Park Towne Place

In Human Scale, artists explore how they perceive and engage with the carefully designed structures that shape our built environment. By examining the formal elements of architecture and uncovering the layered histories within buildings, five artists find inspiration in edifices—industrial, residential, and commercial alike—drawing from their beauty, functionality, and cultural significance.

Janos Korodi investigates architecture and urbanism through a social and environmental lens, capturing spaces and forms that shape our environment. Similarly, David Beker responds to the structures around us, juxtaposing industrial elements with the idea of “home” in his functional and abstract sculptures. Through this tension and balance,  his work reflects the complexities of the modern world. Likewise, Philadelphia’s rich architecture, Allen Spencer and Deborah Imler, convey their immense love for the city with their photographic assemblages highlighting its facades through intricate patterns and layered compositions.

Additionally, Anna Guarneri emphasizes the interplay between humans and architectural structures through her colorful and playful stained glass Body/Building series and mixed-media works. At the same time, Krista Svalbonas, reflecting on her family’s history of migration, addresses the ideas of displacement and belonging, capturing the emotional resonance of impermanence in the series Migrant and Migrator.

Collectively, the artists of Human Scale reveal that adapting, building, and cohabiting are fundamentals of the human experience. Their works demonstrate that our physical surroundings are not merely a backdrop, but an active force in shaping identity, memory, and community.

Anna Guarneri

b. Oakland, CA

Anna Guarneri is a visual artist based in Philadelphia. Her work explores the possibilities of suggestive imagery and the devotional connotations of stained glass.  She uses crude marks and associations to tap into early human experience, pulling from various sources - ancient art, architecture, dance history, and her own body.  Colors in her work conjure poignant memories, turning drawn forms and glass structures into celebrations, memorials, or premonitions.  

Guarneri received a BA in cultural history from the University of Pennsylvania and pursued a career in nonprofit administration before turning to visual art. Since 2020, she has exhibited work at venues nationwide, including the Delaware Contemporary, the Center for Emerging Visual Artists, Mesa Contemporary Art Museum, and FJORD.  She is the recipient of the Canopy Program’s James Bernard Haggarty scholarship and the American Glass Guild’s James C. Whitney scholarship, and she recently received a Paradice Palase fellowship to attend a residency at ChaNorth in Pine Plains, NY.

Statement

“This exhibition highlights a collection of sculptures and works on paper that continue my exploration of suggestive forms and stretch the possibilities of stained glass, my primary medium.  These works consider the relationship between humans and architectural structures, and between color and memory.  Connections are varied and personal: some artworks reference a specific building or architectural feature with a human attribute, association, or story.  Others are suggestive of figures, or otherwise evoke human presence.  Colors recall visual worlds from my childhood.”

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David Beker

b. Washington D.C.

David Beker is a Philadelphia-based designer, craftsperson, and artist. Originally from Maryland, he studied architecture at the University of Maryland before moving to New York to pursue computer graphics, earning an MFA from Parsons School of Design. He later returned to the field of architecture, completing a Master of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania and becoming a registered architect.

Seeking a more hands-on design practice, David shifted his focus from traditional architecture to sculpture, furniture design, and kinetic art. His work has been exhibited nationally at venues including the Wharton Esherick Museum, New Hope Arts Center, Wayne Art Center, Cherry Street Pier, and most recently, the Automat Gallery. He currently lives and works in Philadelphia, where he teaches architecture and furniture design at Drexel University.

Statement 

“David Beker is a contemporary designer, craftsperson, and artist. Drawing from his experience as an architect and digital artist, his three-dimensional projects exist in a space between functional furniture and abstract sculpture.

‍He draws inspiration from the deep cultural meaning of recognizable objects and structures. These elements are combined and arranged to create a new composition that challenges the understanding of the object’s original meaning. These pieces may at first seem disparate, but all celebrate making with an attention to thoughtful details and design. David maintains a true, one-person studio, where he designs and makes all of his work.?

