A collaboration between two esteemed Philadelphia artists Anthony DeMelas and Pete Checchia. In this series, DeMelas and Checchia blend their unique styles to bring forth a new visual experience. DeMelas and Checchia infuse their unique aesthetics and techniques, forming new works together. Both artists are dedicated to disintegrating what they perceive as arbitrary barriers between disciplines by expanding the boundaries of their respective mediums (painting and photography). Anthony DeMelas and Pete Checchia have been collaborating on exhibitions for four years now, but their influence on each other’s artwork, and way of seeing, spans two decades.

Having grown up four blocks away from each other on Pine Street in Philadelphia, their paths finally crossed as young adults. What started out as a sharing of ideas and techniques grew into collaboration on actual artwork. They explain: “we would be working on our independent shows (Pete Checchia at Vox Populi Gallery and Anthony DeMelas at Pentimenti Gallery) and helping each other out, exchanging techniques and then eventually even sampling each others artwork into our pieces."  What began as a back and forth eventually inspired them to make collaborative work together. Very early on in the process of creating their first body of work, they realized they were onto something; the photographic images and painting meshed well, ideas flowed, and the work seemed to be making itself Collaboration allows them an opportunity through a fluid exchange of ideas and practices to discover vital and unexpected styles and results..  A mutual commitment to exploration has driven their respective work to unexpected places, where the edges of each form collapse into the other.

Anthony DeMelas graduated from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art in Philadelphia. He is a recipient of several awards and honors two of which are  The Lewis S. Ware Memorial Travel Scholarship Award and The Pennsylvania Governor's Award. He has also exhibited extensively throughout throughout the United States. DeMelas's work is about the process of exploring overlooked glimpses of visual reflections that coexist all around us. His conceptual process and inspiration is always in flux; DeMelas reanimates fragments of his life through a broad palette of wood, oil, wax, paint and photographs, layering images to expose another realm of existence. Anthony's pieces are a cumulative expression of the dimensions between the desire to see what we want to see and what is there. By pulling paint across surfaces, allowing oil, water and wax to do what they may, and take photos without the guise of perfected shutter speeds, he gives us just enough information.

Anthony DeMelas is represented by Pentimenti Gallery in Philadelphia. His work has been purchased for multiple public collections including  the Thomas Properties Group Inc. (Philadelphia, PA) Deloitte Inc.(Philadelphia, PA) Fork Restaurant (Philadelphia, PA) Blank & Rome, (New York, NY)  as well as numerous private collections. His commissions include James Ingram, Grammy Award-winning American singer, Los Angeles, CA.

As well as Anthony DeMelas’ collaboration work with other visual artists DeMelas has a long history of collaboration with dance artists, performance artists and video artists incorporating his imagery into many performance pieces. Two important collaborators are Pew  recipient Kate Watson-Wallace, dance choreographer and Ricardo Rivera, noted video artist of the clip collective.

Pete Checchia has a diverse career both as a highly esteemed freelance photographer as well as an acclaimed multi-disciplinary exhibiting visual artist. He has found his niche as one of the leading photographers of the classical music world. He serves as a primary house photographer for Carnegie Hall, and has been the principal photographer at the prestigious Marlboro Music Festival for the past 20 years. He includes among his regular clients the Philadelphia Orchestra, Curtis Institute of Music, the Marilyn Horne Foundation and the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society. He has done extensive work for the Chamber Music America, the Brevard Music Festival, and Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project and many others. Musical artists, ensembles, dance organizations and others regularly hire him as their publicity photographer. He has built a wide and profound archive of imagery spanning the classical music world that reads as a “Who’s Who” of the leading artists. Much of this work he incorporates into his expressive fine art work.

His work has been published in numerous Music Cds, magazines and over 10 books. Books include commemorations of Midori’s 20th anniversary, the Curtis Institutes 75th anniversary, the Philadelphia Orchestra’s “Century in Music”, Rudolf Serkin’s life (biography) and the Marlboro Music Festival’ 40th anniversary “Espressivo”.

As a visual artist, Pete Checchia’s work has been recognized many times for juried exhibitions, including a three-year residency at Creative Artists Network in Philadelphia an organization dedicated to promoting and exhibiting emerging talent. He was a member of the vaunted Philadelphia artist collective Vox Populi for 10 years the last two of which were spent as an artist member of the board. Among the jurors who have singled out his work for exhibition at various shows are Mark Rosenthal (curator for the Guggenheim and Philadelphia Art Museums), Ilana Schmidt and Chris Dean (of Schmidt/Dean Gallery), Lisa Panzera (of Levy Gallery at Moore College), and Thora Jacobsen (Fleischer Art Memorial exec. Director).  In 2008 two of his large photographic construction pieces from the 1990's were included in a retrospective called STRETCHING THE TRUTH that focused on alternative processes in photography and was held at the Kohler Art Center in Sheboygan Wisconsin.. Checchia says “I embrace the philosophy of putting art out into alternative spaces and public places.” It is equally possible to see his photographic art and installations gracing the walls of a Philadelphia bar or restaurant as it is to view it in more venerable art spaces such as the Institute of Contemporary Art, the Sande Webster Gallery or the Philadelphia Art Alliance.