61st annual "Art of the Northeast" opens Friday evening at Silvermine Guild Art Center

Silvermine Guild Art Center
1037 Silvermine Rd., New Canaan, (203) 966-9700
61st Annual Art of the Northeast
Apr. 30—June 11, 2010
Opening Reception: Fri., Apr. 30, 6 p.m.

Press release

Art of the Northeast (AoNE) is one of the most anticipated regional juried shows of the year at the Silvermine Guild Arts Center located in New Canaan, Connecticut. Traditionally drawing over 1200 entries, AoNE is open to all media and artists throughout New England, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Celebrating its 61st anniversary, this year's event will be juried by Katie Rashid, Director of the Jack Shainman Gallery in New York City. The juried competition/exhibition opens on Friday, April 30th with an awards ceremony from 6pm to pm, open to the public, and will run through June 11th, 2010.

"Over the 61 years Silvermine Guild Arts Center has been organizing the annual Art of the Northeast Exhibition, the galleries have show hundreds of dynamic works of art that reflect the changing aesthetics and ideas of contemporary art produced in the region," stated Gallery Director Jeffrey Mueller. "In many ways, the juried competition has continued to serve as the first, if not only, opportunity many young artists have had to present their work to some of the art world's most prestigious and national/international known curators, gallerists, and critics."

Begun in 1949 as the New England Exhibition, the competition was founded by Guild members Miriam Broudy and Revington Arthur to showcase art from the region. Over the years, this distinguished exhibition has presented over 6,000 works of art. Throughout its history, Art of the Northeast has been a platform for both established and emerging artist, many who have gone on to receive national acclaim. Jurors have included major critics, curators and directors from some of the most influential contemporary art institutions including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, MOMA, The New Museum of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum.

Saturday opening at City Gallery in New Haven

City Gallery
994 State St., New Haven, (203) 782-2489
Judy Atlas: Expressions
Apr. 29—May 30, 2010.
Opening reception: Sat., May 1, 2—5 p.m.
Press release

Judy Atlas will be exhibiting paintings and collage through the month of May at City Gallery in New Haven.

There will be an opening reception for Expressions on Sat., May 1, from 2—5 p.m.

Open studios this weekend at Arbor Street

This Saturday, 11 a.m.—5 p.m. and Sunday, noon—5 p.m., artists will open their studios at 30 and 56 Arbor Street in Hartford.

"Crossing the Bridge" opens Saturday at Hygienic Art in New London

Hygienic Art
83 Bank St., P.O. Box 417, New London, (860) 443-8001
The Fifth Crossing Annual Juried Exhibition
Apr. 24—May 22, 2010
Opening reception: Sat., Apr. 24, 7—10 p.m.

Press release

The Fifth Crossing Annual Juried Exhibition 2010 will be the Hygienic Art Gallery's fifth year of its juried art show. The original concept of "crossing the bridge" is an attempt to get people "Out for Art." In Southeastern Connecticut everyone's excuse for not getting out to local events many times comes back to the bridge and possibly the rivers that divide our towns. This exhibition is an attempt to get people to cross the bridge literally as well as to motivate artists to become involved on our side of the river. It is a regional show with over 100 artists submitting artwork to be considered.

The fifth Crossing Juried Exhibition is not a theme based show it is open to all themes and we hope to receive artists best and most recent work. It is also an opportunity for new artists from across other bridges to get involved with the exciting things happening at the Hygienic Art Galleries and in downtown New London. Every year we have a different juror. Every Juror looks for different things so it is always interesting to see what makes the cut. This year's juror is local artist and blogger Sharon L. Butler (Web).

Prizes will be awarded, including the Best in Show $500 Charles Chu Award. Charles J. Chu was an artist, poet, calligrapher, teacher and vibrant soul. He enjoyed teaching at Yale University for 15 years, and then moved on to establish and direct the Chinese program at Connecticut College in New London, Connecticut until his retirement in 1984. Charles Chu and his wife Bettie lived in New London for 40 years and actively enjoyed and supported the local art scene.

The opening reception will be Saturday, April 24 from 7—10. There will be cash prizes for selected best pieces. The show will run through Saturday May 22.

Artist reception this Saturday at New Haven Public Library

New Haven Free Public Library Art Gallery
133 Elm St., New Haven
The World of Paradoxes: Paintings by Lisie S. Orjuela
Through Apr. 30, 2010
Artist Reception: Sat., Apr. 24, 2—4 p.m.

Press release

There will be an artist's reception this Saturday afternoon from 2—4 p.m. at the New Haven Free Public Library for the show The World of Paradoxes featuring the paintings of Lisie Orjuela. The show closes on Apr. 30.

