Masters of Spin and Other Light Arts
By Carissa Katz
 Bonac Tonic likes to make art pieces people can afford to take home with them. Cartoons like this one by Justin Smith appear on T-shirts sold at the shows.
 Bonac Tonic
 “Route 114” by Grant Haffner
 Bonac Tonic
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(09/18/2007) The members of the Bonac Tonic art collective are on a mission.
With unpretentious work that comes in the colors of a bubble gum rainbow, a spin art machine, a happy army of stuffed “Bubbie Monsters,” and an infectious enthusiasm for the creative process, Bonac Tonic aims to make its mark on the South Fork art world, one show at a time.
“We’re trying to revive the art scene out here,” Scott Gibbons said. “And let everyone know it’s okay to make art,” added Grant Haffner.
“Art should be for everyone,” Justin Smith said. “That’s exactly the point,” Mr. Gibbons agreed.
“We’re trying to infuse a younger feel to East Hampton because it can be a little stuffy out here, and old,” said Mr. Gibbons, who is 30 and grew up here with Mr. Haffner, 28, and his twin sister, Carly, another member of the collective. “The three of us have known each other forever now,” Mr. Gibbons said.
Mr. Smith is 28. Gary Lovelace, another member, is also 30, and Don Porcella, a sixth person showing with the collective this weekend at Ashawagh Hall, is 41.
While they’re all relatively young, the feel the collective is after has more to do with spirit than age. They are committed artists, but they believe they can make serious art with smiles on their faces.
The show at Ashawagh Hall this weekend will be the collective’s fourth. It will open with a reception tomorrow from 5 to 10 p.m.
Most of the members of Bonac Tonic have shown their work individually, but “it’s our group shows that are really fun,” Mr. Smith said.
“When it comes down to it, our whole families help us out,” Mr. Haffner said. Mr. Haffner’s mother, for example, is cooking kielbasa and sauerkraut for tomorrow’s opening reception.
The Bonac Tonickers are friends as well as colleagues. Their shows are, at least in part, just “another excuse to have a party.”
Bonac Tonic was born in 2005 when Mr. Haffner, his twin sister, and Mr. Porcella were putting together their first group show at Ashawagh Hall. Grant and Carly Haffner grew up going to art shows at Ashawagh with their parents and had always dreamed of showing their own work there someday.
The name, Bonac Tonic, is the nickname for Schwenk’s Dairy iced tea, which comes in a green and yellow carton and is a favorite local libation. “It’s so Springs, so perfect for Ashawagh Hall,” Mr. Gibbons said.
And it has a double meaning, too, Mr. Haffner said. “A tonic is an elixir. The whole term is so perfect, and it’s easily recognizable.” At that show, along with paintings and sculpture by the three artists, they also sold caps embroidered with the iconic green and yellow iced tea box, which were a big hit.
“We did well and we had a great time,” Mr. Haffner said. “It was really our first art show ever.”
Since then, all three have gone on to show in other galleries. Mr. Haffner’s paintings of power lines in Technicolor East End landscapes have been included in a number of bigger shows, including several at the Silas Marder Gallery in Bridgehampton and, most recently, one last week at Ashawagh Hall that was organized by Vito Sisti.
Mr. Porcella, who describes his work as “whimsical and subversive,” does encaustic paintings with titles like “Creature Feature,” which gives you a vague idea of their character, and sculptures using everyday materials like pipe cleaners. One piece posted on his MySpace page is of green pipe-cleaner aliens in his own handmade packaging. In his art statement, he says that their “content and structure play with our concept of consumerism, reality, and our own weird mortality.”
Ms. Haffner’s childlike paintings and sculpture are cheerful reminders of the unbridled creativity of youth. A recent sculpture that will be included in the show this weekend is a sort of tower of brightly colored cars constructed of found cardboard. “She likes to use cheap materials,” her brother explained. “It’s more lowbrow arts and crafts, but bringing it into a fine art realm.” She is working on an M.F.A. at Hunter College.
At first Bonac Tonic was just a name for a show, “a raw idea,” Mr. Haffner said. Soon, though, “we filled in the blanks by adding more people.”
