BICA School Lab | 30 Essex Street
Open to All | Free to Join | No Registration Required

Join us at BICA School for a casual, come-as-you-are reading group that welcomes everyone—whether you’ve read the text cover to cover or just want to hear what others have to say. We’ll explore critical and curious texts together in a space that values open conversation, listening, and learning.

Read ahead if you can, but there’s no pressure to be an expert—just bring your thoughts, questions, and curiosity.

→ Stein, Gertrude. “Objects.” In Tender Buttons. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, 1997, 3–16.

→ Additional Essay TK

Bring your thoughts, your snapshots, or your questions about what makes an image powerful.

Hosted at BICA in collaboration with BICA School and Civic Arts (a project by teaching artist Robin Lee Jordan), Arts for Something! is an interdisciplinary program for young and emerging artists (ages 14–19) exploring the intersection of art and civic engagement.

Over the course of the series, participants will build creative skills—like screen-printing, zine-making, sewing, literary arts, and specialized visual arts—while learning how these tools can be used to support civic initiatives such as social justice, activism, and local community needs.

Young artists who commit to all eight sessions (with up to two excused absences) will have the opportunity to create and present a civic arts–inspired project in any medium. These projects will be featured in a collaborative zine and shared during a final exhibition and celebration in June.

Workshops take place the first Saturday of every month, October through May (skipping January), from 12–2 PM. 

The Buffalo Institute for Contemporary Art (BICA) is pleased to announce The Language of Color, a solo exhibition by Detroit-based multidisciplinary artist Jova Lynne, opening Friday, January 30 from 7–10PM. The exhibition marks the first installment in BICA’s new exhibition series, The Real Deal, a two-year project that spotlights six contemporary artists whose work blurs the boundaries between photography and sculpture.

The same evening marks the opening of Nick Mass: Under Observation in the BICA Project Space and the launch of Cornelia Magazine Issue 20—rounding out a triple event you won’t want to miss.

Join us to preview the exhibition Jova Lynne: The Language of Color! Lynne will give a walkthrough of the exhibition as it comes together, give insights into her artistic practice, and talk about the influences at play in her current body of work.

This BICA School event is open to the public.

BICA School Lab | 30 Essex Street
Open to All | Free to Join | No Registration Required

Join us at BICA School for a casual, come-as-you-are reading group that welcomes everyone—whether you’ve read the text cover to cover or just want to hear what others have to say. We’ll explore critical and curious texts together in a space that values open conversation, listening, and learning.

Read ahead if you can, but there’s no pressure to be an expert—just bring your thoughts, questions, and curiosity.

→ Benjamin, Walter. “A Short History of Photography.” In Selected Writings, Volume 2, Part 2: 1931–1934, edited by Michael W. Jennings, Howard Eiland, and Gary Smith, translated by Rodney Livingstone and others, 507–530. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2005.

What do we see in a photograph—and what do we miss?

In this richly layered essay, Walter Benjamin explores how photography transformed our relationship to images, memory, and truth. Written just a few years before The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, this piece previews many of Benjamin’s key concerns: aura, authenticity, reproducibility, and the politics of visual culture.

We’ll talk about early photographic portraiture, what it means to capture a face, and how new technologies continue to reshape how we look—and how we’re seen.

Bring your thoughts, your snapshots, or your questions about what makes an image powerful.

Join us to celebrate the 2025 Generator Fund grantees!

This informal happy hour is your chance to meet the ten artists and collectives awarded a total of $60,000 through this year’s Generator Fund. Stop by to learn more about their projects—ranging from backyard installations and immersive performances to analog media labs, public sculpture, and cold-weather art experiments.

We’re gathering at 1500 Clinton Street, Unit 156—home to Libby Projects + Editions and H Boone and Quincey Miracle, two of this year’s grantees. Expect good vibes, great conversations, and light refreshments in a working artist space that reflects the energy of the Generator Fund community.