"The world of paradoxes currently engages my attention," writes Lisie Orjuela. "Our interior territories—with the struggles and contradictions of the soul, the spirit, the psyche, and the mind—is a vast, complicated, and intriguing field. The attempt to understand and be consciously aware of this, motivates me and drives my artwork. My paintings integrate and weave thoughts, feelings, and experiences into an avenue in which to tap into, explore and inhabit these bewildering paradoxes. I use the format of diptychs and triptychs to accentuate the underlying sense of disruption, disconnection, abstraction, which is juxtaposed with continuity, fluidity, connections.

"I work in a way that reflects natural life; in a slow organic process each painting is created. The paintings are created with multiple layers of paint, visual textures, rich earthy colors, as well as human and animal forms. The figures tend to be a central part in most of the work, dissolving and coming out of the surrounding ground, interacting with it, and being a part thereof. The paintings change and evolve continuously as I work on them, as layers cover and reveal some of the earlier stages. I work with oil paints, oil bars, and oil pastels on stretched canvas. Most of my current work is approximately 4 and 5 feet square."

Originally from Argentina, and now a resident of Trumbull, Ms. Orjuela holds an MA from New York University, and a BFA from Andrews University, Michigan. She also attended the Art Students League in NYC. She began her teaching career in Mexico in 1986 as an Assistant Professor of Art at the Universidad de Montemorelos, where she later served in 1992 and 1998 as Visiting Artist and Lecturer. She has taught Studio Art, Art History, and Museum at such schools as Hunter College High School, and the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York City. She has lectured in Mexico and at St. Paul's Chapel on the campus of Columbia on the development of early Christian and sacred medieval art, and on Spiritualism and Feminism.

Friday opening at Zilkha Gallery at Wesleyan

Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery, Wesleyan University
238 Washington Ter., Middletown, (860) 685-3355
Bearing Witness: Stories from the Front Lines
Apr. 24—May 23, 2010.
Opening reception: Fri., Apr. 23, 5—7 p.m.

Press release

From 2005 through 2008, painter and printmaker Daniel Heyman accompanied a team of human rights attorneys to Istanbul and Amman, where he sat in on dozens of interviews of formerly detained Iraqis. Closer to home, in 2008 and 2009, Heyman began painting another group of people with few opportunities to tell their stories: poor, recently incarcerated African-American men in Philadelphia, all of whom are fathers.

Bearing Witness: Stories from the Front Lines is an exhibition of Heyman's portraits of both of these groups, and runs from Sat., Apr. 24 through Sun., May 23, 2010 in Wesleyan's Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery. It incorporates first-person testimony and features a plywood wall installation that provokes questions about the ongoing crisis in the Middle East. The exhibition is curated by Zilkha Gallery's Nina Felshin.

The public is invited to attend the opening reception on Fri., Apr. 23 from 5-7 p.m., with Daniel Heyman giving a talk at 5:30 p.m.

The portraits and accompanying text provide powerful and disturbing insight into the experiences of Heyman's subjects. One account of abuse by American forces that Sadik Saturi al-Dailami related to American human rights attorneys in Istanbul after his release from Abu Ghraib prison in 2008, hauntingly begins "I was in the cage seven days." Heyman artfully weaves the words of this testimony into his depiction of the speaker, integrating a dress shirt and tie with the story: "After my hand was broken (fingers stepped on by Lynndie England), I passed out. Then she dragged me." Amazingly, in part because of the amount of time it took to translate into English, Heyman was able to complete each portrait during the course of the interview.

Returning to the United States, he observed his next subjects in Philadelphia progress from inexperienced parents with uncertain futures to responsible members of their communities, guided by the National Comprehensive Center for Fathers. In creating their portraits, Heyman was "impressed by the honesty with which they shared their thoughts and their life stories." What began as a limited commission for a one-day Philly Fathers exhibition two years ago has grown into a seven-portrait collection of fractured, but healing, urban lives, in the same style of interwoven image and text as his project in the Middle East.

Bearing Witness features portraits of both former detainees and former felons; each has his own story. The renderings of prisoners released from Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison give humanity and a voice to that cohort of men and women now bound together by their survival. In similar fashion, the Philly Fathers series allows the viewer not only to see the men but also to hear their moving stories. The dignity of Heyman's subjects is underscored by the fragile yet powerfully seductive formal qualities that characterize the artist's unique style. His delicate yet assertive use of color, line, and text as a formal element result in work that is intriguing, powerful and completely engaging.

In a departure from his two-dimensional work, for this exhibition Heyman has created a 10 x 14 foot plywood wall printed with images that is meant to provoke questions about our understanding of ongoing conflicts in the Middle East. "Without the wall," Heyman explains, "it might be too easy to look at the portraits and think, 'this is all in the past, everything's returned to normal,' when it hasn't."

Daniel Heyman received degrees from Dartmouth College and the University of Pennsylvania, prestigious grants from the Pew Fellowship in the Arts, Independence Foundation, the AMJ Foundation and the Rhode Island School of Design. He is also a 2010 recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship. He currently resides in Philadelphia and teaches at the Rhode Island School of Design, Princeton University, and Swarthmore College.

