Space 4 Art is proud to continue its dynamic series of cutting-edge exhibitions, public programs, and community-engaged events throughout 2026— an initiative that will at once spotlight and strengthen the city’s vibrant, experimental community.

The second exhibition in this series,The Medium Is the Message is a group exhibition exploring how meaning in visual art emerges through the relationship between material and content. 

Inspired by Marshall McLuhan’s revolutionary 1967 book The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects, this exhibition highlights artists who use diverse materials to challenge perception and demonstrate how medium itself communicates.

Curated by Material Projects DTLA, artists include:

Meghan Augustine, Joe Riley, Jaya Darriet, Helena Westra, Elijah Rubottom, David Fobes, Bridget Rountree, Beliz Iristay, and Annie Claflin.

Curatorial Statement:

The Medium Is the Message explores how meaning in visual art is created through content and medium. Inspired by Marshall McLuhan’s The Medium is the Massage (1967), the exhibition centers visual art as a space where medium and content are manipulated by artists to undermine expectations.

Across the exhibition, artists work with clay, adobe, encaustic, pigment, industrial materials, and organic matter to demonstrate how material itself communicates. Weight, fragility, erosion, accumulation, and touch become carriers of meaning alongside imagery and form.

Some works align medium and content to reinforce a clear message, while others introduce tension between the two, allowing material to complicate or challenge what is depicted. Together, these works invite viewers to look beyond what a piece is “about” and consider how artistic choices shape interpretation.

By foregrounding material and process, The Medium Is the Message offers insight into how artists think and how meaning is made.

Presented by: Space 4 Art in partnership with Art Produce
Supported by: The Prebys Foundation Arts Ecosystem Grant