May at Blue Sky
May Exhibitions and Programs at Blue Sky
Blue Sky is pleased to announce May Exhibitions and Programs. Please join us on May 4 from 5 -98 PM for First Thursday Opening!
Mishka Henner & Vaseem Bhatti
Energy Goast
image © Kristen Joy Emack
May 4 - 27, 2023
First Thursday Opening: May 4, 5 - 9 PM
Zoom Artist Talk: Wed, May 24, 12 PM (PT)
Energy Goast is a nature awareness brand set up by Vaseem Bhatti and Mishka Henner. This iteration of the project at Blue Sky is a multimedia installation that questions the commodification of ‘nature’ in an age of synthetic landscapes. Featuring insta-stylised imagery overlaid with graphics inspired by military optical equipment, Energy Goast builds from a steady churn of #outdoors content into something more critical, capable of grappling with the foreboding landscape of the Energy Coast and the myth-making that takes place around it.
Robin Friend
Bastard Countryside
image © Liliana Guzmán
May 4 - 27, 2023
First Thursday Opening: May 4, 5 - 9 PM
In-Person Artist Talk: Sat, May 6, 4 PM
Robin Friend’s Bastard Countryside collects together 15 years worth of exploration within the British landscape, dwelling on what Victor Hugo called the ‘bastard countryside’: “somewhat ugly but bizarre, made up of two different natures.” Friend’s large-format color images scrutinize these in-between, unkempt, and often surreal marginal areas of the country, highlighting frictions between the pastoral sublime and the discarded, often polluted reality of the present. Starting from a classical landscape tradition, Friend’s meticulous 5x4 photographs are given heightened effect through exaggerations of color and composition, embodying friction between British pastoral ideals and present reality. In particular, Friend follows moments in which the expected narrative of the landscape is rudely interrupted through leakage, pollution, or the wreckage and containment of nature.