BY AARON STELLA CITYSPACE, a Philadelphia-based real estate company, will open its doors to its first ever series of art shows starting this weekend with rising-star artist Mat Tomezsko with his installation “Those Ghosts.” A real estate company might not be the first business you’d imagine sponsoring an art show. CITYSPACE, however, is different in that it realizes that there is more to real estate than the mere buying and selling of properties; it’s about community development, supporting local businesses, making smart uses of technology, investing in green alternatives, and most importantly, providing someone with the largest possession they’ll ever own—a home. Support for the arts naturally falls into CITYSPACE’s directive — re-thinking real estate — and they have committed themselves to giving a leg-up to local Philadelphian artists by allowing them to display their works in yet-to-be inhabited residential spaces.
“Those Ghosts” is Tomezsko’s visual essay on art as a sacrificial act—a giving over of one’s whole exhausted being so to manifest the “Ghosts” of one’s mind onto a canvass. “All of the paintings are portraits of my friends and family,” Tomezsko says, “But it shouldn’t matter whether someone knows these people or not; it’s the forms these people become when they’re put to the canvas — detached and then recreated in the image of their essence — that makes these paintings what they are.”
Tomezsko specializes in painted series. “Those Ghosts” will include various series such as Sun and Moon, The Singer, Dancer and Smoker, and, perhaps what is the main attraction, a yet-to-be-named 13-painting adaptation of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper, along with others. Piles of other paintings will also lying around the show space, above which will be poems, songs, journal writings, diagrams and pages from art textbooks erratically pasted about the walls. “I want to render the space inside my head — where these ghosts exist — while showing what influenced their formation. The ghosts are the essence of the paintings…they live in flux as a work-in-progress until I give them over into this existence…which is also their detachment from me.”Tomezsko also believes that the raw space at the Parkview Condos works well for the show, because it bares all of its insides out for people to see, which is something he also tries to exhibit in his paintings — progression is suspended in time. Henceforth, entering into the installation, you behold the artist’s studio in disarray, cluttered with the material paraphernalia necessary for Tomezsko to eek by as he bears his ghosts into being.
The installation will also include a score composed by acoustics extraordinaire Steven DiGregorio, who created a piece inspired by Tomezsko work. DiGregorio plays for several bands throughout the Greater Philadelphia Area, along with his band Druid Circles. There will be an artists’ meet-and-greet Saturday beginning at 8:30pm in the Parkview condos. Wine and cheese will be served. No RSVP is requiring for admission. Just come and have fun. For any questions, call (215)-625-3650 or email astella@phillycityspace.com.