I had the good fortune to interview Danny Simmons almost a decade ago about his vibrant paintings, which effortlessly engage and synthesize abstraction and figuration. What was paramount then has become more lucid over the last 10 years: Simmon's artistic reach is generous and broad. He's always been quick to promote the work of other artists - mounting shows in his Brooklyn house and working as art editor at One World Magazine - and, since the time we first met, Simmons co-founded the Rush Arts Gallery and Resource Center in 1995.

     Located in the heart of Chelsea on 26th Street, Rush Arts Gallery is a non-profit arts and education organization devoted to exhibiting and promoting works of art by African Americans and artists of the African diaspora. Through the Danny Simmon's Visual Artist Program and the Norman Lewis Curatorial Program, Rush Arts has provided an outlet for artists to further this initiative. Most notably, Rush has been a springboard for several notable artists through its continuous schedule of group and emerging artist solo exhibitions, including Odili Donald Odita, Kehinde Wiley, Sol Sax, Wangechi Mutu, and countless others who now show their work internationally.

     This winter, Rush devotes its time and space to a new exhibition that celebrates its mission to expose artists of African descent. "Impregnable Direction," on view a Rush from February 7 through March 15, 2003, is a showcase for young African American artists from varied points around the country. Originally organized last January at the Hampton University Museum under the title "New Power Generation," Impregnable Direction" brings the work of a select group of young artists to New York for the first time, with historical repercussions linking the symbiotic missions of both venues.

     In 1894, Hampton became the first historically black college and university to collect, preserve, and present works by African Americans and Native Americans. Hampton's vision to document and archive this art began a movement that set the pace and standard for institutions and collectors of African diasporic art worldwide. Their efforts recently culminated in the traveling exhibition "To Conserve A Legacy," which was seen over the last few years in Atlanta, Chicago, Washington, DC, and New York. While universities such as Hampton, Fisk, Clark Atlanta, and Howard performed groundbreaking cultural work for African American art in the first half of the 20th century, Ruch is picking up where the left off, with its concentration on young and emerging artists.

     "Impregnable Direction" features sculpture, photography, and painting by eight artists. Eric Mack's mixed-media canvases are influenced by the contemporary glut of digital information that is a fact of life. The wash of reds and blues in Low Country equally resembles a brilliantly hued Kente cloth and a computer screen gone wrong. Whereas Mack's conceptual impetus carries the weight of digital history, Roy Lagrone's Orientation Module #1 is a direct digital image, abstracted and corrupted into fascinating abstraction that might recall the inside of a computer. Likewise, Teri Richardson takes a colorful palette of primary colors to her acrylic-on-panel paintings. Caribbean Angels pictures a drippy composition of luscious, animated semi-circles.