Ultralight Beam Curated by Rebecca Mills
On View at Pelham Art Center September 15-October 30, 2022

PELHAM, NY. Pelham Art Center presents Ultralight Beam curated by Rebecca Mills, on view September 15-October 30, 2022. Ultralight Beam features the work of artists: Sunny Allis, Angelica Bergamini, Claire Buckley, Susan Carr, Joan Di Lieto & Thunderfox (working collaboratively), Ala Ebtekar, Gabriel Mills, Sarah Renzi-Sanders, Christina Saj, and Chris Watts. The exhibition, homonymous to the Kanye West song, explores transcendent themes of higher consciousness, enlightenment, and the Universe as a whole. The selected group of artists use spirituality, visionary methods, religion, and/or concepts of the metaphysical, intangible, and transcendent. This is addressed through surrealism, abstraction, religious iconography, meditative work, or art that is beyond categorization.

The artists in Ultralight Beam use visual and tangible modes of communicating the spiritual and metaphysical, tapping into the unknown, and perhaps frightening, parts of our human reality and imagination. Ala Ebtekar translates the concepts and physical properties of light emanating from the stars into works of art. Ebtekar leverages the potentials of the cosmos in his art to reflect and empower both outward contemplation and inward vision. A part of artistic growth is testing, while also pushing, the limits of what is readily available to our imaginations; this is how Gabriel Mills approaches the canvas, where he explores the complexities of experience and sensation through a combination of abstraction and figuration. That space of imagination is where artists who are deep in their practice are constantly searching. This is seen in Sarah Renzi-Sander’s surrealist landscapes, as well as in Susan Carr’s sculptures that are created as a devotional act and method of shadow work. Claire Buckley draws from the wellspring of her own emotional state to convey expressive colorful artistic abstraction. Sunny Allis is a trans, non-binary individual whose work explores the human ability to transform and evolve, leading the viewer toward a state of transcendence beyond the physical bodily form.

The work of Angelica Bergamini, Chris Watts, Joan Di Lieto & Thunderfox, and Christina Saj include elements of religious mysticism.  The higher dimension these artists depict and draw upon to complete their works is one that we search to understand as the basis for our reality and life on Earth. This search is treated as both an individual endeavor and a collective pursuit of the universal human consciousness.

EVENTS PRESENTED WITH ULTRALIGHT BEAM

Opening Reception: Thursday, September 15, 2022, 6:00-8:00pm
Attend the free public opening reception for Ultralight Beam. Light refreshments will be served.

Santeria Batá Drum Circle with Marcus Kreiger: Sunday, September 18, 2022, 12:00-1:30pm
Join Marcus Kreiger (Marcus World Soul) and fellow percussionists at Pelham Art Center for a performance and demonstration of the Santeria drumming tradition. Learn about the musical, spiritual, cultural and historical aspects of the batá drums, as we explore how rhythm and sound create beautiful expressions of community and divinity. This event is part performance, part lecture, and part hands-on drum experience that is suitable for any age. Free and open to the public.

Cacao Ceremony & Sound Bath with Sage Cacao: Sunday, October 9, 2022, 11:00am-1:00pm
Sage Cacao, a NY-based ceremonial cacao company, will host a full-moon cacao ceremony and sound bath on October 9th inside the Ultralight Beam exhibition. Drink chocolate in its most wholesome, native, 100% pure form–ceremonial cacao offers amazing benefits to the body and mind, opening the heart and energizing the spirit. This community circle is perfect for first encounters with ceremonial cacao; attendees will learn about cacao as a traditional plant medicine and spiritual plant ally originating in Meso- and South America, and then experience a guided ceremony with Chynna Dee Andrada, Holistic Nurse and founder of Sage Cacao. The ceremony will culminate with a sonic healing bath, with crystal singing bowls providing pure frequencies to soothe the energetic and physical body. Tickets are $44, available on Pelham Art Center’s website.