontextualized Objects by the Committee of Vigilance 


What was lost, is found.
What was plain, is beautiful.
What was discarded, is treasure.

Such is the manifesto of the Indianapolis based Committee of Vigilance. For the second installment of Secret Museum in Indianapolis, the collective finds high style and design in lost and often discarded objects. Found photographs and a World War II era practice bomb make up just a small portion of the work in this exhibition in which these objects have been re-assimilated into a contemporary vernacular. By presenting the work in new and imaginative ways and, in some sense, even highlighting their flaws, what was old is beautiful again.

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