Bethesda Painting Awards

I would have told you earlier, but for some reason I no longer get any news releases from Bethesda.org, but the Bethesda Painting Awards finalists were announced last Friday.

There are some interesting surprises in the list, as well as a couple of artists channeling old art movements or other artists, but at this early stage my picks for the award are Lillian Bayley Hoover, from Baltimore, MD (she has twice been a Sondheim Award finalist and a 2008 Bethesda Painting Award finalist), or Reston's Heidi Fowler, which was also a finalist two years ago.

Darkhorses are newcomers Katherine Mann and Greg Minah. Five of the eight finalists are from Baltimore/Annapolis area, which is interesting, since none of the jurors are from that area.

The selected nine finalists will display their work from June 3 - July 4, 2009 in downtown Bethesda at the Fraser Gallery located at 7700 Wisconsin Avenue, Suite E. The Fraser Gallery is located two blocks from the Bethesda Metro station.

Wrong Time

I understand that the landlord of several key DC galleries is in the process of doubling their rent.

Wrong thing to do in this, ah... austere fiscal and real estate environment.

This weekend at Reston

It is time for the 18th Annual Northern Virginia Fine Arts Festival this weekend on the streets of the Reston Town Center in Reston, Virginia, right off 267 (exit 12).

The Festival is produced by the Greater Reston Arts Center, and it is a top-rated annual juried outdoor street fine arts and fine crafts festival held in the heart of the elegant and bustling Reston Town Center. This two-day event attracts over 50,000 patrons and provides an interactive experience to view, purchase, and experience art directly from the unique and talented artists who have created it.

The 2009 festival is this weekend (May 16-17) and will feature more than 220 artists from around the nation as well as outstanding music and entertainment, activities for families, (all free) and delicious food.

See ya there! Swing by booth 835!

Gals' Birthdays: The place to be in DC this Friday

Join a couple of DC's uberartchicks (am I gonna catch hell for that or what?) on Friday, May 15th for an art and dance night to celebrate a couple of arty gals' birthdays.

My good buds Heather Goss from Ten Miles Square and Jayme McLellan from Civilian Art Projects flip over another year this May and want you to come party at Critical Mass, a one-night only art show featuring 20+ talented D.C. artists, followed by a straight-up dance party with DJ KC from Fatback and DJ Nite Krawler from Moneytown.

In addition to Civilian Art Project's ongoing solo exhibitions featuring Erick Jackson and Ken D. Ashton in the gallery, Ten Miles Square will host a salon show in the office space gallery, including well-known artists like Michael Janis, Tim Tate, Cory Oberndorfer and Billy Colbert, along with TMS regulars (and soon-to-be well-known names!) John Ulaszek, Cesar Lujan, Kyle Gustafson, and many more.

Every piece in the office will be available for under $150 that night - a downright steal that is our artists' gift to us and all our guests. And much of the work in the Jackson & Ashton exhibitions is priced at below $300 to boot!

Arrive between 9 and 10 p.m. for some mingling and art viewing. At 10 p.m. their arty birthday party will reach Critical Mass as DJs KC and Nite Krawler take over for a gallery dance party.

And who knows, the Lenster might be there as well...

Wanna go to a DC opening this week?

Artists' Websites: Henryk Fantazos

Blood for Toys by Henryk Fantazos
Henryk Fantazos is an artist with a very acute insight into what makes us all move and what makes a society tick and tock under a layer of sanity barely covering the rage of a humanity barely a breath away from barbarity. He writes:

In one of his poems Salvatore Quasimodo called the night I was born – the eighteenth of January 1944 – the darkest night of the war. The little town where I was born was in the Nazis bloody hands, then the Russians’. The homicidal scowl of Stalin declared that our town was never to be part of Poland again. Providence agreed with Stalin, and we had to move to settle in Upper Silesia, an agglomerate of coalmines, steel works and other heavy industries that produced unrestricted clouds of acrid, fetid smoke. Greasy soot covered every blade of grass. My father was a watchmaker and a jeweler. My mother took care of three children.

I escaped trice from two kindergartens and solidified an indestructible sense of being special. I painted and drew from the time I was a small child.

I am really taken by this artist's works and I think that his work is a prime candidate by DC or Philly galleries looking for a little danger in their exhibition schedule.

