We're used to dealing with scenarios involving a big white elephant in the room, but we have to admit that not once have we had to deal with there being a big orange bear head in the room.
Friday, and the sidewalk in front of 1414 Monterey Street was six deep for the opening reception of Nothing is Impossible, the Mattress Factory's current answer to life's "what if" question, where the dare bear was just one piece that had us dreaming a little dream a la artists Karl Burke, Rhona Byrne, Brian Griffiths, Bea McMahon and Dennis McNulty, each hailing from across the pond (read: Londoners and Dubliners).
"This is the week of St. Patrick's Day and we have all these Irish artists in town...having them here at this time of the year has been an interesting experience for us!" mused MF's Jeffrey Inscho.
The first in a series by curators-in-residence Mark Garry and Georgina Jackson, the duo continued the MF tradition of effectively cultivating the conglomerate of cool, where a sprinkling of hooligans, hipsters, artifiles, students and suits all effortlessly intermingled throughout all three floors of the gallery with MF co-directors Barbara Luderowski and Michael Olijnyk, new board chair Michael White, Christine Astorino (the reigning crown of this year's Urban Garden Party), and Karla Boos and Joel LeGall.
