Thursday, February 28, 2013

This Side Effects Weekend, Feb 28th, March 3rd
















The 43rd Gasparilla Festival takes place this Saturday Mar. 2nd 9am-6pm and Sunday, March 3rd 10am-5pm. 230 artists (out of 1000+ applicants) going after $74,500 in prizes, including the $15,000 Best in Show in front of over 100,000 viewers. It's big. All at Curtis Hixon Park on Ashley in Downtown Tampa. Free admission. 
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Philip Pearlstein @ Museum of Fine Arts, St. Pete - This New Realist is being shown @ the MFA. Opens Saturday, March 2nd. all at 255 Beach Drive, St. Pete. Admission is $17 for adults.




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Open-Faced Jam Jazz on Toast Sandwich @ Venture Compound - Starts @ 8:00 pm. 2621 Fairfield Avenue, St. Pete. Admission a paltry $3.00 to listen or play(!). Thursday, Feb 28th.







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St. Pete Shuffle Presents: TYPES, Yo! Kissimmee and Macrame Owls 





St. Pete Shuffle Presents TYPES: Yo! Kissimmee and Macrame Owls - At 559 Mirror Lake, St. Pete. Admission is Free. 7-11 pm Friday, Mar. 1.


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Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Seen/Scene: February 2nd Saturday @ Warehouse Art District, Part II

                                                  2nd stop was at Charlie Parker's Studio.








Charlie Parker giving a demonstration.

Beate Marston, "ID Emerged"

Neverne Covington was showing at her husband's work office, Strobel Design Build, next door to Charlie Parker's.

Al work by Neverne Covington


Book by Neverne Covington

All work by Neverne Covington


Then it was onto Duncan McClellan Glass....

Latchezar Boyadjiev, "Embrace".

Dorothy Hafner, "Wind Dance" Diptych.

Robin Grebe, "Personal History"        

Work by Duncan McClellan

I ran into Amy Marshall and her jewelry at DMG...

Amy Marshall






The Trolleys were a success. Here's a picture from Tracy Kennard showing the numbers of people using them...





Congratulations to the WADA for putting on a great 2nd Saturday.

--- Luis




Seen/Scene: February 2nd Saturday @ Warehouse Art District, Part I

The Warehouse Arts District is rapidly evolving, expanding its footprint in the city. One of the Warehouse District Arts Association's (WADA) latest efforts involves the use of trolleys to ferry people along the gallery circuit there.

The evening started at the cavernous warehouse space at MGA Studios. There were works on display by Carrie Jadus, Mark Aeling,

Carrie Jadus, "Forget the Details"
On right and left are two views of Mark Aeling's "Inverted Falcon".










Mark Aeling, "Phoenix"

Work by Victoria Ahrendt.


Margaret Juul, "Crest" 





--- Luis



Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Street Art: Two Gretchens by Jennifer Kosharek

I was present when these were painted on private property. 





--- Luis

Ancient Greek Erotica: An Evening With Aphrodite

George Medeiros and Scott Durfee design and make beautiful sculptural art purses and other fashion accessories in St. Pete [Link]. Last year they put on the Egyptian erotic night at the Museum of Fine Arts. On Feb 5th, 2013, they threw Ancient Greek Erotica: An evening with Aphrodite. 

Here are some pictures from that evening....

 George thoughtfully took me to where the models were being photographed...









A Rose by any other name...





George and Scott on far left and right w/models


Cinthia Samaha had her jewelry on display.





















There was an excellent lecture on Greek Eroticism by Dr. Robert Steven Bianchi, from the Fondation Gandur pour L'Art Geneve. Scholarly, randy, informative and entertaining.

The Viktoria Richards chocolate tasting was busy the entire night. Her chocolates are not only fantastic tasting, with new, innovative flavors, but also eye candy, beautifully designed to tantalize from a distance.

Josh Poll and Christian Zvonik




George Medeiros and Scott Durfee
Congratulations to George and Scott for fulfilling their mission to beautify the city in many ways, including this show, and to the MFA for hosting it. It was a fabulous evening.

--- Luis

Monday, February 25, 2013

2 Cool PAVA Show 2013

Gulfport is what Florida used to be and could have been, had it not been buried under condominiums. Through the vision and the fight of its citizenry, Gulfport escaped that ubiquitous fate. At the center of this, bordering on the water, is the Casino where the Professional Association of Visual Artists, along with sponsors City of Gulfport, Gulfport Merchants Association and the St. Petersburg Tribune put on the 2 COOL Art Show.