"Supermen and Scoundrels" opens Friday at Gallery at Black Rock

The Gallery at Black Rock
2861 Fairfield Ave., Bridgeport, (203) 814-6856
Matt Sesow: Supermen and Scoundrels
Apr. 23—May 29, 2010
Artist reception: Fri., Apr. 23, 6—10 p.m.

Press release

The Gallery at Black Rock is proud to present Supermen and Scoundrels featuring the work of artist Matt Sesow. The show will open with an artist reception at 6 p.m. on Thurs., Apr. 23, 2010.

Sesow most recently showed in the Arte Vistas Gallery in Albi France and has shown extensively internationally and nationally. Sesow, a Washington D.C.-based artist, has been labeled as an "Outsider Artist" but has found a great deal of success in the art world. In his career he has overcome many personal obstacles, most importantly the loss of his left (and dominant) arm to a freak accident in which he was hit by a plane as a child.

Sesow's colorful and energetic painting style lends the subjects a somewhat menacing quality while often portraying benign subjects such as bunnies and pandas. In this show he will explore the dichotomy that exists within public figures. It is often unclear as to which is a superman and which is the scoundrel and ultimately it will be the viewer who decides which category the subject best fits into. Sesow will be showing all new work, much of which has been painted specifically for the Gallery at Black Rock show.

Two shows open Thursday evening at Mystic Arts Center

Mystic Arts Center
9 Water St., Mystic, (860) 536-7601
Long and Lean
The Elected Artists
Apr. 22—May 22, 2010.
Opening reception: Thurs., Apr. 22, 5:30—7 p.m.

Press release

The Mystic Arts Center will host an Opening Reception for two new exhibitions on Thurs., Apr. 22, from 5:30—7 p.m. to highlight regional emerging and professional artists in the exhibitions.

Long and Lean • Each year, the Mystic Arts Center hosts a themed exhibition challenging artists to create outside of their typical styles. This year, the theme will stretch not only the imagination - but the canvas, as each artwork in Long and Lean is limited to the size specification of at least twice as long in one direction over another.

"An exhibition based on unique dimensions is always visually arresting, and we look forward to seeing how the artists approach this challenge," says Karen Barthelson, Executive Director of the Mystic Arts Center. The exhibition features over one hundred artists using all media except photography.

The Elected Artists • Member artists whose work is accepted into four juried MAC exhibitions within a twenty-four month period are allowed to apply for Elected Artist designation. This coveted distinction allows Elected Artists the opportunity to hand-select a work of art for this annual exhibition.

Monetary awards will be presented for exceptional work in both exhibitions during the reception, and the Art Center's KTJ Studios will host an open showcase of artwork by current students.

Both exhibitions run through May 22, and are sponsored by The Washington Trust Company with additional support from the Connecticut Commission on Culture & Tourism.

Thursday evening opening at Jennifer Jane Gallery

Jennifer Jane Gallery
838 Whalley Ave., New Haven, (203) 494-9905
8 Eyes: Photographs by Four Extraordinary Painters
Apr. 22—May 22, 2010.
Opening reception: Thurs., Apr. 22, 5—8 p.m.
Press release

"Arts After Dark" in Mystic tomorrow night

Mystic Arts Center
9 Water St., Mystic, (860) 536-7601
Arts After Dark
Tues., Apr. 20, 2010, 5:30—8 p.m.

Press release

On Tues., Apr. 20, the Mystic Arts Center will host the outdoor after-hours event Art After Dark, featuring live music by local jam band, RIPE, and live art by New London artist Denny Rivera.

From 5:30—8 p.m., guests can enjoy Cottrell beer and Pizza Grille snacks while lounging on the patio, listening to music, and watching Rivera transform a blank canvas into funky new graphic art. The artwork will be sold in a silent bid auction at the end of the evening to benefit the programs of MAC.

Rivera has been part of the New London art scene since the mid 90s, and is now part-owner of Aticc Gallery with his partner Cristin Gallagher. His work has been embraced by critics and artists for its untrained innocence and inspired radiance which draws from both classical and street influences. Other works by Rivera will be on display during the event.

The Mystic Arts Center is also currently exhibiting the Elected Artist Exhibition and a juried themed exhibition titled Long and Lean.

Art After Dark is designed to bring together art forms and showcase the Arts Center's role as a community hub for new creative expression and young artists. This event begins a new series which will be held the third Tuesday of each month through October and will feature different musicians and artists each month.

"The arts are such a great way to draw community members together," says volunteer event coordinator Courtney Moore, co-owner of CMB Creative Group. "The first event we held last October was a huge success, and we're really excited about this year's line-up."

Tickets are $10 at the door and benefit the exhibitions and educational programs of the Mystic Arts Center. Guests should dress for the weather, but the event will move indoors if it is inclement. For more information, call 860-536-7601x209 or visit www.mysticarts.org.

