Installation Images

Here are a few images of recent installations at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Atlanta. These are all cut paper and other media. The large "Sleeping Giant" is white cut paper on a brown and black painted wall. The crouching giant, entitled; "Trepidation" is made simply of black cut paper. The other works are black cut paper and video projections. Each video has slight movements including circling hawks, planes flying through clouds, elevated commuter trains, and flocking birds.

Dreams of a Sleeping Giant - Opening Reception / Exhibition dates and Artist talk

Dreams of a Sleeping Giant - Matt Haffner

Exhibition Dates: April 24th - June 6th, 2009
Opening Reception: Friday, April 24th, 2009, 6:30-8:30pm

Artist Lecture: Wednesday, May 20th, 2009, 6:30

Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia
TULA Arts Center
75 Bennett Street, Suite A2
Atlanta, Ga. 30309
404.376.8700
info@mocaga.org

About the MOCA Ga. Working Artist Project

We are grateful to the Charles Loridans Foundation for funding the Working Artist Project, including the exhibition and catalog. This project is an initiatve of The Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia to support established, working artists in the Atlanta metroplolitan area.

Joining MOCA's Annette Cone-Skelton as a 2008/2009 juror was Carter Foster, Curator of Drawings at the Whitney Museum of AMerican Art, New York. Each of the Three winning artists is supported with an exhibition, promotion, a studio assistant and major stipend to create work over the course of a year. The Working Artist Project exhibitions and the accompanying catalog will present new work by these three artists and document the work created throughout the project year.

Matt Haffner's exhibition is the first in the series presented by the 2008/2009 Working Artist Project winners. This exhibitiobn will be followed by solo exhibitions by the other two artist winners, Marcia R. Cohen and Maria Artemis. A catalog featuring the work of all three winners will be available at the end of the three exhibitions.

Exhibition in Philadelphia

Pentimenti Gallery

Info for upcoming show at Pentimenti Gallery in Philadelphia:
Laura and I are having concurrent exhibitions at Pentimenti Galery in Philadelphia this month. Conceptually and aesthetically, our work is completely unrelated. This is the first time that we have shown "together", aside from single pieces in group shows, auctions and the like.

MARCH 6 - APRIL 11, 2009
Reception: Friday, March 6, 6 - 8:30 pm
Pentimenti Gallery is pleased to announce 2 solo exhibitions AGGREGATE and TALES FROM THE LONESOME CITY from March 6 - April 11, 2009. A reception with the artists will be held on Friday, March 6 from 6 - 8:30 pm.

LAURA BELL
"Aggregate"
Paintings

This series of paintings is derived from biomorphic forms and cellular systems, as well as celestial objects such as constellations, nebulae, and galaxies. Image sources include both Hubble photographs and microscopic slide images of deadly human diseases, in an exploration of both the minute and the monumental.
The images suggest an inner space, populated by fluids and gasses, bacterial growth, paramecium, fungus, and mold. Through the exploration of microscopic forms that simultaneously hold both regenerative power and destructive potential, the images are both a celebration of the beauty found in the pulsating undercurrents of life, as well as the an acknowledgement of the powerful threat that these same forms can wield. Despite their intimate size, the paintings also refer to an outer, infinite space, which hints at both the source of life, as well as its absence.

see more of her work here:
laurabellstudio.com

MATT HAFFNER
"Tales from the Lonesome City"
Paintings & Works on paper

MATT HAFFNER’s paintings and ink drawings on mylar with traditional photograph derive from film noir, comic book and contemporary popular media. This new series presents fictional and chaotic urban landscapes with remembrances of street life staged with transparent figures evoking a feeling of nostalgia. Also in these works, the source imagery is from the streets of 3 cities: Philadelphia, New York and Atlanta.

After this solo show at Pentimenti Gallery, I will be having another solo exhibition open April 25, 2009 at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia, Atlanta.

Upcoming Exhibition of Drawings and Paintings

This has been a busy last several months, and now I'm beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel. The first thing on my calendar coming up is an exhibition of drawings and a couple paintings at Pentimenti Gallery (March 6th - April 12th / Opening reception as part of First Friday, March 6th).
Next on the agenda will be a long anticipated solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, in Atlanta. This show will feature, large scale works of installation, video pieces and paintings.
In the next few days I will post a couple images for these shows with some more formal announcements.

Studio View.
I've been working 100 miles an hour lately. Getting ready for my April 25th opening at MOCA here in the ATL. Here's a quick sneak peak as to what's being worked on. Lots of cut paper, video, stencils and exacto blade cuts.

New Life to the old Web Site

I just gave the web site a bit of an overhaul. New images, new text, some videos, etc. I'm working on revising the links and a few other tweaks, but the portfolio was the priority.

check out the face lift:

http:www.matthaffner.com

Atlantan Shout Out

I've been off the blog for a bit working feverishly on a couple exhibitions for the spring. I'm making renewed effort to keep up with postings. Just the other day the December issue of the Atlantan magazine came out with an Arts issue. This issue features one of my paintings on the cover and a small blurb about me and my work on page 12.

