Innholdsfortegnelse for November 2018 i American Art Collector

I met Derek Penix at the Oil Painters of America National Juried Exhibition several years ago. As the editor of this magazine as well as Western Art Collector, I try to go to this event every year. I’ve missed a few. But I believe this was one in Dallas. I liked Derek’s work a lot when I saw it. So did everyone else. In fact, the year we met he won the American Art Collector Award of Excellence and he also won the Best of Show award from the group. Recently, Derek reached out to me. I think I’ve seen him one other time since he received our award. He sent me an email and asked how much it would cost to take our back cover. I was impressed that…

Dina Brodsky traditionally paints tiny images. As a classically trained painter, she is loath to simplify and eliminate detail to accommodate her often 2-inch circular format. “I can’t simplify to save my life,” she says. For White Tailed Hillstar, a gouache of an iridescent hummingbird, she has expanded the format to 3 by 3 inches. The extraordinary little bird is native to the northern Andes. Brodsky cites Chilean poet Pablo Neruda who wrote, “bird by bird, I learned to know the earth.” She adds, “I want to know the earth, too.” Ben Aronson paints large cityscapes and small, intimate, still lifes. Recently, he experimented dramatically and successfully with expanding his 12-by-12-inch floral still lifes into a format over 4 feet. The small paintings often depict one or two blossoms in…

Matteo Massagrande says, “In everyone’s past there is a room of which we remember the light that it was filled with.” As an 8-year-old he had a building of such rooms to explore in his aunt’s country villa in Italy. He roamed its park, which was “a mix of very little spaces and ample expanses of light…It was inhabited by all sorts of animals, geese, cats, dogs, ducks, enormous empty aviaries…and a bamboo forest that my 8-year-old eyes were perceiving as a jungle. The park was all mine. I had the freedom to explore it in every season, at any time of the day. The villa, on the other hand, was a real mystery, save for the few rooms that we were living in… “It was a completely new space…

A rawness permeates through Jeremy Mann’s paintings. There’s an organized madness to it all as his seemingly improvisational paints are laid down around pristine figures, their flawless features juxtaposed with the primal application of color around them. Paint is mashed, rolled, swiped and stabbed onto the canvas before it is flayed open and reapplied yet again. “…Destroying and then rebuilding paintings stage after stage is not only thrilling after the fact, but also has the look, the feeling of history, melancholy and memory that I am wanting in my art,” Mann told us recently. In The Unbound Process, his newest solo show, many of those paint qualities can be seen in Mann’s photography, which will take center stage in a unique new exhibition opening November 16 at Principle Gallery in…

A portrait by Phoebe Dickinson is one of 48 works chosen from 2,667 submissions for the 2018 BP Portrait Award at London’s National Portrait Gallery. Her large triple portrait of the Cholmondeley children in their ancestral home, Houghton Hall, recalls 19th-century portraits but is very much of the 21st century. One of the twin boys stands barefoot on a wooden bench while his brother sits on its arm as their sister plays on the floor. Her composition and placement of the children in the vast space recalls the composition of John Singer Sargent’s painting at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit, 1882. Known for her portraits, her exhibition of new work, Journey Through Landscape at the Tessa Packard Showroom in Chelsea, London, November 12…

This November, J.M. Stringer Gallery of Fine Art in Vero Beach, Florida, will host its season opening exhibition, Spotlight on American Women Artists, featuring five artists from its roster. Each artist—Stephanie Amato, Cathy Ferrel, Mary Garrish, Joy Jackson and Claudia Seymour—will display new paintings that highlight their individual inspirations and styles. “I chose an all-female cast because I want viewers to contemplate their unique, exceptional and thoughtful handling of paint as they explore their subjects,” says gallery owner John M. Stringer, who will present the show from November 1 to 24. “Together, they prompt beautiful questions of how traditional, representational oil painters interpret their surroundings. Individually, they convey how their personal experiences as women affect their interpretation of those same surroundings, subjects and scenes.” Among the pieces in the show…

