Shadows Taller Than Our Souls
Christa Whitten at Real Art Ways

Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by Christa Whitten.  Cairns have long served as way-finding constructions in terrain where the trail may become unclear. These carefully stacked rock piles act as navigational aids and are trusted to guide the way in critical conditions, such as when dense fog or storms obscure the path. They provide direction in uncertain times. These cairns are offered as places to pause and reflect, reminding us to focus on the waypoints in the storm…

Real Art Ways presents Distant Bystander; a solo exhibition by Priya N. Green  Priya N. Green’s work delves into the fragile interplay between sight, perception, and reality. Anchored in the relentless repetition of images from the 24-hour news cycle, Green’s paintings grapple with the tension between agitation and desensitization. This constant barrage of mediated visuals shapes her response: a search for emotional connection amidst the noise. Rooted in large-scale oil paintings, Green’s recent series draws from found images of protests…

Real Art Ways presents artwork by Bethani Blake  Blake translates a present day world which depicts personal nostalgia, recontextualizing appropriated and personal images. A first generation Black person in an immediate family of white Americans, she grew up surrounded by iconography and other paraphernalia specific to American culture and first-world consumption. Conflicting agency as a consequence of existing between contradictory circumstances, she chooses to acknowledge this connection which drives her to depict an experience in contemporary society with subject matter…

Real Art Ways presents Thin Ice; a solo exhibition by Joseph Smolinski.  Thin Ice, 2020 Digital animation, 6 min. 31 sec. I was born in the 1970’s shortly after the Oil Embargo that brought our country to a halt. The period of 1975-1980 was a missed opportunity to learn from our unsustainable addiction to fossil fuels and embrace innovative new green technologies. In hindsight, this inaction has set us on a course of grave danger all while marketing campaigns from…

Above image:  Mariana Iacono and Juan De La Mar, El VIH se enamoró de mi (HIV Fell in Love With Me), 2024. Commissioned by Visual AIDS for Red Reminds Me…   Day With(out) Art 2023: Red Reminds Me… Real Art Ways is proud to partner with Visual AIDS for Day With(out) Art 2024 by presenting Red Reminds Me…, a program of seven videos reflecting the emotional spectrum of living with HIV today.  Red Reminds Me… will feature newly commissioned videos by…

Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by photographer Peter Brown.    The images in Memories Misused represent recollections from a personal trauma the artist Peter Brown experienced as a victim of an armed home invasion in 2013. The themes of innocence, violence, dismay, anger, violation, vengeance, resilience, and justice throughout these works convey the multi-layered dispositions associated with persons suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.      The work is produced from digital captures, color negative film, lensless cameras, Pinhole photography,…

Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by Real Art Award winner Sophia-Yemisi Adeyemo Sophia-Yemisi Adeyemo (b. 1999 in Burlingame, CA) is an interdisciplinary artist creating liberatory visions. Both historical liberation struggles and current resistance movements are central to how Adeyemo constructs the scenes in her work. At the intersection of assemblage, painting, and sculpture, Adeyemo pulls from the visual sensibilities of graffiti, protest art, Cuban solidarity posters, hand-drawn shop signs, and non-canonized African-diasporic storytelling sensibilities (so-called “naive” art) as…

Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by interdisciplinary artist Denisse Griselda Reyes.  I only found you when I stopped looking, Reyes’s first solo show in Connecticut, features short films, familial ephemera, and a new body of paintings that humorously explore themes of self-formation, reparative representation, and archival preservation. I only found you when I stopped looking serves as a thoughtful response to Reyes’s previous show, Did you have a hard time finding me? at A.I.R. Gallery. The titles draw inspiration…

High Society: A Conversation about Art and Pharma A discussion with independent writer and curator Sarah Fritchey and artist Jeff Ostergren on High Society, an exhibition at Real Art Ways. Thursday, August 1, 6PM Free Admission For more information please click HERE Real Art Ways presents a solo exhibition by New Haven-based painter Jeff Ostergren. Jeff Ostergren makes art about the intertwined histories of pharmaceuticals and color. His pointillist, color-saturated paintings, sculptures, and videos, infused with actual pharmaceuticals and chemicals,…

A discussion about Real Art Way’s new exhibit No Bodies: Clothing as Disruptor involving visual artists, poets, designers, and curator Alva Greenberg. Within this conversation, participants will discuss the use of written language within the exhibit, assumptions of materiality, cultural identity, and other elements that can make clothing a Disruptor. No Bodies: Artists in Conversation will be held at Real Art Ways, Hartford, on March 29th, 2024 from 5:30pm to 7:00pm.  Discussion Panelists     Carlos Estévez was born and raised…