Artist Critique and Converstion at the Maitland Art Center.

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The quarterly Artist Critique and Conversaion took place in the Germaine Marvel Building (210 West Packwood Avenue, Maitland, FL). Critique and Conversation is an exciting initiative to assist in the professional development of local artists.  A bar was available with beer, wine, water and soft drinks. Artists of every medium and skill level are encouraged to participate in the critiques. Each critique reviews up to 9 artists, and all artists must sign up in advance.

The June session focused on commercial art. Illustrators, graphic designers and commercial photographers were invited to have work reviewed by our guest panelists. Everryone was invited to hear the panelists’ insights and learn how they balance artistic vision with client expectations.

The guest panelists were

Doug Berger (REMIXED, Agency Partner). Remixed is a full service, multi-disciplinary marketing design agency that develops marketing strategies and brands. They incorporate a ten-step process to develop comprehensive marketing initiatives with award-winning designs that meet strategic goals.

Scott Donald (Art Director) – Donald is an illustrator, painter and designer. His works are part of a larger narrative involving myth, inherited memory and transient glimpses into nature’s connectedness.

Jim Hobart (Commercial Photographer) – Jim is the man behind Macbeth Photography, a distinctive studio that provides portraits, architectural, product and commercial photography, with offices in Orlando and New York City. His passion for architecture is reflected in his fine art photography.

Angela Henson, an interior designer, showed photography of Roman ruins. The best show depicted the huge shadow on a sculpted angel on the walls of a church. Mike Tipso who shoots event photos for the Orlando Weekly, had some vice photos off a farm to table event that took place during the golden hour as the sun set and everything turned to gold. Delores Haberkorn showed a large painting of a dancer gesturing towards a bird surrounded by Greek columns. Steve Parker, I believe is the artist depicted in my sketch. He showed a painting of a friend of his who has a phobia of moths. There were moths all over the man’s red shirt and around him as well. Some moths were painted so photo real, that they seemed to be standing on the surface off the canvas.

Bring Your Own Beamer at the Maitland Art Center

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Bring Your Own Beamer Orlando was a one night gallery exhibition featuring explosions of light and movement by local and world renowned digital artists, designers and filmmakers.

This is pop up projected experience included animated GIFs, motion graphics, interactive installations, video shorts, and more.

BYOB Orlando is a collaborative effort by Snap! Orlando, and the Art and History Museum with Nathan Selikoff and Michael Forrest as the curators.It took place in the Germain Marvel Building, Art and History Museum campus (231 East Packwood Avenue, Maitland, FL).

Even more more important, the exhibit fell on my birthday, so I treated myself to a unique sketching experience. Since the show was all about high tech projections, I decided to execute my sketch on my tablet. I figured that way I would sort of blend in. It was tricking finding a spot where I wasn’t blocking a projection beam. I sat right next to the projector that threw an animation of a view that looked like the camera was flying over a city of colorful cubes. I was most intrigued by Ivan Depeña‘s piece which consisted of a blue screen that would explode like colorful fireworks when people walked in front of it. All evening children and adults moved in front of the screen to watch the color dance. On the floor was a tiny TV. I couldn’t make out what was being shown but later when i got a drink, I met Carl Kickerbocker and he explained that the TV was showing one off his animated shorts. I decided to go back and I sat down in front of the TV to watch. Another projection was sampling colors from around the room and vibrations from a pan of water drove the image frequencies projected. I’m probably explaining that wrong, but it looked cool. This really was a world class exhibit. Exhibitions like this have occurred all around the world in cities like Moscow, Begota, Firenza,  NYC and Copenhagen to name a few. It is good to see Orlando catching up to the World art scene.

Artists in the Orlando BYOB exhibit included,

Art Car

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March at the Maitland Art Center involved a solid month of artistic events called Art 31, meaning 31 days of art. On March 25th, I arrived early for the Artists Critique and Conversation in the Germaine Marvel Building, 210 W. Packwood Avenue, Maitland. Artist and muralist Andrew Spear had covered a Toyota with symbols and patterns inspired by the many sculpted patterns on the Maitland Art Center campus. The car was silver and some of the panels had been painted white to accentuate the line work added to the car. He made a wonderful use of just one color, orange which  showed up throughout. The car had a pizza delivery or taxi signage with information about Art 31.

Although we never experience fall or winter here in Central Florida, there were plenty of leaves blowing around the carport across from the Art Center. Which reminds, me, it was a very windy day. A couple had taken the afternoon off and were bringing their ten year old son to the museum. He noticed me seated in the car port and kept his eyes on me. His parents never looked anywhere but straight ahead. The building had recently been covered with blue plastic as part of the 31 days of art. The plastic rustled and snapped in the wind.

I was one of the first people to arrive at the Critique which was a blood bath.

Critique and Conversation

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The March Critique and Conversation was held in the Germaine Marvel Building at the Maitland Art Center (210 W. Packwood Avenue, Maitland FL.) The lead panelist was Rebecca Sexton Larson who curates the exhibits in the Maitland Art Center. The guest for the evening was Gallerist Mindy Solomon who has just moved her gallery from Saint Petersburg to Miami. Each artist was given 15 minutes to show their work and get feedback. The critiques were ruthless and informative. The walls of the room were covered with crude mural art that will come down once renovations begin.