The Mystic Arts Center is located at 9 Water Street in downtown Mystic. The Arts Center is a non-profit organization dedicated to connecting community with current creative expression, cultural enrichment and Mystic's rich artistic heritage. Open daily 11 a.m.—5 p.m.

Two fine shows at A-Space Gallery in West Haven

A-Space at West Cove Studios
30 Elm St., West Haven, (203) 627-8030
Line Dancing: A Writer's Choice of Works on Paper
Through May 3, 2010
Locations/6 Views
Through May 1, 2010.

Locations/6 Views, a show of paintings by six artists, explores the landscape, pastoral and otherwise. The artistic approaches vary from those characterized by gesture and boldness of mark making to those created with emphasis on pictorial detail and precision. Each approach has its merits.

Anne Doris-Eisner's monochromatic acrylic on paper paintings are feasts of black line work. Many of them teeter on abstraction, depicting the rich tactile textures of stone and wood. Lenny Moskowitz also favors kinetic gesture. He floods his canvases with broad brush strokes and swirls of thick color.

More to the other end of the spectrum are the works of Josephine Sheridan Robinson and Anne Culver. Robinson offers up works in which nature is barely present, glimpsed only in ghostly light and troubled skies. Her compositions sprawl with urban architecture--specifically that of New York City. She paints a jostling of rectangular, conical and cylindrical forms as seen through a bus fume haze. In "Morning Interior," the crowd of buildings seems almost to dissipate into the smog-dappled sky.

Culver's paintings, imagined landscapes of river-hewn gorges and plains beset by tornadoes, are notable for the softness of her brushwork and the way the colors soak into each other. In "Tempest IV," Culver deftly captures a foreboding quality of light in the sky. As three twisters swirl down to the ground, the storm clouds churn with guttural puffs of dark grays, blues, green and rust brown.

Katie Kindilien's paintings--she variously uses gouache, acrylic and oil paints--straddle the boundary between mark making and pictorialism. I think the most compelling of the works she displays here are the three done in gouache: "Monhegan Sunburst," "Gulf Rock, Monhegan" and "Venetian Casa." In "Gulf Rock, Monhegan," in particular, Kindilien finely combines line work with washes of color.

Brian Wendler's paintings are nicely situated near the window: a visitor can look out at the water of West Cove or admire Wendler's similar Fair Haven vistas of bridge, river and sky. Especially impressive is "View from Lenny's Studio." Wendler marks out his forms with an admirable simplicity of expression but uses his colors with a maximum of feeling.

Lining the corridor from the first gallery to the second--which is actually artist Jonathan Waters' studio--Anne Doris-Eisner's paintings are the perfect segue to Line Dancing, a selection of drawings curated by art critic Stephen Kobasa. True to Kobasa's eclectic and open-minded tastes, Line Dancing pirouettes well over the stylistic map. The show embraces the abstract mark making of Miguel Trelles and Thomas Stavovy, the doodle-like red ink drawing of Larissa Hall ("Some Things I Am, Curious About") and Nathan Lewis' finely wrought graphite imagery ("Coward, Servant, Blindman").

The latter work illustrates the ambiguous position in which the medium of drawing often resides. Lewis is preeminently a painter. A recent move, though, has left him temporarily without a studio in which to paint. This drawing is one result. Drawings can stand on their own; "Coward, Servant, Blindman" does. But drawing is often used as a venue for testing out ideas, sketching, experimenting, roughing out concepts to be finished later in a different medium. Lewis' finished drawing suggests an as yet unrealized painting.

Many of these drawings communicate a sense of openness, of being "in process." I get this feeling from Jillian Vento's "Sprawl II: and I think that is what they [we] are all doing," composed with graphite, acrylic paint and watercolors. The image depicts a couple of brick city buildings sketched out with pencil lines. Painted atop the buildings are a grazing deer and a water tower. The concept of alienated nature is reinforced by an outlining of thick white paint around the deer, tower and buildings, isolating them compositionally from the open sky.

Some of these works I have seen before but was happy to see again such as Nancy Eisenfeld's "Twister" (which bears a strong resemblance to the drawing "Speaking a New Language" shown during the 2008 City-Wide Open Studios--is it the same image with a different title?) and Christine Darnell's "Birthday," displayed in a 2006 show at Creative Arts Workshop.

It is interesting to see how Emilia Dubicki's style translates into a somewhat different format. Her two abstract landscapes, "Rocks/Morris Cove" and "Rocks/Morris Cove #2," translate well as pastels. The second well captures its imagery of tangled sea refuse and rocks in the foreground and the mist-shrouded waters in the background.

