Call for entries from Housatonic Museum of Art; deadline May 31

Housatonic Museum of Art
900 Lafayette Blvd., Bridgeport, (203) 332-5229
Call for Entries: Flower (Re)Power
Deadline: May 31, 2010

Press release

Why (Re)Power the Flower?

When you couple the art class exercise/classic art staple of the still life with the flower - sumptuous siren of subject matter for painters big and small, the result is a brigade of flower art that ranges from straight representation to a kinetic sculpture where sunflowers turn circles in a wooden box. Like trying to write a love song, it is challenging to revamp the exhausted visual of the flower, bringing it into a contemporary art dialogue and finding new ways to approach it as formal element, subject, symbol, etc. With Flower (Re)Power, the Housatonic Museum of Art is asking artists, whether you love or hate flowers in art, to share works influenced by or that address the flower in any way. All media are welcome - sound, video, painting, sculpture, online projects, etc. Experimentation, critique, quirky perspectives, and general irreverence are encouraged!

For more information, check out the Flower (Re)Power blog.

Juror: Terri C. Smith

Important Dates:

Entry deadline: May 31
Email notification of acceptances: June 4
Drop off selected work: June 10, 11, 14, 10 am - 8 pm
Shipped work must arrive by June 11
Opening Reception: Thursday, June 17, 5 - 7 pm
Exhibition dates: June 18 - July 23, 2010
Pick up of artworks: July 26, 27, 10 am - 8 pm

Saturday evening opening at Hygienic Art

Hygienic Art
83 Bank St., P.O. Box 417, New London, (860) 443-8001
Three Artists: Kevin Cooper: Glass, Megan Craig: Paint + Adam Campos: Photo
May 29—June 26, 2010
Opening reception: Sat., May 29, 7—10 p.m.

Press release

Hygienic Art presents three artists working in glass, paint and photography. Inspired by the colors of Venice, the rooftops of Brooklyn and the transient life, at Hygienic Art we see how these three artists experiment, communicate and imagine experience.

There will be an opening reception for this show on Sat., May 29, from 7—10 p.m.

Kevin Cooper: Glass

Artist statement:

For three years I have been an apprentice under Jeffery P'an at Precient Studios at the Velvet Mill in Stonington CT. In addition to learning the techniques I am now faced with the challenge of finding my voice or individual style. The work I made for this show was largely experimental of where to go next. The smaller work is inspired by my trip to Venice last year where I bought supplies and tools and inspired by the colors used by Jeffery. Tollen was created as an answer for my desire to recreate my surroundings with out having the ample techniques needed. It is a combination of chemistry and my true passion glass.

Kevin is an artist in residence at the Hygienic Art Coop, New London, CT.

Megan Craig: Paint

Statement:

Painting has always seemed to me like a brute way of talking, more like pointing. It's not gentle and it's never precise. When I paint I always end up pointing past or through what I thought I wanted to show. It's like wearing mittens to thread a needle. Sometimes I think about painting as a way of organizing experience. I think about work that is brave or truthful—paintings that make life seem more full or more urgent.

I started painting cityscapes in 1997 from the 6th floor window of my apartment in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn. I had a view of Brooklyn rooftops, church steeples and the fading outline of Queens. I was trying to find some space in the city, some clarity and distance, a place of my own. Painting let me get to know New York.

My new paintings explore experimental spaces, fields of color and the cavernous holes between strokes. My work derives concretely from immersion in cityscapes and the architecture of crowded places, but these new paintings focus on feelings and forces rather than objects or images. I'm concerned with the ambiguities between the still and the moving, the concrete and the abstract. The accumulation of paint strokes generates spaces that are tensed with multiple centers of gravity, a propagation of intricacies, cities within cities. Painting has a special ability to express the forces emanating from within seemingly sedentary things—bricks, books, junk. Paint can reanimate objects and make visceral a certain sweetness, the erosive weight of time, the explosive thrust of joy, the ways things bend and buckle, rise and resist. My paintings present such forces and their pre-articulate, visceral moods: pinched, tense, shy, poised, yellow, pink, free, fast, and jubilant.

Megan lives and paints in New Haven, CT.

Adam Campos: Photo

Artist Statement:

Floaters. They're kind of creepy almost like ghosts. No, they are beautiful and free, more like clouds. I see now, no two are exactly alike so they are like snowflakes. Maybe they are simply that shapeless blob that floats in casual fashion across the corner of your eye. You blink. It's gone.

Actually, they are like all of those things. Floaters are as mysterious as a ghostly specter, while evoking as much imagination and wonder as the shape shifting form of a cloud slowly drifting across the horizon. At the same time if you do find a Floater meandering into view and you happen to blink, you will miss it and no matter what you do you will never get it back. You see, a Floater form may only exist for a fraction of a second because it is constantly shifting and mutating until about a second after it springs to life it ceases to be at all. That's right, less than a second is all you have to admire one in person.

Exhibiting Floaters in states of rising and expanding, at their peak and during their inevitable deterioration as they return to the earth from where they spawned. Observing many Floaters in various phases of their lives may be taken as representations of how transient life, the universe and everything are and how beautiful it all can be even in a period of deterioration. Even something as magnificent as a mountain range at its peak once rose from mere hills and plains and will return to hills and plains over the millennia.

Even when looking into the still image of a Floater they're so surreal that it's easy to get lost in the layers and tangle your mind in the folds as it may appear to be still moving. I usually see faces, others may see animals or flowers those with yet greater imaginations may perceive entire scenes or a story. In short, a Floater will be anything you allow it to be.

