The Dufala Brothers, well-known for their participation in the wildly popular Philadelphia band Man Man, are noted artists with featured exhibits in both Philadelphia and Brooklyn. The most recent exhibit showed from January 11th through today, February 9th, as part of Challenge 3 at Philadelphia’s Fleisher Art Memorial.
Fleisher is in its 30th season of presenting the four-part Wind Challenge exhibition and this year The Dufala Brothers were on set of 12 artists chosen from hundreds of applicants to diaplay their work. Located in South Philadelphia’s 700-block of Catherine Street, Fleisher Art Memorial exhibitiona are open and free to the public with an optional, but unsolicited, donation box at the front door.
The installation by The Dufala Brothers provided social commentary on homelessness (quite a problem in their hometown of Philadelphia), genetic engineering, beauty, and violence. One full wall was covered in black and white pictures of homeless men and women sleeping on the streets of Philadelphia in the shape of a house. Next to the collage was a sculpture piece made from those big lawn ornament snowglobes; instead of a snowman inside, The Dufala Brothers fashioned a homeless man sleeping on a mattress surrounded by garbage and a bottle of liquor.
Featured along another wall were two drawings, one of which was a camera fashioned from leaves and the other was two guns also created from leaves. Several small mixed media sculptures lined another wall. The first piece was a man squatting in bushes fashioned from several pieces of paper which created an interested 3D effect. Next was a large sculpture in the shape of a box of matches with hundreds of tiny matches inside all of which donned different facial expressions (similar to what is pictured). A whole purple chicken (headless, featherless, like something you’d eat before it’s been cooked), with pink nipples sat atop another pedestal. Next came a small brown couch (Barbie-sized) atop which sat the carcass of a rat.
The fourth wall featured two large drawing, one of a series of a squirrel which ended up being stomped and another of two pigs with intestines spilling out. Next to the larger drawings were a series of small, varied drawings tacked up to a cork board which museum goers well allowed to take for free. I respected the sign’s wishes of being discriminate of taking on one piece, though I wonder what the gallery will be doing with the many pictures that still remained tacked to the board when the exhibit closes this afternoon. The gallery’s pi�ce de r�sistance was called “Gurney with AK47″ which was literally a gurney set-up with an AK47 wrapped in bandages and an IV drip leading to the gun’s barrel. The asking price for this piece is “Two comprehensive healthcare plans,” which I unfortunately am unable to afford.
Head over to The Dufala Brothers’ website to check out some more great art, including toilet affixed to bicycles, icecream trucks mashed with military tanks, and drawings of body parts intertwined and morphing into machines.
The Dufala Brothers website
Fleisher Art Memorial website
Man Man website | myspace
[where: 719 Catharine St, Philadelphia, PA 19147]