Coastal views from Charleston, South Carolina, to Maine—from inland images of East Coast cities and tidal marshes to views of the open ocean and boat-filled harbors—will take center stage at a new two-man show featuring the work of Roger Dale Brown and Rick Reinert on November 2 at Reinert Fine Art in Charleston. The pairing will allow the two artists’ works to play off each other in exciting ways: Brown will be presenting more representational views of fishing and sailing boats, reflective scenes of wetlands and harbor scenes that hint at the deep history of maritime life the permeates through small towns on the coast, while Reinert will be offering looser, more modern views of Charleston, including light-dappled sidewalks, wet city streets and seascapes rendered in with abstracted qualities. For…

Lisa Gleim loves painting light and shadow and how it affects her subjects, explaining, “It’s fascinating to watch the colors and shadows radically change, moment to moment.” From the misty gloom that hangs around after a storm or the warm glow of the golden hour to sunlight creeping through a window, Gleim believes dramatic lighting brings life to her paintings. Pastels have been the medium of choice for Gleim ever since a family friend gifted her French pastels after graduating from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in the mid-1990s. Pastels provide her the ability to draw with pure pigment and are what drives her desire to create vivid scenes of atmosphere and light. Many of her paintings are strongly influenced by her love of nature and animals. She…

international artist AWARD WINNER Houston, TX • rgwilliamson@comcast.net • www.robinwilliamsonfineart.com Robin Williamson’s artwork is done in a painterly realistic style that allows viewers to see the details as well as the elements that make it identifiable as a painting. However, she does enjoy “fooling” people who look at the work into thinking it’s a photograph at first glance. “Someone once said, if it can be said with a photo, why do we need a painting? I want to say more than a photo can—to give the subject its full view and potential,” she says. Another characteristic of Williamson’s artwork is the dramatic lighting effects, or chiaroscuro, that are reminiscent of the Renaissance painters. Her latest series of paintings combines two of her great loves: art and dance. During her youth,…

Arizona artist Frank Gonzales trained as a classical figurative painter at Laguna College of Art and Design, where he earned his bachelor’s degree in 2003 before finding his passion for nature themes. He began with ornithological subjects and has combined those with plant life and minerals over the years. The pieces show his background as a technical artist, but also highlight his contemporary eye through a bold use of color, exploration in design, and imaginative forms and ideas. “Eventually, I didn’t have too much I wanted to say with the figure, and I started involving things that were of interest to me in my work, which was kind of tough at first because you have this fictitious audience you think of that tells you what you can and can’t paint,”…

BARBARA ANDOLSEK (760) 384-8803, bandolsek@gmail.com www.barbaraandolsekfineart.com BARBARA STANTON (925) 373-9638 www.barbarastanton.com BEVERLY FAGAN GILBERTSON (574) 265-5501 skyscape321@yahoo.com www.beverlyfagangilbertson.com CAMILLA HALE lisacamillahalefineart@gmail.com www.lisacamillahalefineart.com CECILIA BRENDEL www.ceciliabrendel.com Represented by Olde Masters Galleria 25 Iron Gate Park Drive Dayton, OH 45459 (937) 602-3173 CHRISTINE BASS www.cbassart.com CHUCK LARIVEY chuck@larivey.com www.chucklarivey.com CLAUDIA SEYMOUR New Canaan, CT claudiaseymour@aol.com www.claudiaseymour.com COLIN STARKEVICH c.starkevich@hotmail.com www.colinandthegrasslandseries.com COREY HELFORD GALLERY 571 S. Anderson Street #1 Los Angeles, CA 90033 (310) 287-2340 www.coreyhelfordgallery.com DAN MCWILLIAMS www.danmcwilliams.com GARVEY|SIMON 547 W. 27th Street, New York, NY 10001 (646) 869-7637, www.garveysimon.com JOHN CUTRUZZOLA (416) 706-3660 johncutruzzola@gmail.com www.theartsofjohncutruzzola.com KAROLYN K. FARRELL (479) 236-0623 www.karolynfarrellart.com K. L. MCKENNA Saugerties, NY, (845) 246-9590 www.klmckenna.com KOMILBEK KABILOV (844) 577-7177 artkomilbek84@gmail.com www.unique-artist.net LEWALLEN GALLERIES 1613 Paseo De Peralta, Santa Fe, NM 87501, (505) 988-3250 www.lewallengalleries.com LOTTON GALLERY 900…

