Walk All Over Waterloo Highlights Many New Exhibitions Amid Changing North Collinwood Landscape

It may have seemed quiet, but recent months have seen major changes along Waterloo Road in North Collinwood. Earlier this year, longtime executive director Brian Friedman left Collinwood’s community development corporation, Northeast Shores. Just days later, the community voted in many new board members (and subsequently voted out several former board members). After being the poster child for gentrification in Northeast Ohio for the past several years, even earning national attention on multiple occasions, it will be interesting to see how the neighborhood’s new leadership will carry their mission forward.

One thing that hasn’t changed is the community’s art walk on the first Friday of each month. April’s Walk All Over Waterloo event features several new and continuing exhibitions. Walk All Over Waterloo takes place from 5 to 10 p.m. on Friday, April 7 (individual venue hours may vary slightly).

Waterloo Arts hosts an exhibition of artist books created from recycled materials by artists in Cleveland and Cuba. The exhibition is organized by Ediciones Vigia editor Laura Ruiz Montes, who is in Cleveland as part of the Cleveland Foundation’s Creative Fusion program.

"We are really happy to show the books published by Ediciones Vigi in the gallery and explore the connection between literary art, visual art and small edition publishing companies,” says Amy Callahan, executive director of Waterloo Arts. “The exhibit reminds me of a mail art exhibit we had a few years ago. The pieces in that exhibit were also a visual presentation of written ideas, constrained only by the ability to send them through the mail and in this exhibit there is a similarity but possibly the works are constrained by the idea of a ‘book.'"

Hosted by CAN Journal this spring, Montes’ residency will be spent interviewing Latino artists in Cleveland, and her writings will appear bilingually on CAN’s blog and in future issues. From San Juan to the Cuyahoga: Artist Books from Ediciones Vigia (Cuba) opens with a reception from 5 to 9 p.m. on Friday, April 7, during April’s Walk All Over Waterloo, and remains on view through May 19.

During next month’s art walk, in collaboration with Art Books Cleveland, Waterloo Arts hosts a WatchArt event. Looking ahead to next month, Callahan says, “Artists will be working in the gallery and visitors will have a chance to discuss book making and try their hand at a simple construction. It will be interesting to see where these two groups, Ediciones Vigi and Art Books Cleveland, overlap and where they are different.”

Returning our focus to April’s Walk All Over Waterloo event, Satellite Gallery hosts its latest round of art installations, Natural Environments: Serene, Wild & Growing. Led by CIA alum Carmen Romaine, students from the Center for Arts-Inspired Learning are creating a biosphere created from repursed materials. Participating artists include: Cimira Crews, Joshua Harris, Iman Harrison, Ashley Jones, Dante Player, Imari Rivers, Christine Chapman-Sung, Daila Wilson and Serenity Wyatt. Satellite Gallery also features additional installations by John Guarnieri, Allyn Rosser and Nicolae Sadovnic.

Space: ROCK, located next to the Beachland Ballroom & Tavern hosts its first exhibition of 2017. The city’s only gallery devoted exclusively to concert photography, Space: ROCK presents Shots in the Dark, recent work by Kevin McCann. Friday’s opening features live music from the Talented, Miss Macy and the Low Pay Daddys. Speaking of the Beachland, Six Organs of Admittance and Istvan Medgyesi perform from 8:30 to 11 p.m. (doors at 7:30). Tickets to the concert are $10 in advance or $12 at the door.

Exhibitions currently on view include Paul Sydorenko’s 366 Days of Skulls at the Maria Neil Art Project, which opened during last month’s art walk. The exhibition collects a yearlong daily drawing project. Each week, Sydorenko switched media, but maintained the same subject matter throughout the process. The result is a room filled with hundreds of drawings of skulls. Believe it or not, this isn’t the first time someone has drawn skulls every day for a year. Noah Scalin’s Skull-A-Day project has inspired countless other daily drawing projects, and Scalin published a daily creativity journal to further inspire others’ daily drawing projects. Perhaps Sydorenko’s 366 Days of Skulls will inspire local artists to begin their own daily projects.

Also continuing this month, Centrifugal at Praxis Fiber Workshop showcases hand and jacquard weaving, quilt and fabric installation, painted soft sculptures and video by four artists from outside Northeast Ohio. The artists are united by their mutual explorations of centrifugal force. Participating artists include: Naomi Clark, Eliza Fernand, Karolina Gnatowski, and John Paul Morabito.

(Waterloo Arts) 15605 Waterloo Rd., 216-692-9500, waterlooarts.org.
(Satellite Gallery) 442 East 156th St., [email protected].
(Maria Neil Art Project) 15813 Waterloo Rd., 216-481-7722, marianeilartproject.com.
(Praxis Fiber Workshop) 15301 Waterloo Rd, praxisfiberworkshop.org.