New Brow Art Takes Its Place, "G40: The Summit" reviewed

“G40: The Summit” is a massive international art show put on by Art Whino in Crystal City. Occupying four floors of an office building and including works from over 500 artists, it boasts an impressive array of work. It’s raison d’être, according to its own website, is to celebrate, explore, and generate discussion around art’s New Brow genre. This genre, which has been captured in several recent documentaries, is the outgrowth of an underground, self-taught art movement, with roots in comics, graffiti, skate culture and punk culture.  

On entering any of the floors of the exhibit, it becomes clear that G40 really does want to create an opportunity for conversation. The works that are displayed in the open spaces, such as murals and other large-scale paintings, generate a natural, yet charged dialogue with one another. Other works, such as sculptural installations, design projects, and multimedia experiences are housed in the small offices that line the perimeter of the space, and offer self-contained aesthetic and emotional escapes for the wandering viewer. An impressive number of the artists bring an urgency and politicized voice to the landscape of street art. The irony of absorbing these messages in a fluorescently-lit building that could be used for any number of corporate or governmental endeavors (and also sits atop a food court filled with McDonalds and other fast food chains) can be seen as either playful or tense, but either way it sets the stage for exchanges that transcend the dynamics of the typical “gallery-going” evening.  

Within the sprawling 75,000 square foot space, G40 showcases the varied premises of New Brow art as seductive, gritty, imperfect, and essential to the future of art-making. Though the idea of just getting out your spray paints or your camera in order to make something happen is not new, the show makes the case that self-taught art is gaining membership and momentum at an unstoppable pace. Obviously, the value of art and the future aesthetics of art are no longer handed down solely from the institution, and probably never will be again. To say that the art world will henceforth be shaped by non-hierarchical networks of creators on the street, on the Internet, and within other modern communities may be a bit idealized, but we are more than justified in claming that artists now spread the ideas and designs that we give a damn about, and not what someone else prescribes.

G40 brings many emerging artists out from underground and into the light of an exciting and talked-about event — and for the most part, this is not to the detriment of the artists’ authenticity or focus. This seems especially true for some of the more seasoned artists. After meeting several creators at G40, it seems clear that the participants are there for exchange, exposure, and dialogue, and that the word “underground” has a broader definition than its spatial one.

The big opening is tonight, Saturday, March 6, and G40 will stay up for one month. You have to see the individual works if you want to understand the anatomy of the event itself – while descriptions and reviews of a show this size may provide high-level takeaways of the summit’s thematic intent, the physical intersections of artists and viewers embody the real importance of the show.