Adam Campos is 23 and lives in Bronx, NY.

Paris in Plantsville opening Saturday night

Paris in Plantsville
15 West Main St., Plantsville, (860) 426-1149
House Call: A Resident Artist Show
May 22—June 30, 2010.
Opening reception: Sat., May 22, 7—11 p.m.

Press release

Paris in Plantsville Art Gallery and Studio will be hosting the first show displaying solely the resident artists from Paris In Plantsville. The reception is on May 22, from 7—11 p.m. The show will run through all of June. We will be holding a symposium during the exhibition reception to explain our artwork as well as inform people about the Salvador Dali etchings.


Paris in Plantsville Gallery and Studio is an emerging arts space located in the village of Plantsville in the suburbs of Southington, Connecticut.

We aim to promote the arts in all forms, in the village, the town, the state, and eventually nationally and globally.

We are six friends; five of us are alumni of the University of Hartford-Hartford Art School, and the other, is an alumni of the University of Connecticut BFA program. Our passion and belief in the positivity and energy of the arts has brought us together at Paris in Plantsville, where we are all resident artists continuing our craft.

A wide variety of new art ranging from paintings to media art and conceptual works by:

• Sean Michanczyk

• Jordan Deschene

• Andy Morrow

• Steve Rand

• Andre Rochester

• Joe Bun Keo

"8 Eyes" at Jennifer Jane Gallery reviewed in Advocate

My review of the show 8 Eyes runs in this week's New Haven Advocate. A glimpse of that review:

Painter Steven DiGiovanni has long used photographs to stimulate his visual imagination. As curator of 8 Eyes at the Jennifer Jane Gallery, DiGiovanni has asked four fellow representational painters — Mia Brownell, Nathan Lewis, Christopher Mir and Lawrence Morelli — to exhibit their own photographic creations as well as one painting.

Photography is not a primary practice for any of the four. Only Nathan Lewis has a background in photography. In each case, though, their use of photography is either intrinsic to or representative of their painting approach.

Read more here...

Wise beyond years: Latino youth photography in Fair Haven

I have two reviews in this week's New Haven Advocate. The first assesses Sueños Americanos, the wonderful show of photography at Arte, Inc. by 8th grade students from Fair Haven School in New Haven.

It begins:

While lawmakers in Arizona were busy legislating a nightmare for Latino residents of that state, seven immigrant students from Fair Haven School (Rony Leiva, Nestor León, Agustín Minor, Jomar Pellot, Edén Pérez, Uriel Pérez and Frances Torres) have been more commendably pursuing American dreams through an after-school photography program.

Their photos are being shown at ARTE, a Fair Haven-based nonprofit that promotes Latino art and culture. The exhibit is titled Sueños Americanos, or, fittingly, “American Dreams.”

Douglas Bowman, a teacher in Fair Haven School’s bilingual language arts program, has been working with the students since last fall in the after-school program. The idea was for the students — immigrants from Puerto Rico, Mexico and Guatemala — to produce a photo essay that represents things that are important to them.

The show flows organically by theme. Starting with immigration, it progresses through religion, youth, culture, student life and adult aspirations. The students developed the themes and came up with the ideas. Bowman taught them photographic techniques, but the images are theirs.

Read more here...

Fore reasons of space, one paragraph from my review was cut (it would have run before the final graf of the story). Exclusively here on Connecticut Art Scene you can read that graf:

Accompanying each photo is a haiku written by members of Mnikesa Whitaker's writing class. The students were shown the photos as prompts and asked to compose poetry in response. Mike Juarez Sartillo's haiku responds to Pellot's "Rompecabezas," writing, "Luxurious stuff/ all over our body, stuff/It is like a plague." "Typewriter" by Frances Torres shows two fingers in close-up poised on a laptop keyboard like a pair of legs about to wade into a river of text. In response, student Eyecenia Suarez wrote, "Look, she thinks of words/ to type so that she can write/ the way she's feeling."

Painting show reception Sunday at Kehler Liddell Gallery

Kehler Liddell Gallery
873 Whalley Ave., New Haven, (203) 389-9555
Presence: Paintings by Deirdre Schiffer & Lawrence Morelli
May 20-June 27, 2010
Artist Reception: Sun., May 23, 3-6 p.m.

Press release

Kehler Liddell Gallery is very pleased to present Presence, a two-person exhibition of new paintings by Deirdre Schiffer and Lawrence Morelli. This will be Schiffer's debut, and Morelli's third show with the gallery. The artist reception for this show will be held this Sun., May 23, from 3—6 p.m.

Schiffer paints solitary figures in varying states of contemplation. Her models stand or sit, in a series of poses, facing the viewer in gently backlit interiors. She paints with expressive strokes that illuminate the psychological states of mind of her subjects, in a limited palette reminiscent of Morandi. Her play with sources of waning and waxing light imbue a feeling of inner enlightenment that we often associate with the rising or passing of personal inner musings. Schiffer's ability to relate presence is so strong, that even when her compositions are void of figures, the feeling of a person-just-removed looms.

Morelli also makes works that explore the ability of paint to explain mind-body relationships. With a rare combination of gusto and sophistication, he embarks on a painting in the manner of the German Expressionists, laying down bold, uncalculated, loose gests. His finished works resemble underpaintings at times, especially those that exhibit exposed patches of white canvas. But at a sizable 60 x 60 inches, the images hold their own, and the immediacy of their rawness pushes the figure-ground tension into real space. The paintings reach out to the viewer, inviting them to see themselves as a series of moving marks—marks that we have memorized, internalized and used to define ourselves. Their quickness and confidence feel like shorthand-or a stenographer's code for a larger, determined concept that already exists as a rule.