Bruce Ferguson, "Egrets Bayou"
The name of the show is a play on words because this show is air conditioned, and there is the original COOL Art show, also put on by PAVA at the Coliseum. Thirty-seven artists in a variety of media comprised the 2 COOL show. A few highlights....

Bruce Ferguson is a Tampa painter who has been reviewed here before. He paints the flora and fauna at the water's edge. Mangroves, water, birds and more with romantic colors and in a slightly Impressionistic manner.

On the right is an unfinished Ferguson, titled "Egrets Bayou". I show it because one almost never sees an unfinished work on display.





Bruce Ferguson with his work.

Liz Williams, who has been reviewed here before, paints on silk. Works with strong, melodic colors simultaneously insightful and witty.
In the painting at left, we see a Cuban Sandwich in what appears to be an ovum-like enclosure. Smaller Cuban sandwiches float like moons and planets around it. Note the DNA strand diagonally across the lower left corner. 







Liz Williams and her work.


Sarah Thee Campagna and her Cybercraft Robots have been reviewed here several times. Her art robots have steadily evolved since the first time I saw one over three years ago.

Sarah Thee Campagna, "Copperhead"

"Copperhead" is a fictional, albeit familiar, artifact, according to its accompanying narrative, a weapon found by a robot from the Redhead Rebellion against the Snake People. It is an artifact of freedom. Coincidentally, the artist happens to be a... redhead.









Sarah Thee Campagna, "Sirius and Corvus"

From the artist's narrative: Named after the Dog Star and the constellation of the Crow, these two Star Rangers patrol our stellar neighborhood fighting injustice and rescuing damaged robots. They are new knights, purposeful and true.

These robots are strangely human.










Congratulations to all the artists, PAVA, and the Casino for a memorable show.

--- Luis























Thom O'Connor, Polymer Prints @ Bleu Acier

I almost didn't write this review because the subtlety in these polymer prints is so delicate that a lot of it gets lost between the prints, photos of them, and the computer screen. The visual-emotional precision of these small prints must be seen to be understood. The show runs another week, until March 3rd.



Thom O'Connor was one of the first Tamarind Printers. He taught at the University of Albany's Art Department for 38 years before retiring and is an internationally recognized master printmaker. I spoke with O'Connor during opening night. He said the nature prints were made from photographs taken in woods around his home that pending development will soon relegate to memory. These are not generic trees, land and spaces, but specific ones, intimate to the artist.
Thom O'Connor, "Morning Trees V"
The nature works flirt between realism and its deconstruction into formalism. The artist does this expertly with light, overlays of patterns, tone and line. The still lifes are minimalist works heavily on the formal side.

Erica Greenberg-Schneider and Thom O'Connor

Work by Thom O'Connor

Work by Thom O'Connor

Within this rigorous space there's an amazing depth of longing and other human feelings. They're palpable in a gestalt kind of way, but not in the form of simple correspondences. I watched viewers at close range interacting with the work and spoke with several. Like me, they found it breathtaking and grasped for words in expressing how and why.






Part of the charm of these works is their small size. In an age of mammoth prints, seeing small ones is a delight. A small prints whispers instead of shouting. Sometimes they listen. Viewing it is an intimate, one-on-one experience. As I told Rose-Marie Prinz at the opening, I feel like a piece of red silk being pulled through a keyhole when viewing a small print.



It came as no surprise that O'Connor mentored Bleu Acier owner Erica Greenberg-Schneider during graduate school. She says this interaction guided her through a tough period and affirmed her love  of stone lithography and was influential in her becoming a Master Printer.



In an interview elsewhere, O'Connor described polymer prints thusly: "Polymer plates have been a recent addition to the printmaker’s vocabulary. They have the character of photogravure, with its links to traditional etching, but use a new process of exposing positive images on film onto a polymer-coated plate that can be exposed to UV light. The plate is developed in a water bath, dried and hardened with heat. It is then printed, like an etching is printed."

Congratulations to Thom O'Connor and Erica Greenberg-Schneider for a very good show.

--- Luis

Bleu Acier Gallery
 Saturdays 10-5 PM; Thursdays/Fridays by appointment.
109 West Columbus Drive | Tampa, Florida | 33602
For more information or images please contact Erika Schneider: 813.215.0622 or erika@bleuacier.com