John Bent's gutsy work churns our innards out. In "Anatomy Lesson One," he layers cartoony imagery of coiled intestines, muscle, fiber and cilia, meshing line work with fluid washes. Fethi Meghelli's four-paneled "The Birth of Tribes" is a dance of pictographic people and animals, offering a sense of either communion and celebration or drift and conflict.

Edward Castiglione's "Drawing in the Old Style (The Ustadah of Isfahan)" meticulously engages with drawing as an end in itself. Using colored pencils, Castiglione combines figurative depiction with gridwork and a patterned image that resembles an ornate medieval representation of the sun. Night and day, day and night. The nude male figure runs toward the sun, absorbing its light, color and heat. It is an exceptional small work in which all the elements of its elemental allegory work perfectly.

Call for art from The gallery at Black Rock: "Contemporary Futurism"

The Gallery at Black Rock
2861 Fairfield Ave., Bridgeport, (203) 814-6856
Call for art: "Contemporary Futurism"

Press release

Calling for art for a "Contemporary Futurism" show. What do you see as the future? Looking for sculpture, installation, painting, assemblage, film and video art. Or any other medium that you can dream up.

Please submit no more than 4 jpegs and a brief statement on the work to thegalleryatblackrock [AT] gmail.com.

The show will open in mid June in the 51 Crescent Avenue location. The show is wide open to interpretation so go nuts.

Sunday program and exhibition at Congregation Beth El-Keser Israel in New Haven

BEKI (Congregation Beth El-Keser Israel)
85 Harrison St. at Whalley Ave., New haven, (203) 389-2108
Tradition and Women's Empowerment in Modern Art
Sun., Apr. 18, 9:45 a.m.—12:30 p.m.; Exhibition opening reception: 12:30-1:30 p.m.

Press release

Two events Saturday at Artspace

Artspace
50 Orange St, New Haven, (203) 772-2709
Grant Writing Workshop: We Are Pleased To Inform You
Artspace Underground
Sat., Apr. 17, 2010. The workshop will be held 12—3 p.m.; Artspace Underground from 8—11 p.m.

Press release

Two events this Saturday at Artspace in New Haven:

We Are Pleased to Inform You

We Are Pleased To Inform You is a Saturday grant writing workshop from 12—3 p.m. The workshop will be led by guest artist, Brainard Carey. Carey has exhibited in the Whitney Biennial and numerous solo museum shows and is the co-founder of the art collective known as Praxis, which he created with his wife Delia Bajo.

Praxis is an internationally acclaimed art collaborative whose works have been featured in the Whitney Biennial, MOMA, PS 1, The Reina Sofia, and most recently in a solo show at The Whitney Museum. Currently Praxis has several traveling shows in progress. Carey also works as a career coach and mentor to artists.

Artspace is pleased to invite Carey to speak about his professional practice, his extensive research in the grant-writing field, current trends in the art market, and his own artist consultation business. The three-hour workshop will reveal the diverse approaches to guide artists in their own pursuits and refine their written materials. The workshop will cover a broad spectrum of topics from how to understand arts organizations and their staff to customizing application packages to submit to galleries, museums, and foundations.

For additional information, please contact Laura Marsh, Communications and Program Director: lauralmarsh [AT] artspacenh.org. This Artspace workshop is $30; the proceeds of your order will help to fund a workshop series in 2011. Please reserve your seat today: https://artspacenh.org/events.asp



Just got out of a Bad Romance? Can't get off the Telephone? Well, put on your Poker Face, play the Love Game, and Just Dance at Artspace Underground on Saturday, Apr. 17, 2010, from 8—11 p.m.! Think you can wear those McQueen platforms better than the Lady, herself? Then walk, walk, fashion baby because the most inspired Gaga look will win a gift certificate from 116 Crown! Try your best, but dress to impress.

Or, if Gaga isn't your thing, no big, we've got two bands and a multi-media puppet show performance right up your alley. SHARK, a three-piece ethereal rock band from both New Haven and Boston, are, according to The New Haven Advocate, great candidates "for listening in the car late at night or putting on the headphones and drifting off to wherever you want to go." Drift over to Artspace for Saint Bernadette, a five-piece erotically-charged aural accord that meshes a disparate template of psychadelic-meets-arena rock with a peppering of jazz and candy-coated sing-along choruses. Kamikaze puppeteer Kim Mikenis promises to tickle your senses with her unique and always original live performance pieces.

So there you have it, SHARK and Saint Bernadette will get you woozy, Kim Mikenis will perform a doozy, and DJ Sofia Cavallo will keep you schmoozy. If you arrive between 8 and 9 pm, get in for $2 with your school I.D. After 9 pm, $5 admission includes free spiked-punch until it's gone. $6 drinks from 116 Crown. Be there or be square. For more information about Artspace Underground or to find out how you can get involved, please contact Madison Moore: madison.moore [AT] yale.edu

Huckins show opens at Real Art Ways during this Thursday's Creative Cocktail Hour

Real Art Ways
56 Arbor St., Hartford, (860) 232-1006
Shawn Huckins: The Paint Chip Series
Through June 13, 2010.
Opening reception: Thurs., Apr. 15, 6—8 p.m. during Creative Cocktail Hour (Admission: $10/$5 for members)

Press release

Real Art Ways presents Shawn Huckins' The Paint Chip Series, which mimics the layout and explores the colors of paint cards found at home improvement stores. The opening reception for the exhibition will be held during Creative Cocktail Hour on Thurs., Apr. 15, 2010 from 6—8 p.m. Admission to the reception is $10/$5 for members.