Mr. Gibbons, who learned to sew from Mr. Haffner’s mother, makes the Bubbie Monsters from felt, fabric, and buttons. “They come with various different personalities and colors and can also include super-cool capes and hair along with the new popular pouches on their backs to hold cellphones and/or iPods,” he wrote in a biographical statement.
At first, he made them for friends, then he started to sell them at the Bonac Tonic shows. Some of them stand alone, others are displayed in frames, and lately he has begun to create whole fabric scenes within the frames. His monsters are also sold in Southampton at a store called Smith.
Mr. Lovelace, who first showed with Bonac Tonic this summer in a show at the Wainscott Chapel, is the realist of the group, but his paintings are realism with a fantastical edge. He also designs and builds amazingly detailed scale models of ships.
Mr. Smith, who works by day doing photo restoration retouching and graphic design at Southampton Village Photo, is the collective’s “number one designer.” He does the posters and cards for the shows and also creates graphics for T-shirts sold at them. He is married to Mr. Gibbons’s sister and started showing with Bonac Tonic in 2006.
“We’re really trying to make a little community,” Mr. Gibbons said. “We only have Saturdays and Sundays to really bust out art.” Mr. Haffner works by day as a landscaper. Mr. Gibbons is a caddy at the Maidstone Club. Mr. Lovelace works at a sign shop, fixes lawn mowers, and gives private art lessons.
With limited time to produce art, having creative friends to bounce ideas off of makes it easier to be productive and constructive, Mr. Gibbons said.
Mr. Haffner helped steer Mr. Smith from doing “these trippy landscape things” toward focusing on the kind of work that came more naturally — offbeat illustrations, cartoons, and paintings of characters that largely spring from his own imagination, which he calls “freakish mutations from the Chromium Wastelands.”
“People love them on T-shirts,” Mr. Smith said.
He has started doing caricatures and parties and fairs and, in the spirit of “democratic art,” the Tonic crew has also added spin art to their repertoire.
At first, it was because they noticed there was no spin art at the Fisherman’s Fair in Springs. Mr. Haffner’s father designed the machines, the Tonic team built them, and now they take them wherever spin art is required.
“It keeps kids entertained,” Mr. Haffner said. “It makes kids feel good, too, because they’re at an art show and they’re making art,” Mr. Gibbons said. The machine was spinning at the Sept. 8 opening of the Vito Sisti show and “it didn’t stop the whole time,” he said.
“Spin art draws its own fans,” Mr. Haffner added. The group is thinking about displaying some of the fans’ art at a future collective exhibit.
Between spin art, the caricatures, the T-shirts, hats, and monsters, and work that is priced less than in a lot of galleries, “people can walk away from a big show with a piece of art,” Mr. Gibbons said.
“It’s been a huge thing toward our success having the range,” Mr. Haffner said. He is starting a company called Tonic to market some of the merchandise the team has come up with and to help other artists put their images on T-shirts or find new outlets for their work.
The collective is also hoping that the show this weekend will draw other artists interested in joining them in their efforts. The cards announcing Bonac Tonic shows always leave room for the last minute addition of other “esteemed guests.”
Bonac Tonic has another show scheduled at Ashawagh Hall for the weekend of Oct. 26. For that one, they plan to bring other artists into the fold, including, they hope, some of the more mature artists who have helped them along their way — “the ones that taught me as a kid, my parents’ friends,” Mr. Haffner said.
“We’ve had some great help,” he said, pointing to Mr. Sisti, Karyn Mannix, an artist and art teacher, and Silas Marder, the gallery owner, among others. “We couldn’t have done it without the support of these key players. We’ve been so lucky.”
Mindful of that, the Bonac Tonic members send out a thank-you card, designed by Mr. Smith, after every show. “We want to stay connected to these people,” he said. They also try to lend their talents to charity, when they can.
“We’re all about helping people,” Mr. Gibbons said.
“It’s good karma,” Mr. Haffner added.
Work by members of the collective can be seen online at myspace.com, and Mr. Smith also has a Web site of his own, www.justinsmithart.com.
Their show at Ashawagh Hall will be up through Sunday.