But here, Morelli breaks down these rules to flesh them out. For Morelli, "a painting cannot be intended, but rather must be wanted or hoped for in order to come into being". While the question of identity looms somewhere in his creation process, the exploration of painting's larger possibilities and depth-spiritual, mental and physical, is what really drives this new work.

Deirdre Schiffer has exhibited paintings and prints throughout the eastern U.S., most recently in Particular Places at the Creative Arts Workshop. She received her BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Cooper Union, and upon graduation was honored with two consecutive scholarships to the Provincetown (Massachusetts) Workshop. For nearly 25 years, Schiffer worked as the principal graphic designer at her firm in Branford. During this time, she continued to make art, and earned fellowships at the Vermont Studio Center and Women's Studio Workshop in Rosendale, New York. She has taught Graphic Design at the Creative Arts Workshop in New Haven, and the Paier School of Art. Schiffer lives and works in the greater New Haven area.

Lawrence Morelli received his BA from Michigan State University and went on to study Illustration at the Kendall School of Design in Grand Rapids, MI. He currently lives and works in downtown New Haven, and teaches Intro to Drawing and Figure Drawing at Norwalk Community College.

Artist reception for photography show tonight at Atticus Bookstore

Atticus Café
1082 Chapel St., New Haven, (203) 776-4040
Ashutosh Khandha: Somewhere in Between: Yale and New Haven
Through May 17—June 27, 2010
Opening Reception: Thurs., May 20, 2010, 6:30 p.m.

Press release

ARTIST'S STATEMENT

I am an engineer by training and profession. Like most professionals, I have spent a majority of my time working on tasks ranging from complex problems to mundane documentation. I seek to see the world by painting with light. Photography allows me to capture the joy I derive from those moments of gazing. Most importantly, it allows me to be an “amateur” of life and nature, in the true, etymological sense of that word. One cannot help but be in awe of the rich architectural history, the beautiful foliage and the limitless oceans that surround Yale and New Haven. I have tried to capture an inkling of the emotion that one feels in these places.

ABOUT ATTICUS BOOKSTORE/CAFE

Atticus is an independent bookstore and cafe, serving downtown New Haven for over 30 years. Atticus offers fresh bread, coffee, sandwiches, soups, salads, and desserts, as well as a selection of fine books and cards. For more information, see the Atticus website at www.atticusbookstorecafe.com.

There will be an opening reception for Ashutosh Khanda's Somewhere in Between: Yale and New Haven on Thurs. evening, May 20, at 6:30 p.m.

Facing the truth: Artist Daniel Heyman bears witness in show at Wesleyan

I've written about Daniel Heyman's artwork previously, specifically back in 2008 when some of Heyman's prints were included in a portraiture show at the Guilford Art Center. Heyman currently has a show at the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery at Wesleyan University. I have a review of this show in this week's New Haven Advocate as well as on the Advocate's Web site:

What have we done? What terrible crimes were committed in our name whose perpetrators are not held to account? Some answers to these questions come in the form of a searing exhibition of portraits by Daniel Heyman, Bearing Witness: Stories from the Front Lines, currently on display at the Ezra and Cecile Zilkha Gallery at Wesleyan University.

Heyman accompanied a team of human rights lawyers to Istanbul and Amman where they interviewed former Abu Ghraib detainees. Sitting in on dozens of interviews from 2005 to 2008, Heyman sketched and painted the former prisoners’ portraits while also scrawling text of their harrowing accounts into the images. The show also includes eight portraits of African-American men, primarily former felons now committed to being responsible members of the community. Additionally, two wood sculptures illustrated with black-and-white allegorical etchings critiquing our national disfigurement by war are installed in the gallery. The latter two works reminded me of Picasso’s “Guernica.”

Read more...

Two receptions Saturday at A-Space in West Haven

A-Space at West Cove Studios
30 Elm St., West Haven, (203) 627-8030
Large Scale Drawings
May 15—Aug. 15, 2010
James Reed: Works on Paper
May 1—31, 2010.
Artists reception for both shows: Sat., May 15, 4—6 p.m.

Press release

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

A-Space at West Cove Studios presents an exhibition of drawings by 10 artists that explore their expression in human scale—or greater—in a variety of mediums. Works by Joseph Adolphe, Alexis Brown, Sue Bradley, Emilia Dubicki, Dorothy Powers, James Reed, Tom Stavovy, Nomi Silverman, David Taylor and Mark Williams. Large Scale Drawings will be up into August.

Also, through the end of May, check out exquisite wood cuts and chine colle prints (see image) by James Reed in his show Works on Paper.

Hesselgrave show opens Sunday at Willoughby Wallace Memorial Library

Willoughby Wallace Memorial Library
146 Thimble Islands Rd., Stony Creek, (203) 562-4927
Close to Home: New Work by Lisa Hess Hesselgrave
May 9—Jun. 2, 2010
Opening reception: Sun., May 16, 4—6 p.m.

Press release

Close to Home: New Work by Lisa Hess Hesselgrave will be on exhibit from May 9 through June 2, 2010 at the Willoughby Wallace Memorial Library in Stony Creek. There will be an artist's reception on Sun., May 16 from 4—6 p.m.

A regular on the New Haven art scene, this show is the first time Hesselgrave has exhibited on her home turf of Stony Creek, CT.

Inspired by the view from a favorite window, the pieces in this series of dusky landscapes evoke the road to home or the road away from home.