The Paint Chip Series explores color choice and its meaning in our daily lives. Mimicking the exact proportions, font, layout, and hues of miniature paint cards found at a nation-wide home improvement stores, bands of color we may choose for our most intimate spaces—bedrooms, kitchens, family rooms—are an ideal stage to examine the everyday people and objects that occupy our world."

http://www.shawnhuckins.com>Huckins talks about his work: "My work concerns how an object's story and our surroundings relate to us. I find pure, simplistic beauty and exceptional intimacy in the common object and our everyday environment." Huckins, a New Hampshire native, has been living and working in his Middletown, Connecticut studio since 2006. Shawn uses what we see and use in our everyday lives as inspiration for his art such as fast food chains, gas stations and even the clothes that we wear. His work has been shown in Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and California.

Admission after April 15 is free to the public, although a $3.00 donation is requested.

Report from Stonington

Cate Charles Gallery
147 Water Street
Stonington Borough
(860)245-5213

Images from the Stonington Printmakers Society
April 3-28, 2010

Last week I stopped by the opening of the Stonington Printmakers Society annual exhibition at Cate Charles Gallery. With a grant from the Bodenwein Public Benevolent Foundation, artists Mara Beckwith and Sadie DeVore bought an intaglio press, set it up at Stonington High School (where DeVore is the art teacher), and began offering printmaking classes to the community. The show, curated by Slater Museum director Vivian Zoë, features prints made in the workshops. Although the prints are uneven in quality, the fact that Beckwith and DeVore have engaged the community in the process of printmaking is fantastic. Out behind the gallery, across the patio, marine painter Russ Kramer has a small gallery/studio where he paints images of America's seafaring past. Maybe it's my Mystic upbringing, but I'm always impressed by artists who paint the ocean well. Kramer will be giving a lecture on his process at the Mystic Seaport Maritime Art Gallery today at 4 pm.

Russ Kramer at work in his Stonington studio.

I also ran into artist Paul Centore. Paul has organized two life drawing sessions in Mystic and wants to get the word out. Who knew Mystic was such a hotbed of life drawing? For those who want to work from the figure and might like to take a drive down to the water before the tourists arrive, here are the details:

The Cove's Edge life drawing group meets Mondays from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., to draw from a nude or clothed model. They typically have several quick poses, followed by one longer pose. The artists work in many media, including pencil, pastel, watercolor, and charcoal. Easels are available onsite. The cost varies from $4 to $10 per night. The group operates on a drop-in basis, so no signup is required. Just show up at Cove's Edge Studio at 91 Noble Ave., Noank, ready to draw.

The Hollow life drawing group meets Thursdays from 7:00 to 9:30 paint, pastel, watercolor, and charcoal. Easels are available onsite. p.m., to draw from a nude model. They typically have one pose for consecutive weeks. The artists work in all media, including oil. The cost is $10.00 per night. The group operates on a drop-in basis, so no signup is required. Just show up at the old white the entire evening, and sometimes extend a pose to last two schoolhouse at 115 Welles Rd., Mystic, ready to draw.

Arthur Danto to speak at Wadsworth Atheneum Saturday afternoon

Wadsworth Atheneum
600 Main St., Hartford, (860) 278-2670
Critic Talk: Arthur Danto
Sat., Apr. 10, 2010, 2 p.m.

Press release

Arthur Danto, former art critic for The Nation and author of numerous books on the philosophy of art, will be at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art on Sat., Apr. 10, to host a talk at 2 p.m. on his influential theories regarding the works of Andy Warhol.

Danto will read from his newest publication, Andy Warhol (Yale University Press, 2009), with a special focus on the Warhol silkscreens in the Wadsworth's own collection, including "Triple Silver Disaster" (1963), "Early Colored Jackie" (1964) and "Camouflage Self-Portrait" (1986).

Selected as one of the "Best Art and Photography Books" of 2009 by Rachel Wolff in The Daily Beast, Danto's work delivers a compact, masterful tour of Andy Warhol's personal, artistic, and philosophical transformations. He traces the evolution of the pop artist, including his early reception, relationships with artists such as Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg, and the Factory phenomenon. Danto draws upon his encyclopedic knowledge of Warhol's time and presents Warhol as an endlessly multidimensional figure-artist, political activist, filmmaker, writer, philosopher-who retains permanent residence in our national imagination.