Hey DC: Grant time

The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities is renewing its commitment to supporting local artists and arts organizations through its distribution of grants for the fiscal year 2010 grant season. According to the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies, the District of Columbia ranks first among states in per capita investment in the arts.

“The creative industry is one of the most prosperous business sectors in the District, in workforce numbers, ticket sales and tax revenue generation,” said DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities Executive Director Gloria Nauden. “We also boast of more than 460 non-profits in the city that self-identify as arts, humanities or cultural organizations.”

Executing world-class arts and cultural programming requires a joint effort of the Commission and the non-profit organizations it serves. The Commission is dedicated to growing and retaining the city’s artist-community base by offering free grant writing assistance. Resources include an online instructional video; one-on-one appointments with program coordinators; technical assistance workshops on “Workshop Wednesdays” with webinar access; and a new public resource center with computer workstations located within the Commission’s office that are available weekdays from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.

“One of our priorities for disseminating the grants is to ensure that the process is demystified. Our staff is available to help artists and arts organizations develop the most effective grant application possible,” Nauden added.

The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities provides grants, programs and educational activities that encourage diverse artistic expression and learning opportunities, so that all District of Columbia residents and visitors can experience the rich culture of the city. The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities is an agency funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.

For more information on grant opportunities or to receive a grant application, visit their website or call 202-724-5613.

Happy Birthday

DC's influential Washington Glass School celebrates its 8th Anniversary with a huge Open House & Studio Sale.

Over 4000 students have attended classes/seminars/workshops at the WGS. On May 16th artwork by instructors and artists of the glass school will be on exhibit and for sale, together with music, jewelry, etc.

Visit surrounding arts studios who are the WGS' neighbors - Red Dirt Studios, Flux Studio, Sinel/Stewart/Weiss Studios and many more!

The Gateway Arts District also has its annual Open Studio Tour and the Mount Rainier Day Festival kicks off the events with a big parade right past the school!

Saturday May 16th, 2009
From Noon til 6 pm
Free and open to the public
Washington Glass School
3700 Otis Street
Mount Rainier, MD 20712
Tel: 202.744.8222

Affordable Art Fair New York: Final Report

Home at last, tired (more like exhausted) after five days of hauling artwork up and down to the 11th floor and schlepping it for five days at AAFNYC.

Overall it is my impression that most galleries at this fair sold very well. Perhaps it is an indication that the art economy is taking a tiny advance, or perhaps it is a simple sign of the times where people are looking at affordable art more closely?

In my personal sphere, I sold a lot of my own drawings (around 30 of them), and the gallery showing my work (Mayer Fine Art of Norfolk, Virgina) also did exceptionally well, practically selling out of Sheila Giolitti's paintings on Friday and Saturday, and essentially selling out all 12 of Matt Sesow's paintings that they brought, and had they brought more, they could have probably sold another dozen. I bet Matt's website experiences a "surge" of interest after this fair, as Mayer Fine Art must have given out a couple of hundred business cards with his details to interested buyers.

Sale of a gorgeous Tim Tate audiovisual sculpture to a major San Francisco collector, and a large Cirenaica Moreira photograph to a well-known collection of Cuban art also helped to push MFA's numbers.

Across from us, New York's Emmanuel Fremin Gallery had a slow start, but by Sunday they had quite a few red dots, mostly accomplished by multiple sales of Drew Tal's gorgeous photography.

And Montreal's Arteria continued to do well, with the roster of young Canadian artists whom they represent.

DC area galleries also seemed to do well, and I continued to see folks from Honfleur and Fraser bring works to the wrapping station.

And finally, tear down was not the nightmare that I thought it was going to be. The fair ended on Sunday at 5PM, and by 8PM we were out of there and stuck in the gridlock traffic for the tunnel to New Jersey.

Affordable Art Fair NY day two and three

Day two and three (Thursday and Friday) at AAFNYC went pretty much along the same way as the opening night, with good crowds and (since we are really close to the wrapping station) we can keep an eye on the sales, and the wrapping station was always busy through both days.

Some of the press reviews have come out, and yesterday Robert Ayers discussed his impressions of the fair and had some good things to say about both my former DC art gallery and about Tim Tate's work (showing with Norfolk's Mayer Fine Art). And LoftLife also reviews the fair and picks MFA with the splendid Santeria work of Marta Maria Perez Bravo.

