Press Release: "FROM VIRTUAL TO ACTUAL 6"
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE PLEASE LIST
Director's Choice
"FROM VIRTUAL TO ACTUAL 6"
Curated by Vernita Nemec
October 31- November 25, 2017
Opening reception Thursday, November 2, 6-8PM
Andrea Barnes * David Bartlett * Nancy Brown * Jeannette Cherry * Deb Flagel *
Marcella Hackbardt * Maki Hajikano * Ed Herman * Jeannine Hunter Lazzaro * Barbara Hillerman Lieske * Len Rosenfeld * Jimmy Salmon * Nela V. Steric * Rosalind Tobias * Jeff Watts *
Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present " Director's Choice: From Virtual To Actual 6", curated by Vernita Nemec, Viridian’s director, featuring a selection of artists who entered our 27th International Juried Competition in 2016, curated by Tumelo Mosaka. This exhibit extends from October 31st to November 25th, 2017 with an opening reception Thursday, November 2nd, 6-8PM.
Although these artists were not “winners” of Viridian's 24th International Juried Competition, their art is uniquely interesting and was of particular interest to Nemec. Viridian's “Director's Choice” Exhibitions arise from one of Viridian's primary missions: to provide meaningful exposure to under-known artists of all ages whose art merits wider attention.
Each of the 15 artists in this diverse exhibition has her or his personal obsession that serves as the starting point for their artistic search to transform inner concerns into an outer reality. The results of transforming these realities into art, remains open to each viewer's interpretation and becomes the first translation of the virtual into the actual. The second translation is the opportunity to see the art in the flesh instead of in a powerpoint presentation as the art were seen in the Juried Competition in 2016.
Below, many of the artists speak for themselves about their motives & intentions in the work. For those that are silent, the viewer is invited to look more closely at the work for clues into the whys.
Andrea Barnes: "The most recent in an ongoing series of exploratory mixed media works which are reflective of my experience and influenced by my interests in science, music, and the process of memory.
David Bartlett: “In its decay, Eastern State Penitentiary strikingly reveals its elemental physicality. In lingering monuments and temples, stone and iron celebrate endurance of the human spirit. Here is brute incarceration - bleak, iterated enclosures with mocking slits of sky and shabby rusted remnants of meager furnishings.
Nancy Brown: “My image-making privileges “found” over “sought”, enigmatic over declarative, less over more. My photographic images – radically de-focused, indeterminate, liminal – encourage a kind of free-flowing inquiry that stimulates new ways of seeing and looking, critical thinking, and play.”
Jeannette Cherry strives to create paintings that are complex, yet simple. She enjoys intuitive risk-taking, interspersed with thoughtful analysis that she feels resembles an order that holds “just barely”. She wants to keep uncovering the endless connections between control and free-falling –
Deb Flagel, after being both a winner in the 28th Juried Competition & Director’s Choice, she is also now a part of Viridian Artists as well as the director of Woman Made Gallery in Chicago. "My work is an accumulation of momentary glances encountered on a daily basis. As my eye records the environmental landscape that surrounds me, my mind begins to weave line, color and shape, constructing a sort of self identity...a personal cultural fabric."
Marcella Hackbardt: feels the "subject" of this series would not be clear to an observer upon seeing just one piece, but can be felt. Beginning with photographs of her son, his strangely known and unknown body, is overlaid her watchfulness, worries, tendernesses, and the real and symbolic distance that comes with his independence.
Maki Hajikano: The advances of science have given us a new perspective of the body. My piece suggests various cell forms and mutation process, which was inspired by the introduction of IPS cells. Through the work I challenge and play with people’s notions about form as well as sexuality, since in some cultures the phallic form does not necessarily imply negative connotations.
