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Dumpster Divers in City Hall

This months' Dumpster Diver Dispatch takes us to City Hall, where the latest exhibit in the Art in City Hall series is "The Green Exhibit," a collection of work by 45 Delaware Valley-based artists on the you-know-what theme. Four of those artists are members of the Dumpster Divers of Philadelphia. On the night the show opened I got some brief audio interviews with them about how their artwork expresses and/or embodies the 'Green' ideology.

This months' Dumpster Diver Dispatch takes us to City Hall, where the latest exhibit in the Art in City Hall series is "The Green Exhibit," a collection of work by 45 Delaware Valley-based artists on the you-know-what theme.

Four of those artists are members of the Dumpster Divers of Philadelphia. On the night the show opened I got some brief audio interviews with them about how their artwork expresses and/or embodies the 'Green' ideology. You can see a few samples above, and if you click on the MP3 links below you'll hear:

  1. Ellen Benson on her 'Dumpster Divas' based on papier-mached plastic bags, and how these pieces - of which she's done around 400 so far - relate to her better known work based in family and memory.

  2. Carol Cole on transforming found objects into totemic wall sculptures inspired by African artists and regular folks who re-purposed Western objects decoratively and functionally. Mayor Nutter makes a special appearance in this clip. Find out more at CarolCole.com.

  3. John Jonik on how his cartoons are both about environmental issues and embody them, as he constructs his own frames from found wood and glass, and even occasionally trashpicks his paints. Note that the gag in his second cartoon above is echoed in the story linked here.

  4. Toni Nash has the keys to the exhibit - literally. She talks about making art from found or accumulated keys, and also about locks - how there was a time when folks would leave their doors unlocked even in downtown New York City.

Of course, there's plenty more art, and green perspectives, in the show, which you'll find on the 2nd and 4th floors of City Hall through January 23rd. City Hall is open Monday through Friday 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

With the variety of expression and talent on display, there's something to tickle every artistic sensibility - and if life really does imitate art, we should all be living a little greener by early 2009.