Talking about Mayer Fine Art, its hardworking owner, Sheila Giolitti, is selling like gangbusters and her resin paintings are flying off the wall. Last year she sold out at AAFNYC and this year Giolitti is once again on the way to a sell out.

On the press preview I got into a slight tiff with a journalist.

She looked at Tim Tate's work and stated, "I know this artist."

"Cool," I responded, and I began to start discussing Tate's work with her.

"He shouldn't be here!" she exclaimed in a thick French accent, clearly miffed. The staff at MFA looked a little puzzled.

"Why?" I asked.

"This fair is supposed to be about emerging artists, and Tate is in museums already, so he's certainly not an emerging artist," she added.

It's not easy to throw me for a verbal loop, but this almost did. I started to counter her point about who or what can be at this fair or any other fair, but she kept going, adding more reasons why Tate's work doesn't belong at AAF.

"I disagree," was all that I could come up with.

"Well," she said imperiously as she walked away miffed, "I disagree too!"

In our row, our across the aisle neighbor, Arteria from Montreal, Canada seems to be doing well, and on Friday night they moved a huge wall sized oil by Jonathan Theroux. Also nearby, MAC Art Group from Miami, Florida is selling their riot of tropical colors steadily and works by Cuban painter Vicente Dopico-Lerner is doing well.

DC area galleries seem to be faring positively as well, and I've seen Honfleur's staff at the wrapping line several times and both Fraser and Nevin Kelly seem to be moving work.

Finally, the new location across the street from the Empire State Building is a winner (in my opinion), since the floor plan is much better and there are no "bad spots" for booths. Because it is on the 11th floor, setting and tear down might be a nightmare, but we'll see.

AAFNYC Day One

The Affordable Art Fair in New York opened in New York last night and the halls were packed and the booze was flowing and artwork was being sold.

It's early to see if the art fair dooldrums are beginning to wane, but let's hope so.

Networking

The Creative Genius DC Happy Hour and Dinner will be at Alero (3500 Connecticut Ave, NW in DC) on Thursday, May 7. Drinks at 6:30 pm and for those interested in staying, dinner will be around 7:30 pm.

This low-key networking event is for all creative types: writers, editors, dancers, jugglers, artists, graphic designers, performance artists, poets, musicians, and dreamers! Come have a drink and meet some new people! Feel free to bring your friends too.

Alero is near the Cleveland Park Metro.

Please RSVP to Willona at creativegeniusdc@gmail.com.

Benny More

In my opinion the greatest Cuban popular musician of all time was the great Benny More, the man whom Cubans call "El barbaro del ritmo."

It's a shame that my favorite song of his is not on YouTube... but here is a whole bunch of other people doing the greatest Cuban dance music of all time: Castellano que bueno baila Usted! or "Castellano, how well you dance!"

Listen to a short clip of the original here.

Loads of Latin American salseros have done this great juicy hips music over and over... ahhh over the years, but none better than the original... other than the great Tito Puente got close here and the great Ibrahim Ferrer honors the song in what I think is the best version of the original here.

But get the original Benny More here if you want Cuban dance music the way that it was meant to be.

In New York

By the time you read this I'll be huffing and puffing and schlepping artwork to the 11th floor for The Affordable Art Fair NYC which has a private opening tonight and opens to the public later this week. I'll be there with Mayer Fine Art in booth D-100.

I'll be blogging from the fair as time permits.

See ya there!

Cojonudo

The nation's vast left wing nuttery is not very forgiving of artists who walk on the wrong side of the tracks. And yet the nation's only out of the closet artist who's openly critical of Obama has launched a new series using photographs from the Official White House Flickr Photostream.

It takes cojones... see it here.

In DC this week

International Art Affairs is going on in various DC venues this week... I have been home one day in the last two weeks and heading to New York tomorrow, otherwise I would have dropped in to some of these:

Tuesday May 5

6 – 7 pm, followed by a short Q&A session
Bauhaus – An International Chronology: G. Martin Moeller, senior vice president and curator at the National Building Museum, is a world class expert on Bauhaus, a school that originated in post WWI Germany, and had profound effects in art as well as architecture and design.

