Showing posts with label Cesar Melgar. Show all posts

5/22/19

Newark Artist Kevin Blythe Sampson and Cesar Melgar invited to teach in Rome we are raising Money so that we can attend

Newark Artist Kevin Blythe Sampson and Cesar Melgar invited to teach in Rome we are raising Money so that we can attend

https://www.gofundme.com/f/NEWARK-ARTIST-TAKE-ARTENA-ITALY-ROME?fbclid=IwAR1PDeusOyg-KVmRaxpE7bz0pqkcdTGSc1EkvDRd0YgmMmcTicdKCZbE2Fk
ear family and friends,

I can’t tell you how honored and excited I am about being invited along with Cesar Melgar to teach this summer at The International Society of Biourbanism in Artena, Italy.

We have been invited along with thinkers, writers, architects, entrepreneurs, politicians, economists, citizens, activist’s artists and more, from all over the world.

We are there to create but also to represent our city and to learn more about the changing face of other cities all over the world and to receive and offer solutions.

Cesar has been invited to exhibit and to teach and I will be doing a little bit of everything including, giving talks, teaching and maybe building or creating some thing in or around the town of Artena which is suburb of Rome.

They are paying for our flight, but we need help in paying for our lodging and expenses. Cesar and I would like to have the resources to take advantage of all that is offered and to be able to stay longer in Italy to continue to make art, photograph the experience and meet with other artists and collaborate.

We need your help to take the Newark flavor to Italy! Your support would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you in advance.

With love and gratitude,

5/14/19

Newark Artist raising money to attend and to teach at The International Society of Biourbanism in Artena, Italy.

Newark Artist raising money to attend and to teach at The International Society of Biourbanism in Artena, Italy.

https://www.gofundme.com/NEWARK-ARTIST-TAKE-ARTENA-ITALY-ROME&rcid=r01-155788141685-7852cf8389e54754&pc=ot_co_campmgmt_w

I wanted to thank those who have already contributed to our gofundme to raise money so that we (Cesar Melgar) and I can attend the international gathering this summer given by The International Society of Biourbanism in Artena, Italy, (Rome
.
This is an on going fund raiser to help send us two Newark artist to Italy, were we will learn, teach and exhibit.
Thanks to those who have contributed and those who will....

Dear family and friends,

I can’t tell you how honored and excited I am about being invited along with Cesar Melgar to teach this summer at The International Society of Biourbanism in Artena, Italy.
We have been invited along with thinkers, writers, architects, entrepreneurs, politicians, economists, citizens, activist’s artists and more, from all over the world.
We are there to create but also to represent our city and to learn more about the changing face of other cities all over the world and to receive and offer solutions.
Cesar has been invited to exhibit and to teach and I will be doing a little bit of everything including, giving talks, teaching and maybe building or creating some thing in or around the town of Artena which is suburb of Rome.
They are paying for our flight, but we need help in paying for our lodging and expenses. Cesar Melgar and I would like to have the resources to take advantage of all that is offered and to be able to stay longer in Italy to continue to make art, photograph the experience and meet with other artists and collaborate.
We need your help to take the Newark flavor to Italy! Your support would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you in advance.
With love and gratitude,
Kevin and Cesar

9/11/15

Cesar Melgar Stalking Brick City by John Foster

John Foster

Stalking Brick City

As a lifetime resident of Newark, New Jersey, twenty-nine-year-old photographer Cesar Melgar grew up on its gritty streets in the company of skateboarders and graffiti artists. These early cultural influences are still very much a part of his life, as he continues to be a part of a positive creative scene in a city that has been known for its share of urban problems.

One look at his photographs and you will see that Melgar has the ability to prowl his familiar Newark streets with the stealth of a cat, at ease in places outsiders may not want to tread. Whether it is a photograph of hardworking people waiting for a morning bus or walking the alleyways at night, Melgar delivers an inside look at the places he is most comfortable in, the places he considers home, and contrary to popular thinking, “home” is not an easy topic in the arts. Home has the ability to overwhelm one with nostalgia; to hide in plain sight the problems and dysfunctional parts you know all too well; and to veil itself as something more soft and palatable for outside eyes. Melgar falls for none of that. What he delivers as a photographer is an unvarnished look at his home—the city streets.

Melgar says he now lives “practically in the shadow” of The Prudential Center, home of the New Jersey Devils hockey team. “When construction started in 2005, hundreds of families were uprooted and displaced by the building of that arena. My neighborhood was flattened—bulldozed for a surface parking lot. Can you imagine? During those years my friends (the neighborhood skaters) and I banded together to survive. We squatted in an abandoned warehouse. We fully furnished it and sourced everything from nearby homes and used it as a space which we desperately needed (a skate park, a place away from our displaced homes.) This building was our ground zero and we held onto it for about two years. My documentary photography really started at this time, and while wandering through the buildings, I ran into a gentleman who later curated the first group show I was in at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in 2007. This time period was very special to me, and really informed what I love to photograph until this day. The photos I shoot today took root during this time.”

Melgar received his first camera more than ten years ago through a high school program, where students were given free instant cameras (with expired film) to go out and photograph what they wanted. “I used the free cameras to photograph my friends at the skateboard parks. It was that early teacher, Yoland Skeete—that provided the spark I needed as a visual artist.”

Today, Melgar belongs to a close-knit collective of artists and friends who lend support, people he considers extended family. But artists who find success, a word with many definitions—find it by pushing their own personal limits and working hard to give meaning to what they make. Melgar is on the right path—his own path—and appears to have always has been.