Using oils and pastels, the artist has recorded a keenly-observed landscape from a favorite window. Hesselgrave's familiarity with the immoveable shapes of her view has allowed her to focus on the continually changing qualities of color and light. An exercise in restraint, the darkest of the nighttime images employ barely perceptible shifts in color, yet manage to reveal suggestions of houses, trees and road.

Hesselgrave's long regarded skill of representing the human figure is transferred here. Most of these images are unpeopled, yet the human presence is suggested by the comforting familiarity of a roofline or the amber glow of a window. Precise in color, nuanced in form, these finely crafted works haunt the viewer with images at once solid and ephemeral.

Lisa Hess Hesselgrave has been exhibiting her work throughout the greater northeast since graduating from the Yale School of Art in 1985. Hesselgrave's work is represented by the Kehler Liddell Gallery in New Haven. She has been awarded residencies at the Millay Colony for the Arts in 2002 and 1992 and at the Seaside Institute, in 1996. Hesselgrave is on the faculty of Gateway Community College in New Haven.

Friday evening opening of book arts show at Creative Arts Workshop

Creative Arts Workshop Hilles Gallery
80 Audubon St., New Haven, (203) 562-4927
Inventive Structures: Books Beyond the Codex
May 14—June 25, 2010
Opening reception: Fri., May 14, 5:30—7:30 p.m.
Artist Talk: Fri., Jun. 4, 5:30—6:30 p.m.

Press release

Creative Arts Workshop (CAW) presents Inventive Structures: Books Beyond the Codex, an international book arts exhibition. The show focuses on the remarkable diversity of book constructions, exploring innovative alternatives to the familiar codex binding, in which a book's pages are attached to a single, central spine. Juried by renowned book artist and conservator Hedi Kyle, Inventive Structures features sixty-five artists from across the United States, as well as from Europe, Asia and Australia.

The exhibition is on view in the Workshop's two-story Hilles Gallery from May 14—Jun. 25. An opening reception will be held on Fri., May 14 from 5:30—7:30 pm. In conjunction with the exhibition, a gallery talk with participating artists Emily Martin and Paulette Rosen is scheduled for Fri., Jun. 4, from 5:30—6:30 pm. The exhibition, opening and gallery talk are all free and open to the public.

The jurying process for Inventive Structures was highly selective, with nearly 200 entries submitted by more than 100 artists. Ms. Kyle selected a wide range of forms, techniques and content for the exhibition to show many interpretations of the book as it is not generally known. "Even if the codex is a unique wonder of ingenuity, [I looked] for creative thinking, imagination and research to propel the book into new realms," explained Ms. Kyle.

Creative Arts Workshop holds a juried exhibition each year to showcase the work of both emerging and established artists from around the world, reinforcing its mission of fostering creativity through participation in and appreciation of the visual arts.

SPECIAL EVENTS RELATED TO THE EXHIBITION

In conjunction with the exhibition, CAW is hosting several special events. An opening reception is scheduled for Friday, May 14, from 5:30-7:30 pm. A gallery talk, with participating artists Emily Martin (Iowa City, IA) and Paulette Rosen (Hamden, CT), will be held on Fri., Jun. 4, from 5:30—6:30 pm. Visiting artist Emily Martin will also teach a two-day workshop, "Magic Books, or Now You See It, Now You Don't," on June 5 and 6. (Please note that there is a registration fee for the Magic Books workshop. To register, please call (203) 562-4927.)

LOCAL ARTISTS WITH TIES TO CREATIVE ARTS WORKSHOP

CAW is pleased to note that participating artists Paulette Rosen and Nancy Eisenfeld are CAW faculty members, and Sandra Rhodes is a Studio Binder. Ann Langdon is Vice President of the Board of Directors. Elise Wiener is a former faculty member, and Joseph Saccio is former board member of the Workshop.

PARTICIPATING ARTISTS

Alice Austin (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
Pat Badt (Orefield, Pennsylvania)
Sara Bowen (Coffs Harbour, New South Wales, Australia)
J. Penney Burton (Columbia, Missouri)
Peter Bushell (Mahomet, Illinois)
Mary-Ellen Campbell (Sparrow Bush, New York)
Jessi Cerutti (St. Louis, Missouri)
Julie Chen (Berkeley, California)
Laurie Corral (Asheville, North Carolina)
Katherine Crone (New York, New York)
Heather Crossley (Stretton Heights, Queensland, Australia)
Curt Dornberg and Isobel Lynne Carnes (Tucson, Arizona)
Nancy Eisenfeld (North Haven, Connecticut)
Bridget Elmer (Tallahassee, Florida)
Joshua Falconer (Ventura, California)
Alisa Fox (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
Ania Gilmore (Lexington, Massachusetts)
Donna Globus (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
Karen Hanmer (Glenview, Illinois, see image at bottom)
K. Nelson Harper (Fort Smith, Arkansas)
Nicci Haynes (O'Connor, Australia)
Barbara Henry and Barbara Mauriello (Jersey City, New Jersey)
In Young Hong (An-yang City, Kyoung-ki-do, South Korea)
Heather Hunter (Haddenham, Buckinghamshire, England)
Andrew Huot (Normal, Illinois)
Amy Jackson (Winchester, Virginia)
Paul Johnson (Cheadle Hulme, Cheshire, England)
Peggy Johnston (Des Moines, Iowa)
Kumi Korf (Ithaca, New York)
Karen Kunc (Avoca, Nebraska)
Marianne Laimer (Romakloster, Sweden)
Ann Langdon (New Haven, Connecticut)
Roberta Lavadour (Pendleton, Oregon)
Gay Leonhardt (Willow, New York)
Erika Mahr (Astoria, New York)
Emily Martin (Iowa City, Iowa)
Pat Martin (Bethany, Connecticut)
Hanne Matthiesen (Malling, Denmark)
Anna Mavromatis (Houston, Texas)
Elizabeth McKee (Pasadena, Maryland)
Pamela Moore (Brooklyn, New York)
Melanie Mowinski (Cheshire, Massachusetts)
Janis Nedela (North Fremantle, Western Australia, Australia)
Kelly O'Brien (Alexandria, Virginia)
Sue O'Donnell (Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania)
Jan Owen (Belfast, Maine)
An Pham (Athens, Georgia)
Amy Pirkle (Tuscaloosa, Alabama)
Ben Reynaert (Ann Arbor, Michigan)
Sandra Rhodes (New Haven, Connecticut)
Paulette Rosen (Hamden, Connecticut)
Laura Russell (Portland, Oregon)
Regula Russelle (St. Paul, Minnesota)
Joseph Saccio (North Haven, Connecticut, see image at top)
Wilber Schilling (Minneapolis, Minnesota)
Susan Share (Anchorage, Alaska)
Carolyn Shattuck (Rutland, Vermont)
C.B. Sherlock (Minneapolis, Minnesota)
Jana Sim (Chicago, Illinois)
Erin Sweeney (Peterborough, New Hampshire)
S.C. Thayer (White Rock, New Mexico)
Susan Viguers (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
Laura Wait (Steamboat Springs, Colorado)
Elise Wiener (Port Chester, New York)
Thomas Parker Williams (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)