Here's the link :

http://digital.modernluxury.com/publisher/modernluxury1/ATLA/issue14/magazine.php?logo=0&issueid=4617&page=1

Back from the woods

i got back last weekend from a really great residency at the hambidge center in north georgia. it was a great opportunity to make art, mediate on some coming shows and get some god momentum on my studio practice. here are some images from the trip and a few of the pieces that i made while i was in residency there.

and here's the art. these are part of a series of 13 works. they are ink on frosted mylar over a traditional cprint (color photo for the lay folk). some of these mylar pieces have been cut into to reveal specific items of the photograph beneath, creating an interesting dimensional push and pull in the imagery.



i've yet to really craft my artist statement for these much less title the work, but i've been thinking a lot about how these are kind of post apocalyptic view of the cityscape. the photos are barren of life with people drawn back in that speak about the memory of place and the chaos that ensues during the collapse of a city. more once i've fleshed out an artist statement on this stuff.

Hambidge Residency

I'm getting ready for a two week residency in the mountains between north georgia and north carolina at the hambidge center. this should be a great opportunity for me to focus on nothing but making new work. as the facilities are limited i'll be trying to work exclusively on works on paper and photography.
i'll be interested to see what two weeks away from family, friends, with no email, phone reception, facebook, etc. will do to my psyche. i'm sure this will be great fro getting work done, but right now i'm a little freaked out about being alone with myself and my art and a book of the writings of marcel duchamp.
check back in a couple weeks and i'll post some new works that were made while at the residency.

Installation of "The Pushcart Vendors"

Matt Haffner - Discusses his new work -
"Community Profiles" or "The Pushcart Vendors"

a large-scale public art installation
as a part of A New Genre Landscape

the talk will be at Coan park in the Kirkwood / Edgewood area of Atlanta

4pm, Saturday June 14th

located on Hosea L. Williams Drive between Anniston Ave. and Woodbine Av.
(the installation is in the lower part of the park on the side of the community center)
1520 Woodbine Ave., SE, Atlanta, GA 30317

Installation shots of "The Pushcart Vendors"

here are a handful of the shots from yesterdays install.

New Mural Went Up Today

click on the image below to get a larger view

"The Pushcart Vendors" - 2008 Matt Haffner

with the amazing help of my crew, we threw up my biggest wheatpaste mural to date - 80 feet long and 2o high. it took about 8 hours to get this completed, but i looks great. check back this week and i'll have some installation shots and hopefully some video of the installation soon as well. for now here's the final installation shot.
this mural is in Coan park in the ATL. it is a part of the (new) genre landscape. check the posting below for more info on this installation, the opening and the artist talk on site.

Atlantan Magazine Article

Be sure to check out the feature article in the Atlantan magazine here:

http://www.modernluxury.com/digital.php?e=ATLA

jump to page 48 to view the article.

Artist Talk for A (new) Genre Landscape

Mark your calendars, I will be doing an on-site artist talk,

June 14 @ 4:00pm
at Coan Park
1530 Woodbine Avenue.

I will be talking about the new piece that I'm installing for this city-wide public art exhibit, my methods for working on a piece like this and the concepts behind a work like this.

Opening Reception for New Genre Landscape

clink on the image below to view it larger.
hope to see you all at the opening on the 7th and on the 14th for my artist talk. more info on that later

New Genre Landscape

Currently I'm working on a temporary public art project for the City of Atlanta's Bureau of Cultural Affairs. The project has been conceptualized and is curated by Stuart Keeler. For this project, I am creating a wheat-pasted mural similar to those that I made for Atlanta Celebrates Photography in 2006. This will be in Coan Park in the Kirkwood neighborhood of Atlanta, on the side of the concrete structure in the lower part of the park. Here is some info about the project and the opening reception.

A (New) Genre Landscape
Temporary Art Projects

OVERVIEW

What happens when a public park becomes an artist studio? Twelve Atlanta artists will explore new ways of working with local communities through the creation of temporary site-specific "artscapes". Sponsored by the City of Atlanta Office of Cultural Affairs Public Art Program OCA/PAP, A (new) Genre Landscape Temporary Public Art Project will take place in twelve Atlanta parks from May 31 through the summer of 2008.
The multi-disciplined contemporary public art of twelve Atlanta artists respond to a curatorial framework developed by project curator, Stuart Keeler. Keeler's curatorial concept aims to broaden accepted ideas of public art by asking the question: Can the networks, systems and fields of the public park, create a new social landscape? Atlanta artists will examine new contexts of working with local communities through the creation of digital, sound, video and other experimental works.

PROJECT STATUS
06/07/08, Saturday, OPENING RECEPTION - Grant Park

MOCA GA Working Artist Project

The Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia

is pleased to announce the winners of the

2008 Working Artist Project

funded by

The Charles Loridans Foundation

Maria Artemis

Marcia R. Cohen

Matt Haffner

MOCA's Director Annette Cone-Skelton and Carter Foster, Curator of Drawings at the Whitney Museum of American Art chose this years recipients . Foster is a native of Atlanta and a graduate of the University of Georgia. His career has led him to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art before joining the Whitney in 2005.

The Working Artist Project was created by MOCA GA to support artists living and working in Atlanta. The program aims to go beyond artist grants and strives to establish Atlanta on a national level as a city in which to launch a viable career in art. Additionally, the WAP program was created to help retain existing artists in Atlanta and attract artists to come to the Atlanta area, bringing in new, exciting talent.

The three artists chosen will receive financial support in the form of a $12,000 stipend. They will be provided a paid studio assistant during the year, working 10-15 hours a week. In an unusual twist, the winning artist then provides valuable mentoring to the studio assistant, helping to launch careers of young artists and thus contributing to an artist-friendly environment in Atlanta.

Each artist will be featured in a solo exhibition with catalogue at MOCA GA. In addition, a work of art from each artist will be added to the MOCA GA permanent collection, insuring their place in the overall history of Georgia's contemporary art.