This event is free and open to the public—no RSVP required. Whether you’re a past applicant, a future one, or just Generator Fund–curious, come celebrate with us!

The 2026 exhibition season of the Buffalo Society of Artists opens early in 2026 with LOCI, a three-way collaboration between the Buffalo Society of Artists, Locust Street Arts, and the Buffalo Institute for Contemporary Art.

This cross-city exhibition elevates emerging voices from within the Eastside and Westside artistic communities of Buffalo for a combined presence that transcends locale while respecting the unique voices of the communities. Artists working within proximity to LSA and BICA art centers were invited to submit work that highlighted the themes of Cooperation over Distance, Elevation of voice, Connection through Art, Identity, and the axis of Accessibility/Exclusion.

This exhibition is the first of its kind for the Buffalo Society of Artists and is made possible through charitable donation from anonymous donor partners and funding from the BSA treasury. This exhibition showcases artists working in the Westside and Eastside of Buffalo regardless of membership status with the Buffalo Society of Artists to exhibit as part of this exhibition – all artists working in the Eastside and Westside communities of Buffalo are encouraged to participate.

This exhibition is staged with staggered dates:

January 9 – 23, 2026 at BICA: The Buffalo Institute for Contemporary Art at 30D Essex Street

and

January 16 – 30, 2026 at Locust Street Art at 138 Locust Street

The exhibiting locations were chosen to represent their individual artist’s voices, and the curatorial team worked together to select individual work for cross-city exhibition within each respective venue to  represent community identity, cooperation and connection through the arts. Some artists are represented at both locations, based on the curation of their individual works.

Opening Receptions will be held from 5 pm – 8 pm on the following dates: 

January 9, 2026 5 pm – 8 pm at BICA, 30D Essex Street

January 16, 2026 5 pm – 8 pm at Locust Street Art, 138 Locust Street

Work included in this exhibition was chosen by a three-panel jury: Emma Brittain, Director of Locust Street Art, Tami Fuller, President of the Buffalo Society of Artists and Emily Reynolds, Director and co-founder of The Buffalo Institute of Contemporary Art.

LOCI showcases the work of Caitlin Andrejova, Axens, Kayliee Bertrand-Henretta, Nicholas Christakis, M Clark, Margaret Connolly, Cassandra Cook, Deidra Duell, Doretha Edwards, Sarah Gerass, Alton Hosey, Gilly Jay, Katharyn Ketter-Franklin, Iris M Kirkwood, Edie Monroe, Ari Moore, Shanti Morrissey, Scott Olmstead, Sabrina Parsons, Silas Rubeck, Rachele Schneekloth, and Sky Vance.

BICA School Lab | 30 Essex Street
Open to All | Free to Join | No Registration Required

Join us at BICA School for a casual, come-as-you-are reading group that welcomes everyone—whether you’ve read the text cover to cover or just want to hear what others have to say. We’ll explore critical and curious texts together in a space that values open conversation, listening, and learning.

Read ahead if you can, but there’s no pressure to be an expert—just bring your thoughts, questions, and curiosity.

→ Ruskin, John. “The Nature of Gothic.” In The Stones of Venice, vol. II. London: Smith, Elder, and Co., 1853.

→ Riegl, Alois. “Die Stimmung als Inhalt der modernen Kunst.” Die graphischen Künste 22 (1899): 47–56.

We’re kicking off our winter season with two short, spirited texts that ask: What is art for—and what does it reflect about the people who make it?

John Ruskin’s “The Nature of Gothic” is a defense of craftsmanship, labor, and the values of imperfection—part art history, part social manifesto. Paired with that, we’ll read Alois Riegl’s “Mood as the Content of Modern Art,” where the 19th-century theorist suggests that it’s not subject matter or style that makes art “modern,” but the inner feelings it conveys.

Together, these texts open up big questions about ornament, intention, emotion, and the role of the artist in society—questions we’ll be carrying all winter long.