ABOUT THE JUROR

Hedi Kyle graduated from the Werk-Kunst Schule in Weisbaden, Germany and, after a brief career as a graphic designer, turned to book arts and book conservation. She recently retired as Head Conservator from the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia. She continues to instruct students in the field of book arts at the University of the Arts Graduate Program in Book Arts and Printmaking, also in Philadelphia.

Over the past 30 years, she has taught numerous workshops in the US, Canada, and Europe. Her one-of-a-kind book constructions are exhibited internationally and are in numerous collections.

Hedi Kyle has had one person shows at the Center for Book Arts in NYC, the Minnesota Center for the Book and the James Michener Museum in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. She is an honorary member of the Guild of Book Workers and a co-founder of Paper & Book Intensive (PBI).

Saturday opening at Gallery at Hunt Hill Farm in New Milford

The Gallery at Hunt Hill Farm
44 Upland Rd., New Milford, (860) 355-0300
Robert Alberetti
Mourina Stott: City Scapes
Brian Walters: Salvage Series
Tony Zatzick
May 15—June 20, 2010.
Opening reception: Sat. May 15, 3—5 p.m.

Press release

There will be a Saturday afternoon opening from 3—5 p.m. for shows by four artists in the Gallery at Hunt Hill Farm in New Milford.

Robert Alberetti • encaustic, collage, and oil painting

Imagination and emotion are the catalyst for Bob's paintings, collages, and mixed media works. This allows him to focus on the significant aspects of remembered scenes and experiences. He references on site, paintings, sketches, and photographs from his travels, which enables him to develop the formal attributes of his work. Alberetti's work, imbued with emotion, resonates with the viewer, which is a major factor in his working process.

Mourina Stott • oil on canvas - City Scapes

Mounira Gareeva was born on September 22, 1955, in Moscow, Russia. Her parents had recently migrated there from a village near the city of Ufa. She demonstrated an early aptitude for drawing and participated as an artist in school newspapers and similar activities. However, in that time and place it was not practical to pursue such a career. She received a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from the Moscow Institute of Radio Engineering and Automation, and until 1992 worked as a research engineer. Following the collapse of the USSR, she returned to school as a student of art, and graduated from the Moscow College of Artistic Professions with high honors. For the next several years she worked as a private artist, selling her works (principally still life's in oil on canvas and other substrates) through galleries and brokers in Moscow, Russia. Many of her works from this period are now in private collections in Eastern and Western Europe. Her recent works reflect her romantic view of the city, particularly New York City.

Brian Walters • sculpture- Salvage Series

A visit to Storm King Sculpture Park inspired Brian to research the exhibiting artists and develop ideas for his own work beginning with drawings and studies for small-scale abstract sculptures. Creating sculpture has become a very rewarding part of Brian's life as he allows all aspects of what interests him to arouse and motivate his inventiveness. His work is untitled, which allows each viewer to explore the work without imposition and much, if not all the sculpture is constructed with reclaimed materials. Brian's work is currently included in The Sculpture Mile in Madison, CT, an outdoor sculpture exhibition, through next spring , as well as here in The Berry Garden, before the Twin Silos at The Henderson Cultural Center. Brian will also be a featured artist both within The Silo Gallery and on Hunt Hill Farm's grounds.

Tony Zatzick • watercolor landscapes

Originally from California, where he was born in 1967, Tony has lived, worked, and exhibited in both Europe and the Americas. His work has been selected for exhibition by many well-known artists and critics such as Irving Sandler, William Bailey, Graham Nickson, Charles Cajori, Barbara Grossman and Bernard Chaet. His work has also been included in exhibition alongside Philip Pearlstein, Janet Fish and Jamie Wyeth.

Thursday night opening at Yale Medical Group's Art Place

Yale Medical Group's Art Place
800 Howard Rd., New Haven, (203) 737-5276
Exhibition XVI
May, 2010—Feb., 2011.
Opening Night Reception: Thurs., May 13, 5—7 p.m.

