Foundation One Goes West

If you've followed my blog at all, you know that I'm a huge fan of Foundation One Studios in Decatur. They are one of a handful of galleries in Atlanta that focus on the urban contemporary aesthetic. Their walls are regularly graced by the work of graffiti, street, and tattoo artists. Over the past year I've seen underlying clues that they are also interested in the pop surrealism movement, popular on the west coast and commodified by such magazines as Juxtapoz. This Saturday Foundation One comes out of the pop surrealist closet with the opening of their new group show "Groundwork."

Along with some of the usual suspects of local, increasingly less underground art ( John Tindel, Michi, Urban Medium, Sam Parker, Keet D’Arms, Jason Honig, Dosa, Blink, Hilary Gore, Bethany Marchman, Rene Arriagada, Born), Dosa Kim and Ivan Annikov, co-curators, bring in some other big names from around the country (Sam Flores, Kathie Olives, Damon Soule, caffeine, Brandt Peters, John Puglisi, Tragnark, George Thompson, Marion Bolognese, Jason Kochis, Matthew Kucynski, David Flores, Lola, BASK, Nathan Spoor, Jamie Zollars, Chris Yormick, Joe Shea, Tyson).

From the looks of Foundation One's newly renovated site, these west coast trends are indicative of the direction that they are trying to take the gallery. I'm curious to see if they begin to pursue big names in this movement from out west, or if they continue to feature local artists who are clearly influenced by, but not necessarily included with the pop surrealists. My hope is that they strive for some sort of balance between local and national artists.

Foundation One Studios
Juxtapoz Magazine