Wednesday May 6

6 – 7 pm, followed by a short Q&A session

How to Build a World Class Art Collection in Washington, DC – A Primer: Renowned Georgetowner Barbara Gordon recounts how her travel experiences and her keen interest in art led her to develop an ability to identify collectable art. Find out how she did it and how the arts became a wholesome supplement to a life of social and political activism.

Thursday May 7

6 – 7 pm, followed by a short Q&A session with exhibit and reception

Healing Art: Outsiders Inside: Lorton Art Program Founder and Director Mia Choumenkovitch will lecture on her decades of experience training inmates in fine art techniques. Ms. Choumenkovitch has lectured internationally at healing art symposiums and has great insight on comparative criminal justice – mainly focused on US versus European approaches. An exhibit of this artwork will be on display from 3 – 9 pm.

Friday, May 8

5:30 – 6:30 pm

Mexico and New York: Art Flows: Barbara Tenenbaum, renowned Mexican scholar lectures on the defining moment in the art worlds that existed in Mexico and New York in the twentieth century. The lecture reflects on the political currents of the time with applications for today.

Friday May 8

6:30 – 10 pm

Latin American Youth Center (LAYC) Benefit and LAYC Exhibit with Music by LAYC Program Participants: International Art Affairs, Blue Flame Capital, LLC, and NGAS Resources, Inc. team up to benefit the Latin American Youth Center’s art and music program. LAYC provides a wide range of important services and mentoring to young people of all ethnic backgrounds. This event will raise money to help the LAYC overcome a funding shortfall with a portion to Cultural Tourism and its Passport DC Budget. Please RSVP to 202-319-2225 or call Bill Farrand 202-256-2139 or Fernando Batista 202-413-2687.

Saturday May 9

2:30 – 3:30 pm, followed by a short Q&A session

Emerging Art Markets – The Case of India: Artist and Sotheby’s scholar Ms. Pooja Tipirneni discusses the roots and evolution of India’s contemporary art movement and Russian and Chinese parallels in trends.

Erectile Weather

(Via Pat)

On the news

A 3-minute Torpedo Factory segment should air today, Tuesday, May 5, on PBS and BBC America, and worldwide on BBC World News.

It is still possible it could be pushed aside for breaking news.

I have been told that the segment is entirely Torpedo Factory footage. When the video is posted on the BBC website I will follow up with a link.

BBC World News interviewed three artists on April 9, 2009 about the impact of the economy on the creative direction of art:

- Rosemary Covey
- Carol Levin
- Susan Makara

View photos from the shoot here.

Tired words

I’m so tired.

As I write this, I am aboard Southwest Airlines, somewhere 30,000 feet above the Eastern seaboard and heading home from North Carolina. By the time this post is published I will be home, after what feels like endless travels through the South. For the last ten days or so it has been a blur of never ending driving and airport waiting and airplanes and strange beds.

And yet, there are always pleasant and enriching surprises where one least expects them. Such as finding a particularly unique piece of sculpture in a show where it is alone amongst its brethren, a seminal piece which tempted me into considering awarding it a Best in Show but ended with a lesser Honorable Mention because I think that the artist has a lot more to explore in order to push the concept behind the work. He needs to enter the world of electricity and lights and videos and then he will be there. There was also the enriching experience of meeting artists who are truly and deeply enamored of their art. And the shock of awarding a Best in Show to a small work whose merit may be overseen by most, like the flower in a dandelion is seen as a weed in a garden of manicured flowers.

And memorable and most unexpected images of predatory jacks-in-the-box dressed like harlequins being fed honey. They made me shiver with concern as to their creation seed, like a character in Stephen King’s “Duma Key” reacting to one of Edgar Freemantle’s hypnotic paintings.

And green trees everywhere, clean manicured lawns and mailboxes guided by Home Owner’s Association standards.

And the unexpected and welcomed surprise of having a rich conversation while being driven to the airport that strikes a special chord, and perhaps triggers thoughts, both light and dark, and ideas, both harsh and moist.

Sometimes a very talented and special artist flourishes amongst a field of good artists. They stand out in a special way, viewed by some as outsiders and out layers and by others as beautiful. Like the powerful yellow of a dandelion flower is seen as a bad weed by the vastness of the majority and also as a pretty flower by those with a delicate eye for beauty.