Press release

Art Place, a nonprofit arts organization founded and supported by The Yale Medical Group is very pleased to announce Exhibition XVI, a group show of "artwork that heals," featuring new work by 6 regional artists. The exhibition will be on display throughout the five floors of the Yale Physician's Building at 800 Howard Street, through February 2011. Highlights include: new landscape paintings by Joan Levy, photographs and constructions by Kevin van Aelst, mandalas and clay sculptures by Melody Lane, color field paintings by David Morico, large charcoal drawings by Anita Soos, and an installation of travel photography by Eddie Torres in the International Gallery. To celebrate Art Place’s ten-year anniversary curators Terry Dagradi, Rosemary DeLucco-Alpert and Sarah Fritchey have organized a Retrospective of Work from the Permanent Collection, to honor those who have generously donated their work over the years. The retrospective will be on display in the North Wing of the fifth floor.

There will be an Opening Night Reception for Exhibition XVI on Thurs., May 13, from 5-7 p.m.

Joan Levy makes paintings and pastel drawings of mountain ranges, glens, bluffs, and forests in a style she calls Mystical Expressionism. She finds endless inspiration in her lush organic surroundings, and believes that Nature is a pulse that unifies the human body, mind and spirit with the Earth. She explains her role as the artist as one of deliverance and translation. For Levy, the artist is responsible for perceiving the senses of the physical world, and finding a way to record their structural and spatial dynamics into a tangible realm, where the viewer can access these ideas and feelings.

Kevin van Aelst photographs common materials and household scenes, which he imbeds with unusual artifacts of everyday life. His gestalt images explore identity and existence. In Exhibition XVI, he presents a series of "Finger Print" photographs that document various manifestations of a solitary prints left behind—in the crinkled folds of a Typewriter paper, in the unwound tape of a music cassette on a wooden floor, in the grains of a Sweet and Low packet on a Diner table, in a bird's-eye view of a Cherry Pie cooling on a Checkered Table Cloth. While the images are unconventional, the truth and accuracy of their illustration are just as valid as their traditional depictions. They are simultaneously pictures of Thumbprints and Typewriters, Tapes, Fake Sugar, and Cherry Pies. For van Aelst, his work is about creating order where we expect to find randomness. His pieces hint at the notion that the reliable minutiae all around us are capable of communicating much larger ideas.

Melody Lane works in clay and glass to make sculptures that evoke themes of ancient cultures. She follows a complicated thousand-year-old process that involves reduction firing, painting in terra sigilata, burnishing, smoking, carbon wash, and waxing. The final result yields objects with a distinct, hand-made feel, whose core elements (earth and fire) are emphasized in the design. In Exhibition XVI, Lane presents a series of mandalas that seek to shed a contemporary light on ancient motifs. Mandalas, an ancient Sanskrit word meaning "circle, or center point," are historically interpreted as a symbol for God, the Universe, totality or wholeness, from which all energy and life begins; Hindus with chakras, American Indians with sand paintings, Christians with rose windows, etc. Lane's mandalas are alive in the moment, as sunlight passes through the stained glass, the colors and shadows change with the cycles of the day.

David Morico paints large-scale abstract field-color paintings. In this new series, "Glimpses," Morico builds up shapes and hues into compositions that feel like landscapes or split-second images of what we see or think we see. Morico always begins his process with simple quick sketches. After the issues of composition have been fleshed out, he applies acrylics and mixed media to his canvases—ranging from resin to molding paste to ripped canvas, that attend to the issues of mood and atmosphere. For Morico, his role as an artist is to make images that contain a certain familiar feeling that his viewers can relate to. Connection is his ultimate goal.

Anita Soos has photographed water for 20 years. For Exhibition XVI, she will present new, large charcoal drawings from her "Water Walking" series that investigate the mysterious properties of the malleable liquid—its movements, events, layers, and uncanny ability to hold light and shadow. Her depictions of water are detailed, and drawn from a birds-eye view. The water floods each, spilling over all four corners—there is no hint of environment. In black and white, the water takes on dynamic properties, temperatures and speeds. In one drawing, the water is turbid and sluggishly moves in spirals, in another the water is clear and streams reliably in one direction. The drawings make us think about the life and journey of water in relation to our own.

Eddie Torres is a documentary photographer who travels around the world to capture the emotions and stories of various people and cultures. On display in the first floor International Gallery, Torres presents a selection of color prints taken over the span of two weeks, in six different locations across Ecuador, where he recently traveled with a missionary group. The photographs document private households, public marketplaces, school playgrounds, churchyards, rural river scenes, and portraits of native Ecuadorians.

Chris Mir show opens Saturday at Windsor Art Center

Windsor Art Center
40 Mechanic St., Windsor, (860) 688-2528
Remembering the Future: The Paintings of Christopher Mir
May 7-June 5, 2010
Opening Reception: Sat., May 8, 5-7 p.m.

Press release

Hamden, Connecticut artist Christopher Mir's paintings will be featured at the Windsor Art Center beginning May 8 and running through June 24. You owe it to yourself to explore this world class artist's work made up of mythical figures, creatures, machines, and fragments of ambiguous forms. There will be an opening reception this Sat., May 8, 5-7 p.m.

Mir's work has been exhibited widely in NYC, and Barcelona, Spain, Berlin, Germany, and in Connecticut at the Matrix Gallery, Wadsworth Atheneum, the Silvermine Gallery in New Canaan and the Aldrich Museum in Ridgefield to name just a few, and now you have the chance to see for yourself what all the interest is about.