Ed Herman: SOKOV= SOCKS OFF. Leonid Sokov is/was a member of the Russian art movement, Sotz Art, the Russian version of Pop ART. Before coming to the US, the Russian authorities bulldozed a work of his, Very Hard Criticism. Finally he represented RUSSIA in the 2014 Venice Biannual. Also, a friend, their studios were on the same floor in 1984-89
For Jeannine Hunter Lazzaro there is and has always been a fascination in creating images that explore the surface and medium of the picture plane. Combining various methods, textures and paint to create becomes a transformative experience for her. Particularly stain-painting, masking out areas, creating collaged surfaces and shaping the canvas are elements she has developed in her visual language.
Barbara Hillerman Lieske’s career path spanned graphic design, craft art, art education, research dealing with the sociology of fashion, and photography. Her interest in street photography evolved while serving in Vienna, Austria, as head of a branch of Webster University's Art Department. “As I walked through the city I was attracted to individuals who expressed their personalities and humanity through gesture and choice of clothing.”
Leonard Rosenfeld (1926-2009), as an Expressionist painted, in his words, "with a weird combination of abandon and discipline." "Frankenstein in Baghdad" (2006), was among his Iraq War series. The series was first inspired by a New York Times review of In the Company of Soldiers by Rick Atkinson, which spoke of General Petraeus' precient question to Atkinson, "Tell me how this ends?" Rosenfeld's Iraq War series spanned 2004-2008.
Jimmy Salmon: Study in Old World Still Life: The photograph in this exhibition, Grapes, Berkemeyer and Roemer, is from a series based on a study of the 17th Century Dutch Still Life painters Pieter Claesz, Adriaen Coorte, and the more rustic work of Spaniard Luis Mendelez. The intent of the work was to create a meditative mood, using simple compositions, with hand painted backgrounds of brush strokes and color pallet to resemble those of Claesz.
Nela V. Steric: "The "Virgin of the Rocks" is a part of my "Spiritual" Series paintings. In the series, I explore my relationship with the "other side", my beliefs, but also my doubts and the underlying irony in the religious stories that people create to explain the spiritual.
Rosalind Tobias: “I love working from a live model. I love the challenge of capturing the essence of a pose. One is working with very deep feelings.
Jeff Watts shot the Central Park Row Boats “as I was intrigued by the their patterns of shape and color and thought they would make for an interesting abstract image which would not be immediately recognizable to the viewer.”
Gallery hours: Tuesday through Saturday, 12 - 6 p.m.
For further information please contact Vernita Nemec, Gallery Director
5 Works by Ellen Burnett will be on view at JCAST 2017
Ellen Burnett will be showing 5 pieces atthe Jersey City Art and Studio Tour on October 14th and 15th. Please go to the JCAST website and click on the 2017 Map button to see the location of the 4 venues where the 5 works will be featured.
The Jersey City Art and Studio Tour, now in its 27th year, developed from an event rooted in artists’ studios, retailers and other downtown spaces (111 First Street among them) into the City's premier cultural event. Since inception, the tour has annually attracted thousands of art aficionados every October from the tri-state area. Started in 1990 by Charles Kessler and Pat Donnelly of Gold Coast Magazine (a Jersey Journal weekly) and continued by Al Preciado and Margaret Schmidt, the event has garnered increased investment by the City over the years, reflecting the importance of Jersey City as a center for the arts in the state.
Wally Gilbert Scarves
Wally Gilbert's Scarves are available for purchase at the gallery! Modeled here by the charming Jeremy Martin
Students from the Freshmen Class of Avenues: The World School Visit Viridian's Selfie and Self Portrait Show
Monica Ramos of Avenues High School brought students from her English class to the gallery this week to see "Selfies & Self-Portraits: 21st C Artists See Themselves". The students were asked to take notes, and each was then asked to write a haiku poem, inspired by individual pieces in the show. The haikus were read out loud...each was very thoughtful and impressive. It was an absolute pleasure to meet this group of young art lovers!