Now Johnsonian Professor Emeritus Philosophy, Arthur Danto taught at Columbia University for 26 years. Danto is the recipient of many fellowships and grants including a Fulbright Scholarship, two Guggenheim Fellowships and an American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) Award. He has been published in numerous journals and is the author of several books on art criticism and aesthetic theory, including Encounters and Reflections: Art in the Historical Present (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1990), Beyond the Brillo Box: The Visual Arts in Post-Historical Perspective (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1992), and The Madonna of the Future: Essays in a Pluralistic Art World (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2000). He was art critic for The Nation from 1984 to 2009,and an editor of the Journal of Philosophy and a contributing editor of the Naked Punch Review and Artforum.

The Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art is located at 600 Main St. in Hartford, Connecticut. The Museum is open Wednesdays to Fridays, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Please visit www.wadsworthatheneum.org for more information.

Edwards Street Artists' Collective show opens Saturday in East Haven

Hagaman Memorial Library Gallery
227 Main St., East Haven, (203) 468-3890
Sending Home the Slates
Apr. 10—30, 2010
Opening reception: Sat., Apr. 10, 5:30—8 p.m.

Press release

The Edwards Street Artists' Collective presents Sending Home the Slates, an exhibition of painting, print-making, sculpture, installations and music. The show will run from Apr. 10-30, 2010 with an opening reception on Sat., Apr. 10, 5:30-8 p.m. Curated by guest curator Johnes Ruta, the exhibition's featured artists are Patricia Ames, Claudine Burns-Smith, Phillip Chambers, Roberta Chambers, Francine Curto, Carole Dubielle, Joseph Higgins, Linda Horning, Bob Keating, Cathy Valley and Rita Valley.

Artists:

Patricia Ames • "I use a mix of textiles and acrylics to create dramatic portraits, combining a loose style with a sense of humor to give these pet portraits a whimsical quality."

Patricia Ames studied sculpture and painting at Middlesex Community College. She also pursued independent study with sculptor James Caudle and painter Lennie Moskowitz. In 2004, Patricia joined fellow artists Lucinda Gray, Margaret Moore, and Francine Curto to form the Cedar Swamp Artist Group.

Claudine Burns Smith • "'Gregory' is the second wall sculpture of a series about my relatives and friends. Gregory is my son and a performing musician. The piece consists of pulp made from recycled newspaper applied to a foam armature and painted with acrylics. Besides paper pulp I work in clay or concrete mostly for outdoors. I am a self-taught artist. I was born in France and came to this country in 1970. I taught art in Colorado and Connecticut. My work has been exhibited in Russia, China and the U.S.

Roberta Chambers • "I'm intrigued with using textiles in unexpected ways—as paper, photographic paper, skin, posters, cards, and in ways there are no words for yet."

Roberta Chambers is an artist, and a designer of textiles, costumes, sets, and sound stages. She has shown her work at ArtPark Whitneyville, Artspace Gallery, the John Slade Ely House, Erector Square Gallery, Wave Gallery, the Moira Fitzsimmons Arons Gallery at Hamden Hall, the Channel 8 March of Arts Festival, the Building Wrapping Art Festival at Gateway Center, the PMVI shows at the Clock Factory, the Green Gallery in Guiford, and the New Haven Women's AIDS Coalition Art Show. Her costume and set designs have shown at Shakespeare on the Green, the New Haven Arts Council "Human Float" for New Haven's 350th birthday, Take Notice Dance Company, Performance Studio, Theatricide, The Buy and Sell, and the Love/Money Show at Erector Square.

Phillip Chambers • "I was born in Australia in the early 1950s. I traveled the world in the early 1970s, and settled in Connecticut in 1975. I've been involved with the art movement in the States for many years and have been in many shows. I like working with pen and ink drawing, and consider myself an illustrator of short stories that I've written myself.

"In this show at the New Haven Library there will be two of my illustrated books. One book is called Mailman walkit and the other book consists of drawings of toys."

Francine Curto • "Art has been the one and only constant sane part of my life..."

Francine Curto speaks of her art as "poetry for the eye, therapy for the spirit, and love for the heart." She studied art techniques privately with some of the leading artists in Connecticut: sculpture with Jim Caudle, pastels with Joann Ballinger, watercolor with Frank Constantine and Judith Campbell. She has shown he work at The Brick Gallery and the Essex Art Association in Essex, CT; the Tip Top Gallery, Plattsburg, NY; at Golden Street Gallery, New London, and at Chester Open Gallery Night.

Joseph Higgins (see image) • "Working in abstract imagery is a natural avenue for me. It is a broad place, flowing nicely with my artistic process, which allows me freedom of expression. My paintings rely on natural rhythms. The intricacy of detail evokes an experience unique to each viewer. I try to create, through depth of spiritual space, an environment that allows travel into the image. As people see, arrange, and resolve my pictures according to their own ideas, I am able to share a part of my artistic experience."