Alex Philips writing for Metropolitan in Barcelona Spain in June 2009, says about Mir:

With careful brilliance and not a hint of sentimentality, American painter Christopher Mir ... cuts through the tripe of media sensationalism and scaremongering, and the incongruous advertising campaigns that share their pages or websites. ....Mir, whose background is in anthropology, creates imaginary but logical scenes, juxtaposing cheesy publicity style shots of figures alone, or in family groups, placing them in desolate, environmentally-ravaged landscapes, or in mystical imaginary ones, with the sinister intrigue of a Grimm Brothers' fairy story.

His figures, supremely well painted, appear like something between a tourist campaign and Dorothea Lange's photographs of poor American families during the Depression. They are isolated yet accepting, aware of what's going on around them, yet passive.

Christopher Mir has a unique painting style. He combines images from found photographs into works that nod in the direction of collage and straddle the line between the tradition of American landscape painting and surrealism. Mir collects photographs from magazines, books on national parks, calendars and the Internet and uses them as a starting point for his compositions. He then layers his canvas with these images. This creates work that seems familiar at first glance but upon further study takes on a disjointed, dreamlike quality.

The Board of Directors of the Windsor Art Center would like to thank the following individuals and businesses for their gracious support of this exhibition and for helping to make it all possible.

• Alice and Dan Ferraina for their generous contribution to help underwrite the cost of mounting this exhibition.

• The George and Grace long Foundation for its support of the programming taking place during the exhibition.

• Malcolm and Virginia Nicholls for loaning work from their private collection and for all of their help in mounting the exhibition.

• International Transfer Service (ITS) for providing door to door transport of some of the work in the exhibition.

Artist reception at Da Silva Gallery in Westville Friday evening

Da Silva Gallery
897 Whalley Ave., New Haven, (203) 387-2539
Jacob Pongratz
May 7—June 5, 2010
Opening Reception: Fri., May 7, 6—9 p.m.

Press release

According to artist Jake Pongratz, the driving force behind his art is "to apply a primal energy that solidifies my experience as a human to canvas. A fluid approach of spontaneity and confusion is essential to my finished product." What is not confusing however is to view the actual work. Unbridled lines of bold color cut lines through the canvas. The work of Mondrian comes to mind, but Mondrian deconstructed, as if some of his jazzy pathways of paint had dripped and remained wet.

Pongratz explains further that his search for an image "must be open and broad, and not focused on termination. I drew the heart of the action from images of remembrance, past and present, recollections of objects used, populations destroyed. Manifestations of moments, or extensive passages of time." His language, like his art, is both inexplicable yet compelling. A color palette this vivid and alive dews the viewer into the canvas. For the viewer and the artist, what you see there is personal and provocative.

Pongratz's show of new work opens this Friday at the Da Silva Gallery in Westville from 6-9 p.m.

Westville Village ArtWalk this weekend

Westville Village Renaissance Alliance
(203) 285-8539
13th Annual ArtWalk
Fri., May 7, 5—9 p.m. and Sat., May 8, 11 a.m.—10 p.m.

Press release

Westville Village welcomes one and all to the 13th Annual ArtWalk on Fri., May 7, 5—9 p.m., and Sat., May 8, 11 a.m.—10 p.m. This free, family-friendly community festival features art exhibits and open studios; three stages with live music, dance, and theater; an open-air arts and crafts fair; and a full day of varied activities, art-making, food, shopping, and fun for all ages, followed by dancing in the street on Saturday night. A sampling of events appears below. Visit www.westvilleCT.org, check the Friday, May 7th New Haven Register, or pick up a flyer at ArtWalk for a more detailed schedule of all the free, rain-or-shine activities and performance times.

Friday Evening, May 7, 5—9 p.m.

• 13th Annual ArtWalk kick-off parties, performances and events, including art gallery openings, artist receptions, ribbon cuttings, merchant open houses, fashion displays, refreshments, live models, wine tastings and musical performances at over 20 merchants throughout Westville Village.

• Dining at Westville Village's unique restaurants, cafes and bakeries.

Saturday, May 8, 11 a.m.—10 p.m.

• Live music, theatre and dance: Caravan of Thieves, A Broken Umbrella Theatre, The Skamatix, Edgewood Jazz Band, Mikata, Goodnight Blue Moon, the Crickstones, Luke Elliott and Sidewalk Dave. Two stages are located in Edgewood Park near the gazebo and the tennis courts at West Rock and Whalley avenues, and one stage is near the craft corridor art Central Ave. and Fountain St.

• Fun for kids of all ages, including Afro-Caribbean folk doll-making, baby and toddler play area, beading, box city, face-painting, hoping, magnet mural, Mehendi (henna) art, mini terrariums, New Haven Public Library Bookmobile, noodle art & jewelry, Yale Peabody mineral table, T-shirt tie-dye, tube bracelets, "Tunnel of Transition" tent and more! Edgewood Park at Whalley and West Rock avenues.

• Craft Corridor: Meet, talk, and shop with more than 40 local and regional artists and artisans. Discover unique Mother's Day gifts, including jewelry, pottery, textiles, glass art, photography, African crafts, sand art, paintings, antique prints, clothing, frames, Judaica, and more! Central Ave. between Whalley Ave. & Fountain St.

• Fine art exhibits and other activities at five galleries throughout Westville Village, PLUS the Westville Village Streetscape Mural Project

• Fashion and art shows, demonstrations, sidewalk sales, fitness demo classes, book signings, chair massage, sidewalk chalking, and other merchant events throughout Westville Village.

