A Big-Tent Party

Bright, toothpick-scale architecture crawls up broken banisters at “The Collaspe.” Local art superstar Michael Arcega’s new show grins pragmatically at a postapocalyptic wasteland, using awesomely mutated tent structures and another man’s trash. As usual with Arcega, the whole thing either makes you giggle or has gone over your head, since he packs everything with double entendres, even the horrifying parts. Inspired by widespread pop-cultural fascination with, as he puts it, “Survivalist and bunker mentality,” Arcega is essentially playing with ideas about home. Hence, plain wooden staircase railings with secret worlds inside them, and the familiarity of stretched nylon and aluminum poles turned on its head — he’s trying to pull the rug out from under our weird love of the Mad Max lifestyle. Fifteen percent of the proceeds from “The Collapse” benefit the Philippine National Red Cross, in case you thought any of this was frivolous.

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• International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies

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An opening reception starts at 5 p.m. Oct. 24.
Oct. 24-Dec. 5, 2009