Higgins invented his method of amorphous painting on 4" square ceramic surfaces in 1990, using only paint, brushes, and water. He attended the University of Massachusetts at Boston where he studied literature, and apprenticed with the Beacon Hill Artisans. He is a founding member of the Edwards Street Collective.

Linda Horning • "I have resided in New Haven for over 30 years. I attended the University of Illinois, receiving a BFA in Art Education. For many years I was a printmaker primarily working out of the Creative Arts Workshop in New Haven. I currently work with mixed media sculpture deriving mainly from found objects. I am mainly interested in symbols or images which condense a concept to elicit an instinctively recognizable in the viewer. Consequently, my current work tends to be more abstract but hopefully quite accessible."

Cathy Valley • "Most of my paintings and collages have to do with statues and garden environments. I've also been exploring underwater objects and materializing otherworldly visions!"

Cathy Valley attended the Swain School of Design in New Bedford, MA. She went on to receive a BA in Psychology from Southern Connecticut State University, and an MS in Marriage & Family Therapy from Central Connecticut State University. Cathy is a licensed Marriage & Family Therapist.

Thursday evening opening at Atticus Bookstore/Cafe in New Haven

Atticus Bookstore/Café
1082 Chapel St., New Haven, (203) 776-4040
Katie Samuelson: A New Day
Through May 16, 2010
Opening Reception: Thurs., Apr. 8, 6:30 p.m.

Press release

Katie Samulson is an artist and interior designer based in Cheshire, CT. She holds an A.A.S. in Interior Design from the Parsons School of Design and has studied painting at the University of Hartford Art School. Her work has been shown in Cheshire, New Haven, Hartford, and Woodbury.

Artist Statement:

This series of paintings is a study of contrasts: of darkness and light, of complementary colors, of gesture painting and drawing. The work has been inspired by my personal experience of loss and recovery from that loss. It explores the conflicting emotions that ebb and flow day to day after a life changing experience: grief and joy, despair and hope, anger and acceptance. By painting in abstract forms, the content of each piece remains intentionally vague, leaving the viewer to understand it in the context of their own personal experience. Emotion and energy are created by the juxtaposition of opposing elements: dark and light shapes, complementary colors, thin washes and thick brush strokes, graphite lines and palette knife strokes. At the same time the work attempts to capture the ephemeral quality of light that fosters peace and healing amid the conflict.

There will be an opening reception for A New Day on Thurs. evening, Apr. 7, at 6:30 p.m.

Two shows open at A-Space Saturday

A-Space at West Cove Studios
30 Elm St., West Haven, (203) 627-8030
Line Dancing: A Writer's Choice of Works on Paper
Apr. 3—May 3, 2010
Locations/6 Views
Apr. 3—May 1, 2010.
Opening receptions: Sat., Apr. 3, 4—6 p.m.

Press release

Two exhibits open this Sat. afternoon in A-Space Gallery at West Cove Studios in West Haven.

Line Dancing: A Writer's Choice of Works on Paper has been assembled by writer Stephen Kobasa. The show features drawings by John Bent, Edward Castiglione, Susan Classen-Sullivan, Christine Darnell, Emilia Dubicki, Nancy Eisenfeld, Howard el-Yasin, Larissa Hall, Janet Lage, Nathan Lewis, Henry Loomis, Laura Marsh, Fethi Meghelli, Dorothy Powers, Michael Shevelkin, Joseph Smolinski, Thomas Stavovy, Miguel Trelles, Jillian Vento and Jonathan Waters.

Locations/6 Views is a group exhibition of paintings exploring the nature of place with works by Anne Culver, Anne Doris-Eisner, Katie Kindilien, Lenny Moskowitz, Josephine Sheridan Robinson, and Brian Wendler. Working in diverse media and styles, these six local artists consider the effects of location. In paintings that range from representational to abstract and expressionist, locations are recorded as both the tangible aspects of external place, and the qualities of place that leave a strong sensory imprint, and 'locate' us as individuals.

Saturday opening at City Gallery

City Gallery
994 State St., New Haven, (203) 782-2489
Double Take: Sheila Kaczmarek & Jane Harris
Through Apr. 25, 2010.
Opening reception: Sat., Apr. 3, 2—5 p.m.
Press release

In this exhibit, Jane Harris is concerned with exploring layers with monotypes and silk aquatints. She leaves much to chance to keep the history of the piece alive.

Sheila Kaczmarek is intrigued by what happens when multiples are assembled. She works in clay and in her two-dimensional work uses mixed media such as paper, oil paint, encaustic, beeswax, fabric and all sorts of found objects.


Both artists are founder members of the City Gallery and have also worked together collaboratively with other Shoreline artists in the past.

There will be an opening reception for Double Take on Sat., Apr. 3, from 2—5 p.m.