The first artist to show her work was Rima Jabbur who is a photo-realist painter. She used a projector to show her paintings. Mindy pointed out the sad truth that photo-realist work isn’t in demand. Abstract work with calming colors is all the rage. There was much discussion on researching galleries. Finding the right gallery is as important as finding the right mate. Rima had one big break when she painted a black man in the pose of Manet’s Olympia. A curator at the Louvre was putting together a show on how Manet’s work has influenced artists, and he found Rima’s painting on the internet. Because of that random internet search, her painting hung in the Louvre.

Jennifer Coop who is a graduate of my Alma matter, SVA, showed photos of her daughter playing hide and seek. Jennifer is a single mom and these artistic shots were essentially her baby album, documenting her daughters life. She explained that there was some angst in the work, but neither panelist saw that angst. The imagery was sinewy and playful. Mindy proclaimed the photos masturbatory and self serving. But from what I saw, they were quite lovely. Jennifer immediately left after her critique, so I never got to see the photos up close.

Martha Lent showed very large paintings of tropical landscapes and a vintage sailboat. Mindy suggested that Martha look for galleries in tourist areas where people might want to buy a painting to remember their trip. Key West was offered up as a possibility along with Charleston S.C. I found it sad that representational work seemed only worthy of being a tourist’s keepsake.

Tony Corbitt showed some of his quick oil studies done on location. Tony is known for doing speed paintings of celebrity faces at events. Tony said, “Art isn’t Art until it is sold, up until then it is an obsession and a storage problem.” Mindy seemed to feel that his studies weren’t detailed enough. A painting of cows in a barn was done primarily in sepia tones and white. She complained that all the whites seemed uniform. “There a million kinds of whites” she said. She complained about the dark frames he put the work in. “When in doubt use white or gold” she said referring to the frames. Tony works quickly from life considering the painting done when he leaves. She explained that Monet often returned to the same location at the same time of day so that he could capture the light. Every critique she threw at Tony’s work could just as well relate to what I do. It would be nice to spend more time on each piece but what I’m documenting is usually over within two hours time. “Fast shouldn’t be part of the vocabulary” she said. She gave me much food for thought.

Danielle DeGuglimo creates paintings that depict chaos, the urban blight that we endure for convenience. I had seen her painting inspired by the Gulf oil spill before. The imagery is surreal and a bit unsettling with grid planes to define the space. She works her paintings obsessively adding layer after layer of paint. She has started documenting each day’s work with photos so she can see what she gained and lost in the course of each day. Mindy wanted to see a stronger center of interest. “Push things beyond normal perception” she said.

The last artist to show her work, I had mistaken for a journalist in the audience. Cat Snapp has just finished graduate school where she did print making, and now she is on the road to find her voice. Most of her pieces were small and jewel-like using bold black and white. A much larger piece was constructed of square wood block prints which were then sewn together like a quilt. The image was double sided with the bold black prints having a primal feeling, “They will suck the life out of you” was scrawled across one side of the piece. Mindy felt that the writing and the bold imagery were at odds. Other pieces also had poetic verse but the words were obscured and at times impossible to read. Art is seldom about camouflage and subterfuge. There was beauty and meaning in the writing so there was no reason to hide it. With my work, I never feel a sketch is complete until I’ve written about the experience.

Josette Urso

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Josette Urso is a Brooklyn based artist who has been invited to come down for a residency at the Maitland Art Center.  Her residency runs from April 28 through June 2nd. This residency program has been resurrected after about a 30 year hiatus. lt was part of J. Andre Smith‘s vision to bring accomplished artists to Florida where they could recharge their creative batteries. Past artists of national prominence,  who were residents here included Milton Avery, Ralston Crawford, Doris Lee, Boris Margo and Teng Chiu.

Josette offered a presentation of her work in the Germaine Marvel Building on the Maitland Art Center Campus. I was one of the first people to arrive. I had been in contact with Josette because I hoped to sketch her at work and learn about her process. This talk was a perfect way to truly meet the artist. She talks with passion and excitement about her art which is accomplished and branches in multiple directions. What was most exciting was that her work has a sense of play as she experiments in various mediums.

Some of the earliest work was collage arranged in circles. Intricate images inhabited tiny squares within the over all design. They were like Madella’s or kaleidoscopes with vibrant color. She collects UPC codes and these linear patterns adorned one of the circular motifs. The image she was working on was huge and she ran out of UPC codes. Most people go to their neighbors perhaps for a cup of sugar but she turned to her neighbors for codes.

When she showed her Urban drawings, I was inspired. One sketch was of a Bushwick building rooftop with a flock of pigeons moving as a dark mass above the building. She thought the pigeons would always be there but the coup was closed down. The drawing was done with a child’s pen she had purchased in Taiwan. The ink is beginning to fade along with the inspiring memory of the flock. She would visit other artist’s studios and sketch the amazing views.

Her paintings border on the abstract yet are grounded in direct observation. She likes to get lost in the process moving around the page and is surprised when it all lines up. One action always leads to another. Her paintings pose questions not offering just answers. Different tools inspire different images. An ink sketch can’t be erased yet an oil painting can be kept in a constant state of flux. Here in Maitland she is working plein air getting her inspirations from the gardens around the museum. She admitted that the Florida sun had tapped her energy. Someone needs to bring this woman a big straw wide brimmed hat.

On Saturday, May 11, from 10 AM to 1 PM,the Art and History Museum will hold an official Plein Air Paint Day with Josette Urso. Painters from around Central Florida are encouraged to come and create alongside Urso. Guests will discover the tools and techniques Urso uses to create her widely-collected paintings, as they enjoy the beauty of the A&H’s Maitland Art Center campus. This program is FREE and the public is encouraged to attend.