Unrealism: A Moment That Already Belongs to the Past
- Mar 17
- 2 min read
Photos from the Unrealism exhibition at Water Street Studios were taken just five minutes before the show transitioned into that mysterious and unreachable place known as the past. Art openings always exist in this strange temporal space; intensely present for a few hours, then immediately converted into memory, documentation, and whatever traces remain.
And yet, in some alternate universe, the convergence of three artists — David Hauptschein, Michelle Stone, and Allen Vandever — will always be happening. Perhaps for those with paranormal sensitivities, these photographs function as a kind of vector, a portal back to that particular evening when ideas, images, and people briefly shared the same physical space.
Digital Work, Physical Space
One of the quiet pleasures of the exhibition was seeing digital work exist where it was always meant to be experienced, not compressed into a scrolling feed, but printed, hung, and encountered in real space. Digital images often reveal themselves differently when they leave the screen. Details emerge. Scale matters. Presence replaces distraction.
Throughout history, whenever a new artistic medium appears, there are always those willing to explore it and those determined to resist it. Photography faced this skepticism. So did digital tools. Today, artificial intelligence sits in that same uncomfortable space... misunderstood, debated, and often dismissed before it is fully explored.
For me, AI is not intelligence. It is better understood as assisted intelligence, a tool that expands possibilities but does not replace authorship. The real work still happens through selection, rejection, revision, and intention. The tool produces material. The artist produces meaning.
Three Different Approaches to Unrealism
What made Unrealism particularly compelling was the distinct yet complementary approaches of the three exhibiting artists.
Michelle Stone’s work explores evolving dreamscapes populated by surreal forms and psychological narratives. Her process is one of layering, intuition, and slow transformation, allowing images to emerge through investigation and observation rather than rigid planning.
Allen Vandever’s work exists somewhere between confession and confrontation. His practice draws from personal history, emotional vulnerability, and spiritual tension. His exhibitions feel less like presentations and more like encounters — spaces where viewers are asked not just to observe but to feel.
My own work continues an exploration of AI as a picture-making tool, creating narrative images that invite speculation rather than explanation. I have always believed that if I explain too much, I risk taking away the viewer’s role in completing the work. As Francis Bacon once asked: If you can talk about it, why paint it?
Gratitude and Continuation
Special thanks are due to gallery director Steve Sherrell and the remarkable staff at Water Street Studios for making this exhibition possible, and for supporting work that embraces experimentation and risk.
While the opening night now belongs to history, the exhibition itself ran from January 9 through February 7, giving viewers time to encounter the work slowly — the way it was meant to be seen.
For those interested in learning more about the exhibition and the artists involved, additional documentation and interviews can be found here:
Art openings end. Exhibitions close.
But the conversations they start tend to continue.
Sometimes in memory, sometimes in images, and sometimes in whatever alternate universe preserves these brief collisions of people and ideas.
And perhaps that is enough.
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