The Jewish Community Center of Metropolitan Detroit’s Janice Charach Gallery will present a new exhibit, “Out with the New, in with the Old,” focusing on a year-long collaboration between local artists Tony Roko and Bowen Kline, August 22-October 10, 2013.
The event will open 5-7 p.m. Thursday, August 22, with a preview for gallery patrons, followed by a reception, open to the general public, from 7-10 p.m. There is no charge.
Included in the exhibit will be one of Roko and Kline’s newest works, “The Last Kaddish,” a six-foot-tall painting that recalls the horrors of the Holocaust.
“This exhibit encourages viewers to take an intellectual look at the works, examining the order and process of two contrasting artists, working simultaneously as a ‘third’ emerges,” said Gallery Director Terri Stearn.
Both self-taught, Roko and Bowen began working together last year. Roko’s clients include Coca-Cola, Vitamin Water, Vibe magazine and the Dance Theater of Harlem. Recently commissioned to paint an official portrait of Lady Gaga, his works hang in the Michigan State Capitol Building, the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History and the Motown Historical Museum. Most recently, he was featured in Ford Company’s “Go Further” ad campaign. Bowen Kline has works held in private collections in New York, Miami and Chicago, among other cities, as well as in Michigan in Artspace II in Birmingham, in Grand Rapids and Oak Park. Kline makes his home in Romeo and has garnered a reputation for his expressive portraits and nudes.
The Janice Charach Gallery is open Sunday-Wednesday 10 a.m.-5 p.m. and Thursday 10 a.m.-7 p.m. and is located inside the JCC, 6600 W. Maple Road in West Bloomfield. For information, call (248) 432-5448.
