biennial postponed to sunday

because every weather forecaster in the country has claimed that saturday may 31st will be a storm. we have decided to postpone the biennial to its rain date, sunday june 1st. everything will still go on as planned, just 24hrs later.

Club Lyfestile

In the summer of 2006, on a sweltering Philadelphia night, twenty something twentysomethings possessing unfathomable dance abilities were lured to a secret gathering with the promise of two dozen matching jumpsuits. The chosen were to don the suits and form the ultimate dance gang.

Club Lyfestile is their name. These kids are unstoppable, hosting monthly parties at the Barbary nightclub and going on cross country summer tours. Come see them sweat it out May 31st!!!!

Philly to New Orleans

PHILLY TO NEW ORLEANS coordinates benefits raising money to send teams of volunteers to New Orleans to do various post Katrina restoration projects. They book New Orleans musicians in local venues for "Big Easy" Events which celebrate the food, music and culture of NoLa, encourage tourism and attempt to educate about the issues threatening the future of the city. They plan and organize volunteer trips in New Orleans to include gigs for musicians, shows at legendary nite clubs, tours, and hotel accommodations.

Representatives of Philly to New Orleans will be at the Biennial, selling cds taking donations, and offering more information to investors and artists alike!

Emily DiGiovanni

Interacting with the forces of nature and dealing with the humor and pathos of life, Emily DiGiovanni uses poetry, photography and mixed media to make surreal, expressive and ritualistic works of art. She is deeply influenced by landscape - most recently by the rain, bricks and mold of West Philadelphia and the dust, heat and stone of Arizona, where she worked construction for a non-profit. For the South Philly Biennial, she is collaborating with humanitarian and visual artist Arielle Messuti, painter Aaron Wemer, photographer and model Monica Mulder and sculptor Edward Lynch Carey to create three sculptural masks inspired by Aztec religion, poetry and philosophy -- all the earth is a grave and nothing escapes it, nothing is so perfect that it does not descend to its tomb.

The Random Tea Room

The Random Tea Room presents the Tea Monkeys in a live-action Tea Mission! Tea will be prepared by the Tea Monkeys in an inviting floor-level setting which everyone is encouraged to join, displaying their home-grown interpretation of the Gong-Fu style of tea-making and more. Tea from China, Taiwan, Japan, India and a few of Grand Tea Monkey Jor Kane's very own herbal infusions will be available for sipping, slurping and gulping. A healthy addition to any gathering, the Tea Mission also provides an energizing element to keep the participants fueled and festive. Come join them at the Biennial!

April Glaser, Pirate Radioess

April Glaser left home at age 16 to work with left high school and worked with a group of activists in Nashville, Tennessee to build the area's only public access, independent radio station, Radio Free Nashville. It was connected to her home. She soon left for Philly to work with the Prometheus Radio Projects, to build low-power community radio stations and help with the fight against media consolidation. She has a precocious way of getting herself involved with some of the most interesting, community based, independently minded projects and people. She is currently a student of philosophy and spent last summer living in Michigan on a boat working with FOUND magazine. and plans on spending this summer in the Catskills working on projects with the Wave Farm.

She will be setting up a 'pirate' radio station at the Biennial to broadcast music and interviews. Listeners can tune in for a few blocks radius, while she will have radio hats so visitors and artists can listen live. She is very informative and wants everyone to know that she welcomes questions on broadcasting, media consolidation, and the wavy spectrum.

Above please check out a video Prometheus projects made of their Nashville, Tennessee project, of which April was involved.

Alexandra Gorczynski & Jonathan Santoro

Alex and Jonny are philly based artists from the Rhode Island art scene. This is an image of one of Jonny's sculptures and one of Alex's videos. They will contribute with a multi media installation at the biennial. Here is a link to Alex's youtube page .

Goallana Roomtone

Welcome the biz's new reconstructive standard guru, Goallana Roomtone*! Enter his Home Depot makeup kit and a Lowes hair management do it yourself workshop station to transform yourself into yourself transformed. Goallana Roomtone is certified and verified and is the "new insecticide to the doldrums of passe at home home and body reconstructive procedure". He will be at the Biennial with his trademark trade-show booth and smile offering free trials in "extensions & redemptions" biz lingo for great hair. Just ask Jess.

new truth. new hair.

*goallana roomtone is in fact an artistic manifestation of ryan trecartin's imagination and is therefore free of responsibilty to corporate or personal liability. check out his youtube page for a real blast.

Roberta Fallon and Libby Rosof

Roberta Fallon and Libby Rosof started artblog, an art culture and criticism website, in 2003. Artblog leads a passionate focus on Philadelphia's booming contemporary art scene. Libby and Roberta are both founding members of Philadelphia Sculptors. Roberta writes art reviews for several publications, including the Philadelphia Weekly, Artnet.com and Art on Paper magazine. Libby is the former editor of the University of Pennsylvania's faculty/staff newspaper, the Penn Current.

These are links to their flickr paAnd their Flickr pages where you can find an abundance of Philadelphia Art World documentation:
Roberta's Flickr
Libby's Flickr

Libby and Roberta will be our Honorable Guests at The South Philly Biennial. We would like to celebrate their almost 20 years of collaboration and lifetime of passion and dedication to the local art scene.
Libby and Roberta will speak at the Biennial!!

The above photograph is courtesy of Martin Bromiski, visit his blog, anaba, here.

Roz Hunter & Charles Hobbs

Charles Hobbs exhibits regularly in Philadelphia and elsewhere, working mostly in installation, sculpture, and drawing. His most recent exhibit of wall paintings and kinetic art was on view at Esther Klein Gallery in Philadelphia, that's where the above photographs are from. Charles also regularly shows at Vox Populi where he has been a member for the past five years. He will be collaborating with Roz Hunter, former PIFAS faculty member and founder of a yet-to-be-named Philadelphia-based feminist organization that fosters discussion through workshops and promotes women in the arts. Below you can find a photo of her print work.
Together they will create kinetic sculpture for the South Philly Biennial.

Brian McKelligot

Brian is a Philly based artist. He has played in many bands including: Sagitarious, The Shitdiggers, The Forest, Horses Kill Horses, Brain Tongue, Live Rubble, Mamma Rolla and the Experimental People Band. He is the founder of the tape/cdr label XPPL. He's also a painter and a sculptor and will contribute with sculpture. These photographs are from a show he was in at Bobo's on 9th.

P.I.F.A.S

The Philadelphia Institute for Advanced Studies is an associate of the Biennial, as various members of their illustrious faculty and residency alumni are directly involved with the motivation, creation, and syncopation of the May 31st events. The institute is managed by enlightened despots, Brandon Joyce, and Richard Davis as seen here in their faculty portraits. Joyce is the former self proclaimed mayor of South Philadelphia's Athenaeum, a center for art and music; which supported a great deal of the "southphilly" art scene. All inquiries on these gentlemen and advanced studies will be handled by the Institute's Human Resource Department: inquiries@pifas.net.

Magnet City Kids

Magnet City Kids are a philly based noisy dance rock and roll band. They are comprised of Jake Anodide , Ashiq Khondker Jen Rice, Eliot Klein, Chris Hayden, Scott Curry, Mike Hayden and Karin Weinreich. They have been playing music together since 2000. These photos are from the first ever "this town needs a parade" in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

Renata Mann

Jewelry designer, Renata Mann, is joining the biennial with a fine art flair. She is excited to participate with a large scale installation, as well as accessories and costume for members of the team. Above is a piece from her Spring 2008 line, and below, Mandy Moore wears one of her designs for a Teen Vogue photoshoot.