Summer 2011 Exhibition At MoMA

Two weeks ago our family took Maggie, our summer exchange student, to see an exhibition in MoMA. She shares love for art with our family. Her face lit up when she saw paintings by Picasso, Warhol, Miro, Dali and many more. She stroked a pose for her Mom, to show her one particular painting.
When Maggie and I got to the 6th floor I got excited with the art video exhibition by an artist (I never heard of) Francis Alÿs called "A Story Of Deception". Only then I realized that one of my works of many images that I edited into a movie last year, which I played at one of my "artists get together events" this year to fellow artists, is done in similar fashion and spirit to Francis' works. Although my very short video is not video per say but rather a video of many images with the use of energetic music. When I saw my husband later (we kind of lost each other in MoMA), he asked me: "Did you see the exhibition on the 6th floor?" I only answered "I know! Right?" Just like my husband, I strongly felt that my work could stand next to Mr. Alÿs' works.

Here is one of the art videos by Francis:





And couple of images of Maggie admiring paintings at MoMA

Below an image of Pointillism style (or Divisionism) by Seurat.

Art Show In The Fairfield Library's Bruce S. Kershner Gallery

My husband, daughter and I decided to be a host family for a student from an exchange program. Yesterday, we took Maggie to a fun event in Fairfield and while we were there, we decided to see Bruce S. Kershner Gallery - they always have a great exhibitions there. And we saw some great art there! The paintings, drawings and collages were done by artists with disabilities and special needs, and I was really impressed with a great ideas and quality of their work. It was very hard to pick a favorite painting for us. Maggie really liked the abstract painting created with wheels of a wheelchair (to the left). Below is another snapshot of a painting. If you are in Fairfield, visit this gallery even if just for a quick look. Art heals souls (and music too)   :-)

Follow this link for Bruce S. KershnerGallery.

The "Summer Time" Exhibition - Wilton Library

When I saw the call for artist for "Summer Time" exhibition in Wilton Library, I had a flash of children playing in the meadow, and children going to a carnival, and children splashing in the water on the sea shore, and having a clown juggler over for their birthday...
So for this show I decided to create a couple of pen and watercolor "free hand" drawings with children in mind - "Girl With Flower" and "Juggling". Below, you can see images from today's reception for two months long art exhibition.

Update: Aileen Lindner mentioned the "Summer Time" exhibition in our local newspaper.

"Summer Time" -  50+ artists exhibited in Wilton Library

 Despite the storm and heavy rain hitting skylight windows of the library, many people came to the reception.

In the middle is my pen/watercolor drawing "Juggling"

My other pen and watercolor drawing "Girl With Flower"

 I've made an artist friend :-)

My dear and loyal husband Jeffrey with my dear and loyal friend Cintia :-)

iPad Daily Drawings With SketchBook Pro

Back in May, my husband and daughter surprised me with an iPad for Mother's day....... and I've been playing with it ever since.

I play Words HD, and read New Yorker, watch Netflix instant movies, listen to Pandora, Tweet, play Sudoku, see what is going on on Flipboard (great app by the way).

I also downloaded four drawing applications - Inkpad (vector based app), OmniSketch, Procreate and SketchBook Pro. The last three are very similar, yet each is different. So far I have been playing most with SketchBook Pro. Slowly I am trying different features - layers,  brushes  (I have downloaded many several sets of free brushes by SketchBook Pro), erasers, and free transform. The application has also text tool (I haven't used it yet), mirror tool (if I draw on one half of the iPad a mirrored drawing appears on the other half etc.

Tonight, when my family and I went to our friends for dinner, we were fooling around with my iPad and everyone really liked SketchBook Pro. My friend loved my whimsical drawings and asked me if I would be so kind and make him a background for his computer. He didn't care what it would be, he just wanted background with fairly light colors - sort of like Easter colors. As you see above, he got a drawing with two little creatures to the side and a lot of empty space in-between for his desktop icons. He was so excited to have something very different.

Below, you can see my other drawings I did while practicing in my drawing applications.

 My very first iPad drawing (above) was done in OmniSketch app.

This drawing was my second one, it is called "Potatohead", since it resembles potato (SketchBook Pro)

 My third drawing - I was playing with the lines and layers (SketchBook Pro)

 Quick drawing before a waiter brought us dinner in the restaurant (SketchBook Pro)

I just wanted to draw a sleeping dog (SketchBook Pro)

 More practice using SketchBook Pro - our reading lamp

An old person (SketchBook Pro)

"The Art of Writing Art Statements" - HVCA Writing Workshop

 Allie McConnell, Lisa Scails, D'lynne Plummer

After an artist creates his/her art, be it a painting, a sculpture, a mixed media, or a photo, he/she also must educate viewers (public, curators, gallerists, journalists, collectors) what his/her art is all about. An artist needs to express his/her message in an "artist's statement", which writing these statements can be a huge struggle for anyone and same applies to me.
Prior to tonight's writing class, I have done a lot of research about how to write such a statement. I spent hours on the Internet reading anything that would be any advice to me and also reading many different artist's statements, so I would understand how to actually write it. After many hours of learning on my own, I still felt I need to learn more.
When HVCA, an organization in Danbury, which supports various artists, offered a workshop on writing art statements, I immediately signed up. This class was very insightful. D'lynne Plummer, our presenter from Boston, MA - actually she is the Director of Professional Development for the Arts & Business Council of Greater Boston (A&BC) - put together a great power point presentation along with several examples. Also she let us practice a bit to see if we understand her message. In nearly two hours we got a lot of quality information for our money. Thanks to HVCA's Lisa Scails and Allie McConnell who organized this workshop, I understand what the "artist's statement" is all about.

Now I just need to learn the correct English grammar and I will be all set. Well almost - I still need to learn how to market myself the correct way :-)