But beauty demands the delicacy of steel, shiny and flexible, and composed of mixed components, each strong on their own, but not as strong as when they are forced to couple together in the cauldron of molten ingredients. The scent of beauty has iron ore and coke and alloys and eventually it becomes steel.

The conversation floated around art, beauty, and the creative process. The words and idea revolved rapidly around love for art and love for being an artist and how love helps to create art; love as a driving force.

“Not just love,” I added, “also hate.”

After some exploration of this idea, we quickly agreed that what was really needed was passion. Poets and common folk have struggled with the nearness of love to hate and the quickness of how they can be molten into one by events and perceptions. Molten like iron and coke and alloys are molten to make steel.

Can art be created from hate?

“From the hells beneath the hells, I bring you my deathly fruits,” wrote Howard in his dark, some would say hateful poetry.

It is a dreadful question and one that I hadn’t really thought about much until a wonderful exchange of ideas with an unexpected kindred art soul brought it to my mind and then to my lips.

Was Goya driven by hate when he etched his horrible “Disasters of War”? I think so; but a very special kind of hate.

The same Goya who so loved the Duchess of Alba, a woman that he couldn’t have, that he painted her with brushes and paints loaded with love, and with desire, and even with direction and wishful thinking.

I think that I think that any passion can drive an artist to create meaningful and powerful art. The fervor of religion has given us some of the greatest masterpieces of art in the world, and not so curiously, as man steps away from God, so has the importance of contemporary religious art.

But it is so disturbing to me to think about pure incandescent hate as a driving force in the creativity of art.

Maybe I should diminish hate.

I hate green peppers.

I had a really good Greek salad for a lovely lunch a couple of days ago, and I was so engrossed in the conversation that I forgot to ask the waiter to skip the green peppers.

The salad was bountiful and tasty, and loaded to the brim with the offending vegetable. And the guilt of wasting food was there as I piled strips of green on the edge of my plate while consuming the rest of the salad voraciously. It’s odd how often I’m not aware that I am hungry until food is presented to me.

I eat too fast. My mother’s aunt once told me that she chewed each bite 33 times. But then you’d spend too many precious minutes chewing food. The answer to this mundane tragedy is somewhere in between three and 33. On the other hand, she lived to be well over 100 years old, 103 or 104 I think.

I hate how allergens can penetrate your body’s defenses and torment your nose, throat and eyes and make never ending days full of physical misery. I often wonder how cavemen survived in moldy caves in a world of sneezing. They must have been killed by their companions. How can a sneezing caveman sneak silently during the hunt? And they really couldn’t be demoted to gatherers instead of hunters, because they’d be sneezing their hairy heads off as they gathered berries and nuts and roots among the pollen rich world in which they lived.

I hate that HBO cancelled “Rome” and left us hanging with Pullo walking away with Caesarian.

I know, I know… different kinds of hate.

Still, I will never paint or draw green peppers.

I’m so tired, but happy.

Masked

"Masked," curated by my good friend Joan Weber is at School 33 Art Center in Baltimore through June 27, 2009 with an opening reception on Saturday, May 9, 2009 6-9pm and a Curator's Talk on Saturday, May 23, 2009 1-3pm and a poetry reading on Thursday, June 11, 2009 6:30-8:00pm.

MASKED is an exploration of work about concealment, secrets, self-conscious and social constructions of identity which ultimately reveal a new face – a brilliant corona of strength, integrity and courage. Each work is a performance piece of sorts; the artists have used their own bodies or their own biographies to very directly create a presence that suggests a story or a secret. However, rather than being a study in psychology or narrative, where one might work to discover that secret – this assembly is exciting in that even while experiencing the powerfully posited content on the surface, we know that there is an equally powerfully complex internal life.

The artists in the exhibition include: Dawn Black (paintings), Iona Rozeal Brown (pigment prints), Lynden Cline (sculpture), Bailey Doogan (drawings), Susan Fenton (hand painted silver print photographs), Inga Frick (pigment prints), J.J. McCracken (performance), Ledelle Moe (sculpture), Elsa Mora (photographs), Elena Patino (painting), Phyllis Plattner (painting), and Athena Tacha (sculpture) and the poets are Teri Cross Davis, Clarinda Harriss, Judith McCombs, and Rosemary Winslow (Poetry curator).