Clinton Snider

This piece of original artwork comes ready to hang.

Opening Friday, June 30th at Detroit’s Inner State Gallery “LAX/DTW” will feature over 80 local and international artists curated by Los Angeles-based gallery Thinkspace. The massive group exhibition serves as introduction to the burgeoning New Contemporary art movement for art lovers in the Midwest, handpicked by one of the scene’s most prolific galleries.

“With roots firmly planted in illustration, pop culture, comics, street art and graffiti, put quite simply the New Contemporary Art Movement is art for the people,” Thinkspace co-founder Andrew Hosner said.

For the eleventh iteration of Thinkspace’s traveling group exhibitions, co-owners Andrew and Shawn Hosner hand picked Detroit to showcase one of their most ambitious collections to date. As part of the exhibition, the Hosners have also picked two featured artist, James Bullough for his unique cross cut portraits.

Snider’s imagery is of the vacant shells of once vital and populated homes and factories now overgrown with weeds and full of broken and boarded up windows. Yet despite the state of decay, Snider infuses the work with a strong sense of hope. His use of color is lively and varied, bright but not overwhelming, creating a vitality for what in reality must be grayer scenery. The color provides a touch of sentiment a memory of a brighter past as well as forward thinking the promise of a better tomorrow. Whether a tree or a ubiquitous utility pole, each piece has a prominent vertical form, like a blossom reaching sunward in spring. Snider recognizes rightly that decay and growth are inseparable aspects of the cycle of life.