New Paintings
ADDITIONAL VIEWING HOURS: FRIDAYS OCTOBER 3 & 10
6:30-8PM, no need to rsvp

SPACE 242 proudly announces its ninth exhibition of 2008, LANDING PARTY, featuring new paintings by Joey Mars. The opening reception, Friday, September 26, runs from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. in Boston’s South End, 242 E. Berkeley Street, 2nd floor (Between Albany Street and Harrison Avenue), Boston. The artist will be present and artwork on view is also for sale. RSVP required for attendance at ww.space242.com.

LANDING PARTY marks Joey Mars’ first major Boston exhibition in years, featuring a variety of new, original paintings. According to the artist “using symbols, a wide-ranging color palate, and perspective on human connections, I seek to bridge the dimension of reality and subconscious in our everyday lives.”

This collection of vibrant, colorful work is the next step in Mars’ style – the fun, dynamic space creatures, mix with common earth animals and mythical elves and monsters -- mostly kooky and usually found amidst landscapes of highly evolved plants, fungus, and subterranean life encircled by UFOs, time grids, and the watchful eye – has now expanded into a world a bit more abstract in imagery, line, and blurred color. The newer works include use of text, numerals, and inferred symbols – but include the creatures, insects, flora, machines, and other world-dwellers of the earlier Mars style.

Mars’ style could be described as a hybrid combining elements of underground comics, modern expressionism, low-brow surrealism, abstract psychedelic, paranormal, and science fiction. According to Mars “I juxtapose the futuristic with the archaic, sequencing evolutionary patterns, pathways, and pathogens. The spirits of plants, animals, and time itself dance with nature and technology.”

Mars notes influences including Ed “Big Daddy” Roth, Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali, NASA, Terrence McKenna, Rick Griffin, Victor Moscoso, Bugs Bunny, R. Crumb, and Jean Michel Basquiat. He has exhibited his work in New York, Key West, and throughout Massachusetts including the Sarah Jessica Fine Arts Gallery in Provincetown, where his work is shown continually.

His artwork has been used in association with concert promoters and corporations including K2, Liquid Blue, Budweiser, Pepsi, Aerosmith, Grateful Dead, The Boston Phoenix, WBCN, WFNX, and Shop Therapy. He attended art school at Vesper Lincoln George School of Art as well as the Art Institute of Boston. A past studio member and president of the Worcester Artists Group, Mars originally from Worcester, lives on Cape Cod with his wife and daughter.

LANDING PARTY is sponsored in part by The Weekly Dig and ArtScope Magazine. Artwork exhibited is available for purchase unless otherwise noted.

SPACE 242 and Boston Underground Film Festival (BUFF) present PHONE SEX by Steve Balderson, in the Mini Theatre. “The result is a tour de force of freakiness.” –LA Weekly

Filmmaker Steve Balderson asked his crazy array of scenester and celebrity pals the question: “What is sexy?” and told them to leave their answers on his phone machine. The responses he got – including bits from Ron Jeremy, Margaret Cho, Jayne County, Christian Campbell, Susan Traylor, Jane Wiedlin, and Tura Santana – are, according to LA Weekly, “an audio mishmash ranging from kinky to sweet to downright bizarre.”

“I assumed people would say similar things,” says the filmmaker. “but was amazed to discover that with the exception of a few, there was a complete variation of answers. Most people are shy when it comes to opening up and discussing this very private thing, so hearing people be open about it is very absorbing,” Balderson says.

Balderson, originally from Kansas, attended film school at California Institute of the Arts. His features and documentaries have won numerous film festival awards including Visionfest, Fantasporto, Raindance, Fox, Kan, B-Movie, Great Plains, and Cannes.