Spaces around Rockford turn into art galleries for Fall ArtScene

By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
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ROCKFORD — This weekend businesses in downtown, Midtown and across the city become temporary art galleries for the year’s second installment of ArtScene.

The biannual gallery walk, which happens each spring and fall dating back to 1987, showcases everything from painters and photographers to performance artists at roughly 35 locations around Rockford.

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Art will fill restaurants, dry cleaners, bars, tattoo parlors and tailors Friday and Saturday for Fall ArtScene.

“ArtScene is a wonderful opportunity for artists to engage with the business community and with special spaces and places that may not typically have art in them,” said Mary McNamara Bernsten, executive director of the Rockford Area Arts Council, which hosts the event.

The event, of course, also happens in traditional galleries and art studios, too. That gives resident artists a chance for a season-end recap of sorts where they can show off the projects that have kept them busy through the first nine months of the year.

“The truth is it gives us a deadline to clean the studio and make it presentable. It’s like when you have your family over for the holidays and you find yourself scrubbing corners you’ve never scrubbed before,” artist Jenny Mathews joked. “It’s also a really wonderful opportunity to show what we’ve been working on all year.”

Mathews work will be on display with other residents artists of Fraim & Mortar, 3022 Wallin Ave., a blend of warehouse, workshop, maker space and art studio on the city’s west side.

Her work will be part of a show with Jeremy Klonicki, Chris Johnson, Dustin Eckhardt, Stefi Jade, Rob Mulkins, Carly Rose, Drew Eurek and Jacob Roufa.

“We’ve got a really nice mix of artists right now,” Klonicki said of the residents artists at Fraim & Mortar. “I’ve spent a lot of time curating this collection of people that works together and jives together. I take a lot of pride in the energy we’ve assembled here.”

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The variety on display at Fall ArtScene ranges from neoexpressionist paintings such as those by Rosa Salinas Rubio at Lucha Cantina, to an awareness-raising piece of performance art at Test Site by Bob Schlehuber, to “paintings with sculptural tendencies,” as John Deill describes his work being exhibited at Kortman Gallery.

“The materials, the colors, the craftsmanship, and the subtle imagery in his art makes for work thatʼs imaginative and elegant,” Kortman Gallery director Doc Slafkosky said of Deill’s work.

At The Music Box of Rockford, the late Steven Alban’s work will be on display on the two-year anniversary of his death. Alban died on Oct. 4, 2022, and his sister Susan Sunday found roughly 200 paintings in his apartment. His work was first displayed a year ago at the McPherson, and now it’s back for ArtScene.

“It’s edgy. It’s not living room art,” Sunday said. “We call it an out-of-this-world experience.”

Schlehuber, who went into an isolation room on Wednesday evening as part of a project to raise awareness about the loneliness epidemic, is due to emerge at 5 p.m. Saturday during the second day of ArtScene.

That piece of performance art, which is being livestreamed, is one of the less traditional experiences that is setting the latest installment of ArtScene apart, McNamara Bernsten said.

“We starting to pull through ArtScene some unique experiences for people,” she said.

If you go | Fall ArtScene

When: 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Friday, Oct. 4; 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 5

Where: There are more than 35 locations. See all HERE

Info: Go HERE

This article is by Kevin Haas. Email him at khaas@rockrivercurrent.com or follow him on X at @KevinMHaas or Instagram @thekevinhaas and Threads @thekevinhaas