Update: Bonus Map Press Roundup

"Bonus Map" (in SF Bay Guardian)

Although it amazed children and adults alike, the original Nintendo didn't produce games people would consider fine art. For most, hits like Mike Tyson's Punch-Out and The Legend of Zelda served merely as eye-glazing entertainment. But local artist Veronica Graham saw more. For her new exhibit "Bonus Map," Graham mimicked the pattern mapping in classic video games with traditional Japanese wood-block prints. Opting for earth tones rather than neon greens and reds, she tiled the walls of CELLspace's gallery with these prints, building a unique, pixelated landscape. (Alex Felsinger)

Through May 25

Reception 8 p.m., free

CELLspace

2050 Bryant, SF

(415) 648-7562

www.cellspace.org

The Mapmaker

In creating the exhibit "Bonus Map," a sprawling maplike installation composed of hundreds of cloth swatches, Veronica Graham took her cues from classic video games as well Age of Exploration cartography, sharing both the graphical tones and the air of fantasy. Her map also took forever to make, a laborious process she accomplished in an apartment. She silk screened in the kitchen, cut squares next to the stove, used a high-pressure hose for something or other in the shower, and ended up with 2,000 cloth "tiles" stacked in the living room. Then she hung them carefully, precisely, all over the walls of the gallery, creating a patterned "landscape mosaic" that also references Japanese woodblock prints, another popular theme in her work. The tiles, which feature sharply graphical images of nature -- raindrops, mountains, trees -- are to be sold off at $1 per piece, giving people the chance to own a little bit of her imaginary land. 

Bonus Map has also gotten a posting on flavorpill.