JP Artist's Work to Be Featured at City Hall Exhibit Next Month

Boston Mayor Martin Walsh’s office of Arts and Culture will feature an exhibition of photographs by artist Brian Rosa of Jamaica Plain next month, city officials announced Friday.

The exhibition will run from Oct. 1 to Nov. 17 at the Mayor’s Gallery on the fifth floor of Boston City Hall.

Rosa, an artist and urban researcher based in Jamaica Plain and Brooklyn, New York, is also an urban planner and geographer by training, as well as an Assistant Professor of Urban Studies at the City University of New York.

His photographs have been exhibited in the United States, Mexico, Great Britain and Hong Kong, and he has also been featured in the British Journal of Photography, Triple Canopy, Metropolis and on National Public Radio; he was also a 2013 Artist Fellow with the Massachusetts Cultural Council, officials said.

“I’m proud to utilize City Hall to exhibit artists from across Boston’s neighborhoods, helping both city employees and visitors to Boston City Hall see some of the creative and artistic work that our city is so well-known for,” Walsh said in a statement. “I hope everyone in Boston can take some time to come in and experience the work exhibited in City Hall’s three art galleries.”

Rosa, according to officials, describes his work as the following:

“My CONVEY series draws from photographs made in Mexico as well New York City, Pittsburgh, Berlin, Hong Kong, Madrid, and throughout England,” says Rosa. “In this series, I frame the often inadvertent—and sometimes dissonant—tensions between advertising semiotics and surrounding cityscapes. In particular, I am drawn to cities’ omnipresent billboards and hoarding—the tall walls constructed to block views and access to construction sites. Since real estate advertising tends to sell aspirational images of the future, while billboards often emphasize lifestyle ambitions, these images and texts serve as a hazy mirror in which contemporary society may be reflected. Or, at the very least, what we are told that we should desire by those who have something to sell.”

The Galleries at Boston City Hall are open to the public at no charge. For additional information, call 617-635-3245, or visit cityofboston.gov/arts.