• 11 a.m.—3 p.m., Artists' open studios throughout Westville Village

• 11 a.m.—3 p.m. Grand opening tours of the newly renovated Austin Street Inn, 9 Austin St., (off Blake St.)

• 2 p.m. Walking tour with local historian and author Colin Caplan. Departs from Lyric Hall Antiques, 827 Whalley Ave.

• Lunch, snacks or supper at Westville Village's restaurants, cafes and bakeries and at vendors throughout the Village.

Saturday Night, May 8, 6:30—10 pm

• Dancing in the Street with two live bands: Bone Dry (6:30—8 p.m.) and Cosmic Jibaros (8:30—10 p.m.) on Central Ave. between Fountain St. and Whalley Ave.

• Dining at Westville Village's restaurants and cafes.

Historic Westville Village centers on Whalley Ave. & Fountain St. between Blake & Fitch Sts., 2 miles northwest of downtown New Haven and 1.5 miles southeast of CT Rte. 15/Wilbur Cross Parkway's Exit 59. Plenty of free parking available curbside and behind the shops on Whalley Ave.

ArtWalk is an annual event of the Westville Village Renaissance Alliance (WVRA), a non-profit organization dedicated to the revitalization, celebration, and enhancement of historic Westville Village.

Thursday night opening at Artspace; 7 new solo shows

Artspace
50 Orange St, New Haven, (203) 772-2709
Patrick Chamberlain: On Your Mark
Sarah Bliss: Journey from Longjiang
Jennifer Crupi: Beyond Words: Expressive Gestures
Ben Blanc: Worlds Apart
John O'Donnell: PG-13
Miguel Trelles: Trámite; Hsiao
Jeff Slomba: Sound Change
May 6—June 6, 2010.
On Your Mark will be on display through June 5, 2010.
Public Opening: Thurs., May 6, 6—8 p.m.

Press release

Artspace announces seven new solo exhibitions with works by Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Rhode Island based artists. Patrick Chamberlain's exhibition, On Your Mark opened on Apr. 1, 2010. The six exhibitions of Sarah Bliss, Jennifer Crupi, Ben Blanc, John O'Donnell, Miguel Trelles, and Jeff Slomba will open on Thurs., May 6, from 6—8 p.m. Common themes that emerge throughout the Artspace galleries are correlations between synthetic and natural forms, the history of labor and cultural practices, and cultural excess and technological evolution.

Gallery 1 • Patrick Chamberlain's exhibition, On Your Mark, represents the artist's first solo show. Chamberlain's abstract paintings illuminate Gallery 1 with hoppy colors and tangential lines and shapes.

Gallery 2 • Journey from Longjiang, by Sarah Bliss, utilizes the economic history of Artspace: a former furniture store, to comment on labor and transportation practices overseas. As furniture production is outsourced to Asia, US jobs are lost, and the materials that are used to transport the products are land filled or burned to create waste and highly toxic gases. Bliss's video serves as a trace of this trans-oceanic journey, and her sculptures contain a lifeless beauty, one that is both delicate and volumetric.

Gallery 3 • Beyond Words: Expressive Gestures, by Jennifer Crupi, is a group of interactive, prosthetic-like proposals for instruments of gestural expression. Each sculpture imagines and presents a different outlet for stress, excitement, and the desire to communicate through body language and self-discovery. By viewing and interacting with the work, the artist seeks to illicit the underlying reasons for our seemingly casual gestures.

Gallery 4 • Worlds Apart, by Ben Blanc, is a series of abstract sculptures that evoke natural and man-made materials as organic forms re-emerge from synthetic materials. Blanc is the founder of Ben Blanc Studio; he collects materials, explores various artistic processes, and reinterprets his design research. Blanc's work often exudes a plastic quality as objects oscillate, shift, and reach a delicate balance.

Gallery 5 • PG-13, by John O'Donnell, is an installation that appropriates various forms of popular media-plastic toys from the discount bin, blockbuster movies, magazines with pictures of food, bad air-brushed pornography, and athletes such as Michael Jordan. O'Donnell implicates a culture over-crowded with material excess, popular icons, and kitsch objects. Many of the forms that the artist chooses recount a connection to childhood in the 90s, an interest in Surrealism, and a concern for a post-industrial society obsessed with blogging, commenting, and crafting assemblages. The result is an installation of personal reference that becomes obscured and expanded upon by each viewer.

Long Wall • Trámite; Hsiao, by Miguel Trelles, is a series of paintings that take a humorous stance on the compositions of Li's Xiaojing tu, Trámite. In the artist's re-interpretation, the "demons" scroll, which constitutes an ethnic caricature of the "other" in 13th Century China, is used to describe a 21st Century Latino American population. The paintings cast a playful air on the traditional allegory and illustrate the varied complexities and stereotypes used to misrepresent a class of people.

Gallery 7 • Sound Change, by Jeff Slomba, is a series of investigations concerned with acts of selective preservation in response to the evolution of technology. The artist introduces scale, context, and gravitational shifts to de-familiarize the viewer with common archetypes of seashells, cassette tapes, speakers, and concrete blocks. The artist reveals their structural arrangements as being dynamic, layered, and malleable forms whose narrative continues to trace cultural production.

Opening reception at New Arts Gallery in Litchfield Saturday afternoon

New Arts Gallery
513 Maple St., Litchfield, (860) 567-5015
Robert Gregson: Outrigger and Eclipse Series
May 8—June 12, 2010
Opening reception: Sat., May 8, 3—6 p.m.

Press release