Draw-In Event on September 28th: 6-8pm
Wally Gilbert in London at Saatchi START Art Fair
Portrait of Wally Gilbert by Vernita Nemec
Alan Gaynor's photograph has been accepted for inclusion in The Photo Review 2017 Competition issue.
Alan Gaynor, "Under Brooklyn Bridge". Photograph, 12”x 7” to 36”x 21” or larger on request
Congratulations to Alan Gaynor!
Ellen Burnett at The Platform Contemporary Art Show, Art Book Fair & Film Festival
Any Road Will Get You There (9.5"w x 9.5"h x 1.5") by Ellen Burnett
Viridian Artist's Newest member is exhibiting work at the Platform Contemporary Art Show:
Brooklyn Expo 72 Noble Street September 29th - October 1st 2017
From artist, curator and publisher Terrence Sanders comes the inaugural edition of
Platform Contemporary Art Show, Art Book Fair & Film Festival.
The Viewing Room features Gerard Frances, Anita Arliss, Chris Justice Cheryl Schainfeld, Bianca Sforni, Ellen Burnett, Walter Poole, Morgan Frew, Joey Solomon, Cynthia McLoughlin, Mo Hongxun & Ping Zheng.
Press Release: Wally Gilbert "Towers"
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Please List
Wally Gilbert
“Towers"
October 3rd- October 28th, 2017
Opening, Thursday October 5th, 6 to 8PM
Closing Reception: Saturday, October 28th, 4 to 6PM
Chelsea: Viridian Artists Inc. is pleased to present an exhibition of digital imagery by the artist/scientist/photographer Wally Gilbert, entitled “Towers”. The show opens October 3rd and continues through October 28th, 2017. In celebration, there will be a reception to meet the artist on Thursday, October 5th, 6-8PM.
Wally Gilbert has always been modest about his achievements. If you looked him up on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Gilbert) , you would learn that he is not only a Nobel Prize-winning scientist but also a Cambridge graduate, a Harvard professor, and a noted and honored expert in numerous other scientific investigations. But after retiring from Harvard in 2001, he turned to the artistic side of his brain and began a career in digital photography, transforming his images with Photoshop and undoubtedly other self-invented techniques to make fascinating compositions suggestive of depths beyond reality.
Gilbert has been working with digital photography now for over a decade, sometimes exploring color, sometimes focusing on black & white imagery. In this exhibit, his focus is on color and light which he investigates and manipulates, transforming fragments of photographs into a plethora of artistic and arresting abstract and sometimes nearly realistic artworks.
The artist/scientist continues his exploration of the digital media of photography, approaching it with scientific gusto, artistic freedom and the wisdom of experimentation, pushing and transforming his images by taking color to the extreme. The work in his latest exhibition begins with color, light and overlapping shapes, creating complex abstractions that leave the viewer to imagine their origins. This time, many of the images begin with towering architectonic structures, perhaps reminding us - with the title “Torn Building Towers”- of The Twin Towers of 9/11.
Gilbert explores the medium of photography zealously, searching for beauty and then translating that beauty into his own imagistic language of color and form. He first captures photographically a wide variety of subjects, translating the subjects into artistic images that he enhances digitally, pushing colors and shapes creatively and scientifically perhaps, reminding us that the thinking processes of artists and scientists are more alike than we previously realized.
With this new series of images, Gilbert continues exploring architectural imagery, but now repeating & altering it so that the images dance before your eyes. They glow with color driven to full saturation creating new interactions, until they have become “abstract meditations” at times approaching the psychedelic images of the 70’s. A time so different from now but perhaps not so for the show at the Whitney of 70’s Political Art which featured the works of many old friends.
"In his digitally altered photographs, Wally Gilbert slices up and weaves city scenes, cranking color values off the charts. Ember red burns against royal purple, and lemon-yellow pops against red and violet, in "Torn Building Tower – Triptych." Zing! The three narrow vertical panels echo forms of the buildings they depict, which tumble, fold, and open into dazzling, game-board grids." -- Cate McQuaid, Boston Globe, March 31, 2017
His art was featured in the Saatchi Fair in London in September in this year as well as numerous venues on the East & West Coast of the US. We hope that you will be able to meet this outstanding artist and share his vision through seeing these incredibly fascinating artworks.
