“Waves Become Wings” opens at Pentimenti Gallery in Old City on September 8, with an opening reception Thursday, September 10 from 6 to 8 PM. The show, featuring painter Erik Spehn, runs through October 24 and adds a good reason to walk through Old City this fall — with a second event in October giving visitors a reason to come back.
An Overview of Erik Spehn’s”Waves Become Wings”
Spehn’s work is built around a distinct visual language — hard edges set against dense, undulating color, organized into woven vertical and horizontal bands. In this new body of work, he’s left the natural linen exposed rather than painting the ground beneath his compositions, creating quieter passages that invite a slower look at each piece.
The show also introduces shaped panels displayed alongside rectangular counterparts, matched in proportion and palette — playful doubles that raise real questions about originality and repetition. Spehn earned his BFA from the University of Michigan and has exhibited at institutions including the Albright-Knox Art Gallery and the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, with work held in the collections of Temple University and the Saint Louis Art Museum.
Two Ways to Experience “Waves Become Wings”
Beyond the opening reception, Pentimenti is hosting a second event on Friday, October 2 at 6:30 PM: “An Invitation to Look Closer,” an artist walkthrough and conversation with Spehn himself, presented in partnership with Collective Futures. It’s a rare chance to hear directly from the artist about the ideas driving the show, rather than just viewing the work on its own.
That walkthrough flows straight into Philadelphia’s First Friday Gallery Walk, running 7 to 8 PM the same evening — meaning a stop at Pentimenti can anchor an entire night of gallery hopping through Old City rather than standing alone as a single destination.
Whether it’s the September opening reception or the October walkthrough paired with First Friday, “Waves Become Wings” gives Philadelphia two genuinely distinct ways to spend an evening with the same show.
How savoring it is for a painter willing to strip his own work down to its essentials mid-career, and an even better reason to see it in person rather than through a photo — the exposed linen and the quiet spaces between brushstrokes are exactly the kind of detail a screen tends to flatten out. Old City has never been short on things to see on a First Friday, but this one’s worth building the whole evening around.
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