W.O.P.
Organized by John O'Brien, Samantha Fields, Joan Kahn and Christina Valentine

Artists » Samantha Fields (Leonardo Bravo, Annie Buckley, Jamison Carter, Cole Case, Trygve Faste, Alison Foshee, Margaret Griffith, Keith Lord, Brian Mallman, Mary Mallman, Mery Lynn McCorkle, Christina Muraczewski, Darren McManus, Tom Muller, Matthew Penkala, Bill Radewec, Kyungmi Shin, Noah Simblist, Jessica Swanson, Sylvia Tidwell, Andre Yi)

Joan Kahn (Wendy Adest, Angie Bray, Barbara Berk, Jacqueline Dreager, Virginia Katz, Robin Mitchell, Carolie Parker Lopez)

John O'Brien (Caridad I. Barragàn, Elisabetta Diamanti, Roberto Mannino, Stefania Missio, Gian Luca Murasecchi, Guilia Napoleone, Cielo Pessione, Lydia Predominato, Daniela Quadraccia, Guido Strazza, Piero Varroni, Carlo Vincenti) + (Sam Ehrenberg, Jacqueline Freedman, Erika Lizèe, Cynthia Minet, Echiko Ohira, Minoru Ohira, Charlene Roth, Sharon Suhovy, Penny Young)

Christina Valentine (Lynn Aldrich, Kathryn Andrews, Matty Byloos, Dan Callis, Stephen Childs, Matt Furmanski, Monica Furmanski, In Young Kim, Jason Mahanes, Jonathan Puls,  Kim Schoenstadt)

Opening: Saturday, Jan. 13, 2007, 7-10 p.m.
Dates: Jan. 13 thru Feb. 10, 2007
Hours: Fri./Sat./Sun. 12 - 5 p.m.
Where: The Brewery Project 676 South Ave. 21 #33

The Brewery Project presents “W.O.P.,”a group show of works on/of paper by Italian and Los Angeles based artists, organized by Samantha Fields, Joan Kahn John O'Brien and Christina Valentine.

The Brewery Project began exhibiting artists in Fall 1997, when Kathy Reges, Richard Carlson and John O'Brien set it up as an independent, artist-organized showcase. Over the years, it has hosted many different types of exhibitions, along with hosting quite a few out of state and out of country artists. The hallmark of the Project has been that the artists themselves have self-selected and tended the exhibitions, thus making it an artist organized event structure where the sales of work have gone to the artists without intermediaries.  With The Brewery Project slated to conclude its exhibition cycle in Spring 2007, it was decided that the first show of 2007 would exhibit works on paper by a number of LA based artists and from a group of Italian artists. This is based on the numerous art exhibition exchanges organized with Italy over the 10 years of the project and is facilitated by the long standing working relationship of the project director, John O'Brien, with Italy. Beginning with exhibiting work by the Italian artists Mirella Bentivoglio and Gregorio Botta and continuing up until recently, there have been frequent Italian guest artists or Italian artist's work at the Brewery. W.O.P. will include works by Guido Strazza, Guilia Napoleone and other artists who in the 80's were part of the research groups working within the National Etching Institute (now part of the National Print Cabinet). The exhibition is titled W.O.P., an acronym stands for "with out passport" (the stamp at Ellis Island that was used to categorize immigrants) and for "works on/of paper". It is an homage to the spirit of those early immigrants and a reference to the way in which works on paper continue to cross boundaries, connecting artists from diverse parts of the world, even when the artists cannot go in person.