Gallery hours: Tuesday through Saturday 12-6PM
For further information please contact Vernita Nemec, Gallery Director at 212 414 4040 or viridianartistinc@gmail.com
Wally Gilbert will show at an Art Fair in London
START
at the Saatchi Gallery
September 13 to 17, 2017
Wally Gilbert and INKA Collaborative
Booth #2.6, at the Saatchi Gallery
Duke of York's HQ,
King's Road, Chelsea, London. SW3 4RY
Wednesday 13th, 15:00 - 21:00, VIP Preview
Thursday 14th, 11:00 - 18:00, Public Opening
Friday 15th, 11:00 - 18:00, Public Opening
Saturday 16th, 11:00 - 18:00, Public Opening
Sunday 17th, 11:00 - 17:00, Public Opening
Srividya Kannan Ramachandran at Montserrat Gallery
A Retrospective of the Endless Junkmail Scroll & other Trash-formative Art
Vernita N'Cognita
August 25- September 3, 2017
Opening Reception: Thursday, August 25th, 6-8 pm
open mostly by appt - call 609 731 2140
Press Release: "Selfies & Self-Portraits: 21st C Artists See Themselves"
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Please List
"Selfies & Self-Portraits: 21st C Artists See Themselves"
September 5 - September 30, 2017.
Thursday, September 7, 6-8PM. Opening Reception and a book signing of Ann Zinman Leventhal's new novel, “Among the Survivors". Thursday September 28, 6-8PM A night of portraiture. All are invited to draw or be drawn!
Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present "Selfies & Self-Portraits: 21st C Artists See Themselves", which extends from September 5 through September 30 2017. The opening reception will be on Thursday, September 7, 6-8PM with a book signing by Ann Z Leventhal.
Artists have been creating self-portraits since the beginning of time, but now with cell phone cameras, the selfie has become the ubiquitous portrayal of self. The selfie has become today's self-portrait, but does it go beyond being just a likeness of the self which the artist has created or is it self-indulgence?
What is a self-portrait? What meanings does it encompass? How honest is reality or an artists' interpretation, even with a media so direct as the iPhone? Couldn't it just be the moment and an arbitrary decision to snap the shutter or be based on the composition of shapes in the image? Is it photography in the same way as our trusty old 35mm cameras performed? Is it more truthful than a brush and paint with a mirror nearby? What is art? What is reality?
Viridian has invited guest artists, as well as its usual entourage, to create and show images they feel represent themselves. Artists were invited to send us a "selfie", aka 21st C self-portrait and to create their selfie in the form of an art object in any media they desire. All the while, thinking about who they are/ what inspires & what motivates them. Or just to do an old-fashioned self-portrait!
Some are outrageous, some political, some as classical as Durer, Rembrandt, but with a twist. Today's self-portraiture because of a thousand reasons has become more diverse & more conceptual. How we see artists from the past may have to do more with their self-portrayals than documents in their archives. But how we see artists today via their self-image is a whole new conundrum.
On the last Thursday evening of the exhibit, September 28th, there will be an evening of portrait drawing. All interested are invited to bring their drawing pads & materials to create self- portraits or portraits of each other. Guests are invited to pose for portraits which can be traded or paid for at the rate of $1 a minute. Come between 6-8PM & participate or just observe. A good time is guaranteed for all! The exhibition continues until Saturday, September 30th.
