In dialogue
Evidence of the Unexpected at The Crown Gallery in Bridgeport, Connecticut combines the work of four artists who approach figuration and narrative in different ways. This group show considers the role of spontaneity in the studio—how works emerge through instinct, experimentation, and chance. The paintings and sculptures in this exhibition take shape when artists engage deeply with their materials and uncover something unexpected along the way. Curator Jane Dávila tells us about the show.
Can you please walk us through the show and point out the relationship between the artists’ works?
Entering the building, we’re met by three of Mark Rosenthal’s paintings. His figures—elongated, muscular, and outlined in black—twist and stretch across the canvas, their forms scraped and scumbled with expressive force. In the first vertical work, pink arms unfurl to the canvas edge, topped by a squat head with a scrape of teeth. A sculptural sinuous nude anchors the second piece, surrounded by grid-like patterns that hint at textiles or architectural motifs—echoes of what’s to come inside. Rosenthal’s third painting bursts with vivid cerulean impasto, pushing an attenuated figure forward: eyes glowing, head tilted, hands on hips. Inside the gallery an expansive figure surrounded by lime green and a hint of sky reaches outward as dynamic white and black forms reinforce the imposing gesture.
Inside the gallery, a steady rhythm unfolds, bursts of vibrant color punctuated by grids and hints of the organic. Jacqueline Shatz’s surreal mixed-media sculptures float across the wall. Each piece, a blend of hand-painted clay, ceramic figurine parts, shells, mirrors, and twigs, suggests a moment in motion: a dance, a dive, a fall. The first work, Leafwoman 2, feels especially enigmatic. The upper half of a delicate figurine, its head overpainted in pale yellow, perches on a V-shaped twig. Clay legs extend below a form that obscures the torso, all unified by a soft matte surface of blended yellows and traces of black. A tiny porcelain hand peeks through onto the figure’s lap. Five more sculptures line the wall, each casting layered, multi-limbed shadows that echo their gestures—flipping, floating, stepping, or swimming across the space.
Alexi Brock’s ceramic crying eyes punctuate the brick columns, their glazed tears suspended from knotted satin strings. Glazes range from satin bronze to iridescent blues and mirror-black with molten metallic trails. On the far wall, two series hang in grids. The Memoir Series features 50 ceramic tiles on custom steel shelves. Brock treats clay like paper and canvas, incising autobiographical line drawings and experimenting with glazes, lusters, and glass. Eyes, hearts, hands, and clocks recur alongside symbolic scenes—a house adrift at sea, heads bobbing in water. Teardrops from the final tile spill onto the floor. Brock’s Moments Series consists of 23 gouache works on paper, arranged in a staggered grid. Using similar iconography, these pieces glow in vivid, even fluorescent color, offering an immediate, emotional reflection on the artist’s life.
Petey Brown’s oil paintings depict museum-goers photographing art—paintings of paintings, capturing the act of looking. The scenes are familiar: milling crowds, glowing phones raised overhead. At the Whitney shows a cropped figure before a vibrant red wall; their shadow, phone in hand, reveals their presence. Brown’s layered, gestural paint adds movement and immediacy. IPhone Surprise centers on two hands holding a phone aimed toward three women. A pale sea-green light and loosely drawn fabric fill the background, while the phone’s screen reflects an unknown view– perhaps two small feet and a bright vermillion rope—shifting our gaze once again. In Olympia, a crowd gathers, long shadows and backlighting drawing focus to a glowing phone—and to Manet’s Olympia, quietly embedded in the scene. Including one of the 19th century’s most controversial paintings, Brown connects past and present—highlighting how we continue to look, frame, and mediate images through our devices, notably shifting the spectacle from the artwork to the onlooker.
What would you like to share about the venue?
Crown Gallery is committed to exhibiting high-caliber artwork that is surprising, thought-provoking, elevated, challenging, professional, beautiful and/or unusual. Metro Art Studios, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting fine and performing artists, occupies a lovingly renovated, formerly abandoned, three-story corset factory in the South End of Bridgeport, Connecticut. In addition to Crown Gallery, which presents 6-7 exhibits annually, Metro provides premium art studio space to 42 artists working in a wide variety of mediums. Many exhibitions at Crown Gallery are shaped through a collaborative curatorial process guided by the gallery committee, consisting of Jennifer Burbank, Jane Dávila, Elizabeth Katz, and Alyse Rosner, all fine artists based at Metro Art Studios.
Their combined perspectives and creative insight inform the gallery’s curatorial direction. Jennifer Burbank is a visual artist whose series-based works focus on the human experience with our natural environment and our part in reshaping its history. Alyse Rosner is recognized for her large-scale abstract paintings acknowledging the contradictions within the natural and synthetic world and the loss and regeneration continuing around us.
Make your tax-deductible donation today and help Art Spiel continue to thrive. DONATE
Evidence of the Unexpected is on view at Crown Gallery June 1 – July 19, 2025. 345 Railroad Avenue, Bridgeport CT
Instagram @metroartstudios
All photos courtesy of Crown Gallery