The Local can’t be everywhere at once. (Though we did ask Peter Saraf to share the secret of the time machine in “Safety Not Guaranteed.” No dice.) That’s why we need you to tell us what we should be covering, and we need you to cover it. Happily, you’ve been doing just that, via our Virtual Assignment Desk. It’s not a time machine, but it’s pretty neat: It allows you to pitch stories and write them yourself, or suggest stories that others can volunteer to cover at our Open Assignments page. Here are the latest reader submissions:

PS Project Space, “Joie de Vivre ” Hullaballoo Collective Opens August 3,2012
Opening reception: August 2, 6-9pm PS Project Space presents Joie de Vivre, a group exhibition featuring artwork from the Hullaballoo Collective, an eclectic New York City-based group of artists. Hullaballoo Collective first exhibited in the 2011 Fountain Art Fair at the legendary 69th Regiment Armory, the site of the original 1913 Armory Show in which modern art was first publicly presented in the United States. Seeking Joie de Vivre is a theme in our daily lives as visual artists. Embracing joy, inclusiveness, and unity, while respecting artistic diversity is our collective “work in progress.”

Hullaballoo Collective artists create work using varied ways of seeing and making; the viewer is invited to seek connections, associations, unexpected dialogues and individual discoveries in this artistic diversity. In the past the Salon des Refusés and the Society of Independent Artists helped provide footing for the emerging avant-garde in art by creating opportunities for the public to see their members’ work. With the same scrappy energy the Hullaballoo Collective creates its own exhibitions, bringing a blast of fresh work with every showing.

Joie de Vivre will feature paintings, prints and sculpture hung salon style, curated cooperatively by the artists in the collective. We exhibit together to celebrate life. We, the Hullaballoo Collective, have taken a leap and offer the summer-in-Chelsea-audience the opportunity to come and see what the Hullaballoo is all about. Artists: Bette Klegon Halby, Ellen Alt, Cecilia André, Sharon Appel, Marianne Barcellona, Fran Beallor, Richard Brachman, Gulsen Calik, Pamela Casper, Ursula Clark, Barbara Coleman, Yvette Cohen, Colleen Deery, Molly DiGrazia, John Erianne, Patricia Fabricant, Robin Feld, Elaine Forrest, Robin Gaynes-Bachman, Beth Giacummo, Theresa Greenberg, Norma Greenwood, Sarah Haviland, Aimee Hertog, Eileen Hoffman, Sandra Indig, JORDAN!™, Robin M Jordan, Bernard Klevickas, Melissa Kraft, Liz-N-Val, Barbara Lubliner, Janie Milstein, Adrienne Moumin, Nancy Nikkal, Nancy Oliveri, Walter O’Neill, Katherine Papadopoulos, Cade Pemberton, Jeffrey Allen Price, Peggi Pugh, Jacqueline Rada, Julie Scott, Joyce Silver, Regina Silvers, Cigdem Tankut, Linda Tharp, Shira Toren, Grazia Vita

“Up From the Deep” Interntional Group Show
“UP FROM THE DEEP” is an exhibit of 15 artists who probe the fathoms of memory, dreams, myth and states of being. The show ranges from photography to mixed media, fabric sculptures, and good old colored pigment smeared on flat surfaces. It runs through August 25. Daily from 12-8. It includes 15 talented artists The Brooklyn artists are Jeff Faerber, Andrew Smenos , and Rusty Zimmerman. From Manhattan Fedele Spadafora and Zoë Williams. Ipek Sen lives in Astoria. And Rupa DasGupta and Buddy Nestor(NJ), Barron Storey (SF),Timothy Wilson (Portland, Maine) Lars Henkel, (Köln, Germany), David Hollenbach (Philadelphia), Reuben Negron (CT), Jeremy Holmes (Ithaca, NY) and Victoria Selbach (Long Island.)

The subterranean themes explored are the ocean’s depths by Rupa “an-Octopus-a-Day” DasGupta, memories of childhood in the iconography of Andrew Smenos, the subconscious dreams and internal mythology of both Zoë Williams and Lars Henkel, and whatever Buddy Nestor pulls up from the twisted depths of his head. TNC is one of the oldest and largest Alternative spaces in the East Village.

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