JFW at Five Points Gallery
My solo exhibition “Torn Books and Lost Texts” in the TDP Gallery of Five Points Gallery of Torrington Connecticut features altered, painted volumes (“Atlas Agonistes” shown here) addressing the meaning of what the ripped-out content of an open book might still say to the viewer. The exhibition will be on view through November 9th, 2024.
JFW at Standard Space Gallery
I’m very pleased to be in the 2-person “This World” exhibition at Standard Space Gallery in Sharon CT. Pictured here is ‘History Lesson’ (2022), one of 9 bookworks of mine on display along with 11 collages and glazed stoneware pieces by Jeff Joyce @the.joycer.
The exhibition remains on view through October 6, 2024.
JFW in Lightwood magazine
Lightwood is an online magazine on life and the arts in the 21st century, edited by poet and publisher Laurence Carr, who came for a recent studio visit. The resulting post on my work, with photos and texts, is now out in the Fall issue #15. “Artist and writer John Frederick Walker is book person, both as an author and as a visual creator using books as the primary medium for his visually and emotionally charged, 3-dimensional artworks. Lightwood visited his studio and was caught up in both his process and his finished pieces where discarded and worn books are saved from the compost pile and fire to become visual and ghostly literary objects of beauty and mystery.”
Check out the full post:
https://lightwoodpress.com/2023/09/22/artists-in-space-john-frederick-walker-book-art/
Towers of Ivory: Does Japan have an ivory problem? It’s complicated.
In a just-published essay in The Smart Set, I examine Japan’s domestic legal ivory market, which is widely thought by many conservationists to be contributing to elephant poaching. Does it?
Given the widespread laundering of poached tusks in national ivory markets elsewhere, most elephant advocates are convinced that it must be happening in Japan as well — even if there’s no evidence of it.
The problem Japan has with ivory sales is much more complicated: it’s a tangle of seductive traditional art, insufficient enforcement and growing rejection of sustainable wildlife trade….
Read the entire article at https://www.thesmartset.com/towers-of-ivory/
JFW in Craven Contemporary “New Nudes” show November 16 – Jan 19
John Frederick Walker, Lip Service (2012)
“New Nudes” is a group show of some of the hottest contemporary artists who are either new or showing the male and female body in a new way. The two largest works in the show are collages by Mickalene Thomas and Troy Michie which appear on the long gallery wall. Other smaller works shown alongside are by artists including Danielle Orchard, Sam McKinniss, Lou Fratino, Mona Kuhn, Bruno Leydet, Linder, Paul Sepuya, Elad Lassry, Jeremy Kost and Erwin Olaf.
The show will also feature a table of altered book works by local Washington, CT based artist John Frederick Walker.
CRAVEN CONTEMPORARY / 4 Fulling Lane / Kent, CT 06757
JFW “Book Works” exhibit at The Judy Black Park, March 13 – April 9, 2019
(Un)furled Text,2018. Mixed media/altered book, 9 ¼ x 21 ¾ x ¾ inches
The Judy Black Memorial Park and Gardens in Washington Depot, Connecticut, presents “John Frederick Walker: Book Works.” Previews of the exhibition begin March 13, followed by an opening reception and artist’s talk on Saturday, March 16, from 4-6 pm. Walker’s work will be on exhibit through April 9.
John Frederick Walker has pursued dual careers as an artist and writer since the 1970s, moving to Litchfield county in 1985. His art has been exhibited in one-person and group shows nationally, and is represented in a number of private and public collections, including the Yale University Art Gallery, the Brooklyn Museum, and the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.
Walker began incorporating book forms into his art in the mid-1990s. The pieces in this exhibition all derive from actual books, or book fragments, radically altered. “Part sculpture, part collage, Walker’s ‘book art,’” writes Emily Soell, “ranges from dramatic, wall-dominating pieces to charming diminutive works.”
The artist has taken advantage of The Judy Black Park’s open, light-filled exhibition space to mount a mini-survey of his recent work. “Book Works” focuses on key themes of Walker’s art: hidden, missing or destroyed information, using the device of open book spreads from which pages have been torn or cut, and turning what remains into graphic meditations on memory and loss.
Regular viewing hours are Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, 2-5 pm, and also by appointment (visit the contact page on the artist’s website).
JFW interviewed on CGTNAmerica
“CGTN’s Rachelle Akuffo spoke to John Frederick Walker about the state of elephant populations and conservation measures. Walker is the author of “Ivory’s Ghosts: The White Gold of History and the Fate of Elephants.””
The Dark Side of Ivory Prohibition: Will it help elephants or just vandalize culture?
With 25,000 African elephants being slain every year for their tusks, maybe it was inevitable that elephant advocates would grow impatient with critically important but slow-paced efforts to help rural communities co-exist with Africa’s herds, root out endemic corruption in range states, and expose international wildlife trafficking rings.
Now, nearly three decades after the ban, with no end to elephant poaching in sight, their attitudes have gone strident, spiraling into emotion-driven campaigns and unhinged extremism that threatens to turn the war on poaching into an incoherent war on ivory….
Read the entire article at https://thesmartset.com/ivory-prohibition/
John Frederick Walker 
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