Gorton + Spademan

CHARLIE SPADEMAN is an artist living in Montclair, NJ. He studied sculpture and painting at the Cleveland Institute of Art for four years from 1974 to 1977, then moved to New York and was part of the Earst Village music, film and art scene. During this time, he appeared in several films in small parts—most notably in Jim Jarmusch’s Permanent Vacation, aptly cast as a mental patient. He was the studio assistant and fabricator for artist Chryssa and designed and fabricated systems to display large works on paper by Frank Stella and James Rosenquist. Charlie moved to Montclair, NJ in 1995 and focused his practice on hand-forging artistic architectural ironwork, which led him to begin creating large-scale public artwork. He has shown his painting and photography work and has received numerous sculptural commissions throughout New Jersey and New York.

JULIA GORTON started her career as the photographer, creative director + publisher of the no wave fanzine BEAT IT!, which offered an insider’s view of the downtown New York music scene, 1976-1980. Her high-contrast photos combined with graphic patterns, DIY lettering, and random collaged elements captured a fleeting time with a unique style which she continues to explore through her photo collages, t-shirts, and zines. Nowhere New York is her photo book of life in downtown NYC during the late seventies. Gorton’s photos of musicians have been seen in NY Rocker, The New York Times, The Guardian, Vice, Dazed, i-D, and on record jackets for independent labels. Her work has been exhibited at Kata Gallery in Tokyo, Doomed Gallery in London, ICP, The Museum of the City of New York, The Brooklyn Museum, MoMA, MAD + The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Currently, her work is focused on shooting portraits in pop-up photo studios around the country and in the UK, but she finds herself returning again and again to the oldest punk house in the south, 309 Punk Project in Pensacola.