ABOUT THE WEST CHELSEA FESTIVAL of ART

The West Chelsea Festival of Art, WCFOA, is the first annual public art festival of its kind to be presented in the historical West Chelsea Art Gallery district November-December 2023.

The festival's purpose is to present a curated selection of works of art, film, fashion, music, and performance alongside public programming which supports rigorous discourse within the international art community.

A celebration of New York City’s West Chelsea art district, a foundation of the art world in New York, WCFOA highlights important contemporary artists and the public issues at the forefront of creative discourse - including intersectional feminism, LGBTQ rights and representation, anti-violence, anti-racism, art as a unifying force of community, spirituality, environmental protection, and the rise of touchless technology.

The festival is presented in partnership with several prominent Art Organizations throughout greater NYC, which include the Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, Franklin Furnace, Lambda Literary, Culture Push, Dyer Arts Center, Not-White Collective, Anthropology of Motherhood Art Start, Materials for the Arts.

The West Chelsea Festival of Art is organized and presented by West Chelsea artist, Scotto Mycklebust (Artist, Founder, Executive Producer, and the Public Art Squad Projects) with support from co-curators Katie Cercone and Eva Mueller. 

WEST CHELSEA FESTIVAL OF ART
526 West 26th Street, Studio 511, New York, NY 10001