Renee Borkow * Ellen Burnett * May DeViney * Alan Gaynor * Wally Gilbert * Srividya Kannan Ramachandran * Kat King * Namiyo Kubo * Phillip McConnell * Matthias Merdan * John Nieman * Mary Tooley Parker * Susan Sills * Virginia Evans Smit * Angela Smith * Deborah Sudran* Kiffi Diamond * Arlene Finger * Ron Moore * Sarah Riley * Kathleen Shanahan * Jenny Belin * Vernita N’Cognita * William Patrick Armstrong * Emmett Barnacle * Jenny Brown * Naomi Christianson * d'Ann de Simone * Dave Dorsey *Julie Gautier-Downes* Melanie Gritzka del Villar *
Olga Garcia Guerra * Charity Henderson * Ed Herman* Flora Hogman * Jieun Beth Kim * Megan Klim *Bernice Sokol Kramer * Angela M. LaMonte * Arturo Lindsay * Vidho Lorville * Jade Lowder * Sara Madandar * Song Lee * Shawn Marshall * Chang Sik Moon * Petronia Paley * Jesse Parajeckas * Carol Quint * Mariko Spigner * Sharon Wybrants * Andrea Barnes * Rarri Oro * Michael Pegues and others!
Gallery hours: Tuesday through Saturday 12-6PM
For further information please contact the gallery at 212 414 4040 or viridianartistinc@gmail.com
Remembering Viridian Artist Barbara K. Schwartz: 1927-2017
Barbara K. Schwartz: 1927-2017
Sadly, Viridian has lost a member of our family. Barbara K. Schwartz, who has been a member of the gallery since 1978, died on July 26th. We will miss her deeply. Posted below is Barbara's obituary from the New York Times. We send our deepest condolences to her family and her friends.
SCHWARTZ--Barbara M., on July 26, 2017. Internationally known artist and teacher. Beloved wife of Robert, devoted mother and mother-in-law of Ellen and Frank Ruck, Andrew Schwartz and Brian Keane. Adored grandmother of Aaron Wolff and great-grandmother of Ryan and Emma. Memorial service Tuesday, August 1st, 2pm at "The Riverside," 76 St. and Amsterdam Ave. Donations in her memory to: The High School of Performing Arts, NYC.
Press Release: "The Heat Is On"
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
"THE HEAT IS ON"
July 18- August 5, 2017
Reception Thursday July 20th, 6-8pm
Closing Reception, Thursday August 3rd, 6-8 pm
KATHLEEN SHANAHAN * DEB FLAGEL * MICHAEL RECK * RON MOORE *
JENNY BELIN * VERNITA N’COGNITA
Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present an exhibition of outstanding art by six artists who are part of Viridian Artists' Affiliate program. The show extends from July 18th to August 5th with a reception to meet the artists Thursday July 20th, 6-8pm.
"The Heat Is On" alludes to the often pressing circumstances of life, our drive to move forward, the need to do it now, and of course, hot topics like the environment. Art offers artists solutions and ways of dealing with "the heat" of daily life. But the art itself gives the viewers too methods and means to cope with life's surprises and pitfalls. These artists will help you bear it all by visually seducing you in a wide variety of ways. Take your pick and be cool!!
MICHAEL RECK has been working exclusively with spray paint and stencils for several months now and recently reintroduced color back into the mix after working primarily in black and white for the past couple of years. "As the medium necessitates working in front of an exhaust fan, I have been trying to produce as much as possible before the New York summer grows too hot to work (or breathe) comfortably."
DEB FLAGEL "My work is an accumulation of momentary glances encountered on a daily basis. As my eye records the environmental landscape that surrounds me, my mind begins to weave line, color and shape, constructing a sort of self identity...a personal cultural fabric."
Flagel holds an MFA in Visual Communication from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Her professional background includes teaching, freelance design and restoration of commercial spaces and she has been an exhibiting artist since 2005. Her work has been shown in Chicago, New York, and places in-between. In addition, she serves as the Executive Director for Woman Made Gallery in Chicago.
