Tools are not always what they seem at Crest Hardware (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
Crest Hardware & Urban Garden Center
558 Metropolitan Ave. between Lorimer & Union
Daily thorugh August 31, free, Monday – Saturday 8:00 – 7:00, Sunday 10:00 – 5:00
718-388-9521
www.cresthardwareartshow.com
crest hardware art show slideshow
The annual Crest Hardware Art Show is an exhibit like none other, a fun, lighthearted display spread throughout the Brooklyn store, which is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary this year. More than one hundred artists have works on the shelves, down the aisles, hanging from the ceiling, and out in the garden, most of which are made of and/or comment on objects available at the popular hardware store. Priced from $10 to $8,888, with most works between $100 and $500, the show is like a treasure hunt, with a majority of the pieces artfully “hidden” as if they are regular hardware items. Chelsea Bahr uses toilet seats in “All the Things I’ve Read on the Pot.” Bernadette Scelta paints a paintbrush painting in “Paint a Wall and Clear Your Mind,” which evokes Magritte as it hangs among the paintbrushes. A pair of rats with a broom are not happy in Peter Pracilio’s “Damn Housing.” Aya Rosen and Ruti Dan create offbeat faces using unusual materials in “Where the Midnight Summer’s Dreams.” Jilly Ballistic places gas masks on Marilyn Monroe and a would-be subway rider that resemble nearby safety goggles and paint odor respirators in “Seven Year Itch à la Jilly Ballistic” and “E Train to World Trade Center.” Joseph Silva’s “50 Shades of Gray” features fifty squares of different shades of the color gray as if they were paint swatches. Jude Ferencz uses wires to create such Tim Burton-inspired works as “Crucified Copper” and “Copper Skate Punk.” Damien Olsen’s “Bill Murray” tells the bizarre tale of a hungry alligator and an unfortunate person. And visitors are encouraged to put on the headphones and groove to Kayrock’s self-DJ’d “Emergency Synthesizer Tool Box.” Other pieces incorporate power drills, hammers, watering cans, ladders, wrenches, chain saws, flashlights, nuts, bolts, locks, spray paint, pliers, lamps, screws, rat traps, duct tape, and other hardware elements in inventive ways. The Crest Hardware Art Show is a great way to spend a few hours when one of you wants to see art while the other is getting ready to do some home improvement. Sales from the works benefit the City Reliquary, the museum and civic organization down the street on Metropolitan Ave.