By Hannah J. Farrow
Burning houses, exploding telephone lines, rising smoke: tonight, Friday, April 26, Justin Wagher’s solo exhibition “Expired Dreams” opens at 6 p.m. The exhibition is hosted by Mergeculture Gallery, located in Tampa at 1544 N Franklin Street, and will be showing through May 14.
“Expired Dreams is a metaphor for broken dreams, failures of our current socioeconomic climate, and just the overall feeling of dealing with disdain, tragedy, and peril,” Tony Krol, owner and curator of Mergeculture, wrote in an email. “With the negative there is always a renewal, and with this body of work, the images assume a rebuild, renewal, or subsequent growth.”
Artist Wagher’s works are exclusively in black and white, and despite a vast array of color, evoke deep emotion in the viewer. “[Mr. Wagher] wants to focus on the destruction of the images, but with sense of what’s to come,” Mr. Krol said.
Mergeculture partakes in Fourth Friday Tampa, which celebrates the art and culture scene in the area. As you view the exhibition, curator Krol asked to keep in mind that Mr. Wagher is one of the youngest working artists in the Tampa Bay area.
“ It’s important for collectors and viewers to pay attention to his work now and see how it has evolved and where he’s going,” according to Mr. Krol.
For more information, call the gallery at 813- 586-4765.