www.westchelseafestival.info

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West Chelsea Festival of Art Artists' Team
	Scotto Mycklebust is a New York based artist who has built a life and career around the avant-garde. Pushing aside notions of form and genre, Mycklebust thrives in his undefinable, ever-changing means of expression, moving from one medium to the next with ease and purpose. For Mycklebust, motivation does not come through creating something beautiful but from the creation itself, whatever form it may take. Using the moment as his muse, Mycklebust observes the world around him, noting the trials, tribulations and tenacity of society through the years. His West Chelsea studio, located in the epicenter of the contemporary gallery district, allowed Mycklebust to become involved in the West Chelsea art community as he championed and produced public art projects and events as well as launched and published a print art commentary publication titled Revolt Magazine. His public art events included the High Line Open Studios and the West Chelsea artist open studios. In addition to these endeavors, Mycklebust curated and produced numerous exhibitions, public art events and programs and continued on to publish another art commentary magazine titled Art511 Magazine, www.art511mag.com.
Scotto Mycklebusrt, Artist, Founder, Executive Producer
	As a yogi and artist of over twenty years, it is through my Art practice that I began to develop a modern sense of the spiritual anchored in archetypal female power. My textile works are fabric based sculptural pieces made from recycled materials that have multiple uses as ritual talismans, wearables, dreamcatchers and traveling altars. My most recent body of work involves an in-depth visual study of the Feminsit Cosmos, including outer-lying feminist asteroids, presented online as astro-memes, physically as astro-feminist “pillow pictures” and performative, socially-engaged pop-up astro-oracles. VENUS Rx is the fabric residue of an interactive astro-feminist performance oracle drawing wisdom from matrifocal mystery traditions and cultural folklore about Venus (center of the Feminist Zodiac). VENUS Rx corrects the patriarchal monopoly on mythic destiny, fortifying collective social-emotional wellness around the concept of Love most broadly defined. Visitors entered the Venus Rx performative installation space to receive 5-15 min guided sessions breaking down their Venus placement, followed by symbolic placement within the Venus Rx textile - hand-sewn on-site as part of the process. Chariklo is a textile work based on the feminist asteroid discovered in 1997 at 6° Leo. Wife of “Wounded Healer” asteroid Chiron, Chariklo is associated with the heart chakra and the centaur. Chariklo patiently abides, bears compassionate witness and silently nurtures, her receptivity facilitating a deep healing process, offering qualities we may usefully cultivate in the face of adversity and suffering.
Katie Cercone, Artist, Co-Curator
	I am a Brooklyn-based non-binary conceptual artist and photographer. "Why" was my most used word as a child. Curiosity is my creative driving force. I am drawn to weirdness and attracted to ambiguity because it keeps me inquiring. At the same time, the practical minimalism of the German Bauhaus School and the irrational silliness of Dadaism profoundly influenced my aesthetic and outlook in life. All that, combined with my rather gender-free upbringing, led me on a path of continuously questioning the prevailing gender binary in our social system. From a young age, I never saw it as anything other than a cultural construct. I employ mainly portraiture and nude photography in my projects which I sometimes presented traditionally as framed prints on the wall or composed as multi-media, immersive installations. My main projects in the past years revolve around our human existence's core constructs, such as gender identity (GenderFuck, Twisted Twins – XXY, MYSOLATION), race (FLOWERS & CHOCOLATE) and sexuality (SPERM, Kinksters.). With each work I present, my goal is to confuse/disorient the viewer to the extent that allows them to gain a new perspective and thus reconsider previous judgments. In 2022 I curated my first exhibition, PRESENT, featuring 33 queer artists from Berlin and New York.
Eva Meuller, Artist, Co-Curator
	Fanny is a visual and movement creator and instructor, as well as a student of the mystical path. For the past 4 years, she has been delving deeply into the experiences of trane and ecstasy, the role of emotions in manifestation, and the non-locality of consciousness. She is a trained facilitator of Ritual Body Postures by the Cuyamungue Institute and is currently an apprentice to Master of Yarsan Sufi order and scholar Farima Berenji. She has been invited to perform, be part of collaborative projects and work with local and international artists and organizations such as NOoSPHERE Arts, Center for Remembering and Sharing, BAX, The Brooklyn Nomads, Stanley Love Performance Group, Culture Push, Dance to the People, Harlem Dance Club, Gaia NoMaya, Nancy Azara, Katie Cercone, Colectivo Tarantula (MEX), El Otro Mono (MEX), Sinestesia (MEX), Laura Ríos (MEX), among others. Through her work, she seeks to bring forward experiences of transcendence through the alignment of the body/mind/spirit and demystify important aspects of life that we’ve been conditioned to undermine.
Fanny Perez, Artist, Co-Curator
	Isabelle Schneider is a photographic mixed media artist based in Ridgewood, Queens. Her meditative, lens-based mixed media works are a surreal convergence of shadows and light reflections, evoking a sense of peace and neighborhood bliss, and often encapsulating a harmony of nature and modernity. She is a graduate of Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University and has been a fine art studio assistant to many accomplished artists and designers, as well as a curatorial assistant and an organizer/curator in her own art community of Ridgewood, Queens. Her work has been exhibited by Trestle Gallery, Field Projects, The Yard Art Program, Local Project, Artspace 109 and Art511 Magazine, as well as in juried competitions and West Chelsea Highline Open Studios events.
Isabelle Schneider, Artist, Event Coordinator
	Elizabeth Lerman is a creative writer based in Brooklyn. She loves woods, waves, wildlife, horror, highways, and alliteration. Her writing has been published by Curlew New York, Coffin Bell Journal, Blood Tree Literature, On the Run and Ruminate Magazine, among others. You can reach Elizabeth and read more of her work via her website www.elizabethlermanwriting.com, Instagram @elizabethlermanwriting.
Elizabeth Lerman, Writer, Communciations
	My name is Sal, I'm a writer, artist, and educator residing in nyc. I'm interested in exploring inner landscapes through process-oriented art. I'm passionate about using art as a tool for:reclaiming power over our individual & collective narratives, bridging inner and outer worlds, and ultimately transforming the way we experience, move, communicate, and share our multidimensional selves.
Sal Chen, Artist, Project Coordinator
	Ronit Levin Delgado is a New York–based multidisciplinary visual artist and a Fulbright Scholar from Israel. Levin Delgado has won multiple awards and honors, including the most recent and prestigious Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Artist-in-Residence program for 2023-24, the 2023 Amen Artist of the Week Fellowship, Asylum Arts, Trestle gallery, the Fulbright Scholarship, and is currently serving on the board of directors of Fulbright's Greater New York Chapter, The Jewish Art Salon, ArtKibbutz and the Muslim-Jewish Solidarity Committee as the Art and Culture Advisor. Levin Delgado has had solo and two-person exhibitions, and her multimedia work has been widely shown in international group exhibitions in Israel, Europe and the US, including the Queens Museum, Heller Museum, Art Basel Miami, Spring/Break Art show, Magnan Metz Gallery, Pratt Manhattan Gallery, Trestle, The Border, The Cell, Museum of Russian Art, Grace Exhibition Space (NY), The Frame (PA), Guttman Museum, Hertzelilinblum Museum (TLV), Cardiff, Wales and Leeds(UK). Her most recent upcoming show, Levin Delgado was selected to exhibit her work at the Jerusalem Biennale in November 2023. Her work is featured in both private and public collections.
Ronit Levin Delgado, Artist, Project Coordinator
	Hello, I'm Stella Lillig, a versatile artist and aspiring videographer based in the vibrant heart of the city. My artistic journey has been an exhilarating ride through the world of colors, textures, and stories. With a palette of mediums at my disposal, from painting to photography, I've explored the endless realms of artistic expression. But my passion doesn't stop with static art. I'm thrilled to dive into the dynamic world of videography, where I'll be weaving narratives through moving images. With each project, I aim to capture the essence of life and its beautiful chaos, making it a visual symphony for all to enjoy.
Stella Lillig, Artist, Videographer, Documentions