Sculptor RON MOORE, when I ask for some words about his art, says “The Heat is On', is certainly apropos of our difficult, and continually upsetting times!! ~ Although my piece, which is entitled; 'Yearning's', may not be specifically aligned with those larger frustrations. ~ On a personal level, it attempts to represent the inner struggle(s), of trying to wrestle free from personal limitations. Then beyond that, to hopefully 'run and soar' with the spirit of artistic wildness, as long as time and inspiration allows.”
In this group of works by KATHLEEN SHANAHAN, nature-inspired forms are partnered with contrasting elements, resulting in new visual entities. “In their stacked formations, these forged visual associations resemble totems. Appreciation of both the micro and the macro elements in nature and our attentiveness to them, especially given global warming and climate change, is both apropos and crucial to our humanity.” For the artist, this kind of preoccupation and focus is a much welcome and paradoxical escape/responsibility.
JENNY BELIN’S drawings are inspired by 1950s/1960s swimsuit models. “As a feminist I am intrigued by the history of pinups: bombshell images of women were iconic at a time when sexuality was often perceived as a threat.”
VERNITA N'COGNITA continues to deal with the overabundance of stuff that would be thrown away if it were not made into art. These collages combine security envelope textures from junkmail with flipped and broken images from fashion magazines and other found fragments as the artist interweaves environmental realities and feminist fantasies in these works from the late 90’s 'til now.
Viridian's Affiliate Program is an important aspect of the gallery's mission to expand exhibition opportunities for outstanding under-known contemporary artists, those young as well as those older.
Gallery hours: Tuesday through Saturday 12-6PM
For further information please contact the gallery at 212 414 4040 or viridianartistinc@gmail.com
Srividya Kannan Ramachandran at the Healdsburg Center for the Arts, CA.
One of Srividya Kannan Ramachandran's photographs will be included in the juried show "Stories through Photography" at the Healdsburg Center for the Arts in California from July 22 to Sept 17, 2017.
Srividya Kannan Ramachandran showing 3 paintings at fashion show + art show + live painting + barbecue charity event. One night only!.
The Set NYC presents: CoutureMask: Bikini Block Party. An event to help end NYC depression and poverty. The mission of The Set NYC is to empower and build people up from poverty situations to sustainable living. Friday, June 304pm - 10pm 21 and over event
Chelsea Manhattan296 9th Ave.
CoutureMask & Bradley Douglas Jordan Bikini Fashion Show. Also showcasing Swim Suit fashion shows, Bikini Bottom Show, Outdoor Meat Grill, Outdoor VEGAN grill, Keg Beer, Outdoor Mural Live Painting, MERMAID Fashion Show, Sea Creatures, Art Exhibitions, Live Bands. $25 unlimited BBQ and keg beer. $30 at door.
Poetry and Art by Srividya Kannan Ramachandran in "Mom Egg Review"
The Girl in the Apartment Below
As the train whistled past the lonely road,
She stood still.
The stale neon lights illumined
the plastic smile on her lips.
Her burdened shoulder drooped.
Yet, she waved.
She was all but ten.
I got a glimpse of her sorrow beneath,
I blinked, and she was gone.
Why didn’t I share my journey with her?
She was all but ten.
–Srividya Kannan Ramachandran
--from "Mom Egg Review Literature and Art" Link here
"The Mind is a Clean Canvas"; Oil on Canvas; 24 x 36 in; painting by Srividya Kannan Ramachandran
Wally Gilbert Art Show at Salon R
Doors to Nowhere
New Wally Gilbert Art Show at
Salon R
703 Mount Auburn Street
Cambridge MA 02140
617-491-2300
June 21st to August 25th, 2017
Tuesday 9:30 – 5:00
Weds & Thurs 9:30 – 8:00
Friday 9:30 – 5:00
Saturday 8:00 – 2:30
Opening Reception: Tuesday, July 11, 6 – 8 pm
"Doors to Nowhere"
45" x 30"
Digital print on Aluminum with a high gloss finish.