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Janos Korodi

b. Budapest, Hungary

Janos Korodi is a visual artist whose work spans painting, printmaking, and interdisciplinary collaboration, focusing on industrial landscapes, memory, and transformation. Born in Budapest, Hungary, in 1971, he has exhibited widely across Europe and the United States over the past three decades. Working primarily in panel painting and pastels, his recent projects have re-engaged with post-industrial spaces as both subject and medium, including site-specific and public art installations. Janos holds a Doctorate in Liberal Arts (DLA) from the Hungarian University of Fine Arts and an MFA from the same institution, and has studied architecture and art management in Hungary and Austria. He currently lives and works in Philadelphia, PA.

Janos Korodi’s work is included in the Park Towne Place Art Collection. 

Statement

“As a painter and individual, I am deeply committed to the public sphere, engaging with social concerns through diverse artistic expressions. While my painting practice is not explicitly activist, it often hints at social and environmental issues on a metaphorical level, and aligns with these themes more directly through collaborative community art projects and educational initiatives. My work also explores architecture and urbanism, rooted in research for my doctorate and expressed in series of works such as the Genius Loci cycle. Embracing evolving visual culture, I incorporate new media techniques alongside traditional methods, viewing art as a means to convey ideas, messages, or symbols through sight.

‍I value art’s capacity to question and transform meaning, sparking imagination rather than structuring reality. Whether through painting or seriality, the creative process remains consistent in its pursuit of connection and discovery. My aim is to surprise, engage, and foster dialogue, revealing art's potential to inspire and challenge perceptions.”

Allan Spencer and Deborah Imler

b. Harrington Park, NJ  and Altoona, PA

Allen Spencer and Deborah Imler live and work collaboratively in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Their work has been included in exhibitions at InLiquid Gallery, Philadelphia, PA; Zimmerli Art Museum, New Brunswick NJ; LG Tripp Gallery, Philadelphia, PA;  Perkins Center for the Arts, Moorestown and Collingswood, NJ; State Museum Of Pennsylvania, Harrisburg, PA; Woodmere Museum, Philadelphia, PA; James Oliver Gallery, Philadelphia, PA; Projects Gallery, Philadelphia, PA; and Jersey City Museum, Jersey City, NJ;. Corporate and Public Collections include CBRE Wayne, PA and Mt. Laurel, NJ; Morgan Lewis, Houston, TX; Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corp., East Hanover, NJ; Select Energy Services, Houston, TX; Newark Public Library, Newark, NJ; and Zimmerli Art Museum, New Brunswick, NJ.

Statement

“We began our joint art-making when we moved into Center City in 1997.  We love Philadelphia architecture and would bike the streets on Sunday mornings taking photographs of the facades and architectural details of the buildings, especially on Sansom Street from river to river.  Manually cutting, deconstructing, and reconfiguring the photographs to create rich patterns was more visually satisfying for us than the original photographs.   These patterns evolved into several geometric series - 4 of which are represented in this Park Towne Place exhibition… parquet, persian flaw,  bainbridge and lorica.  The series parquet and persian flaw are inspired by skilled artisan designs and techniques;  bainbridge references the plat maps drawn for Philadelphia properties/lots; and the lorica series reflects the shingling of roofs in the historic parts of the city.  

‍In each of our pieces, we seek a finished work that reflects our joint sense of balance and symmetry, depicts the element of the hand in its making, and conveys beauty in its abstraction.”

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Krista Svalbonas

Krista Svalbonas holds a BFA in Photography and an MFA in Interdisciplinary studies. Her work has been shown in a number of exhibitions including: the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art, Spartanburg Art Museum in South Carolina, Howard Yezerski Gallery in Boston, Marshall Gallery in Los Angeles, Klompching Gallery and ISE Cultural Foundation in New York.  Her work is part of the permanent collections of the Cesis Art Museum in Latvia, the Gregg Museum of Art and Design in North Carolina, the Woodmere Art Museum and Temple University in Philadelphia. Recent awards include a Center for Photographic Art Artist Grant (2022), Baumanis Creative Projects Grant (2020), Rhonda Wilson Award (2017), Puffin Foundation Grant (2016) and a Bemis Fellowship (2015) among others. In 2022/23 Svalbonas had solo exhibitions of her series Displacement, at the Copenhagen Photography festival in Denmark, the Tallinn city museum in Tallinn, Estonia, Museum of Textile and Industry in Augsburg Germany and the National Museum in Vilnius Lithuania. She is an associate professor of photography at St. Joseph’s University. She lives and works in Philadelphia.

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