David Morrison teaches the art of looking and seeing to his students at Herron School of Art and Design at Indiana University. “They think they already know how to look and how to see,” he says. “But I tell them we’re going to really look. I ask them to describe every little part of an object, not to generalize. We spend two weeks looking and observing. I want them to see how incredible the objects are. I have them draw their fingernail, looking at the ridges and colors and patterns, and how it grows. They’re always amazed at how much they haven’t seen. Once they’ve improved their vision and learned how even in drawing realistically there is gesture and abstraction, I encourage them to discover their own artistic expression—what makes…

On November 16, Bonner David Galleries will open its exhibition for figurative painter Melissa Peck, who is displaying a solo show of new works for the first time in seven years. After the birth of her son five years ago, Peck scaled back on painting but over the past year, with her son entering kindergarten, she has found dedicated time for creating again. For this show, the artist will be paying homage to one of her artistic influences, artist and animator Mary Blair. Blair is best known for her work at the Walt Disney Company, creating concept art for films such as Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan and the “It’s a Small World” ride at Disney theme parks. “There’s a flatness to Blair’s artwork, and my work is somewhere…

Through November 24, LeQuire Gallery in Nashville, Tennessee, will display an attention-grabbing new series from Joshua Bronaugh inspired by the painting process. After doing a value check of a painting in progress through a piece of amber-colored glass, an idea struck him to create a series of monochromatic paintings. For his works, Bronaugh used Gamblin’s cadmium red light to conjure a dramatic mood. He says, “Cadmium is an intense and pure color and has a strong retinal effect. I hope collectors find the effect as electric as I do. It’s simultaneously hypnotic and arresting.” To go along with the intensity of the color, Bronaugh painted a series based on the Drawing Down the Moon ritual, with his figurative works showing participants, and one work, Eclipse, depicting the moon as it…

As the holiday season approaches, RJD Gallery in Bridgehampton, New York, mounts its exhibition BIG ART small canvas, featuring small-scale pieces by its gallery artists and emerging talent. This year’s edition opens November 10 with paintings by Andrea Kowch, Mary Jane Ansell, Rick Garland, Kris Lewis, Phillip Thomas, Amanda Greive, Alain Vaes and Jantina Peperkamp on view. “A strong demand continues for smaller artworks from those that appreciate fine art, but struggle with their dwindling wall space,” says Richard Demato, principal of the gallery. “These ‘little gems’ are diverse and make their own powerful statement within the confines of compact dimensions. Many art connoisseurs purchase several of the small works not only for themselves but also for holiday giving.” Kowch will be represented in the show by two early and…

Self-taught Southern California-based artist John C. Moffitt has been creating artwork professionally for over four decades, as a fine artist, illustrator, muralist and scenic artist. Prior to teaming up with noted muralist Garth Benton to execute the murals for the Getty Museum in Malibu and the pair’s decadelong collaboration to create murals decorating the homes of many well-known celebrities and notables, Moffitt’s early Trompe l’Oeil and surrealistic oil paintings were winning awards and being added to area collections. Says the artist about his early work, “After pondering Ernst’s After the Rain, Magritte’s The Human Condition and Dali’s Living Still Life at a museum exhibit as a teenager, I knew I wanted to become a painter and evoke the same questioning wonder in the viewer.” His fine art aspirations frequently shelved,…

Nancy Balmert enjoys painting large florals and landscapes she has photographed in places she travels, such as Venice, the Cotswolds and Scotland. She has been receiving international recognition for her large floral paintings. In January she received the Leonardo Da Vinci International Art Award, in Florence, Italy. She was awarded the International Prize of Nations (Tribute to Tiziano) in Venice, Italy, in March. In May she was awarded International Art Prize Raffaello in Bologna, Italy. In July, she was honored in Rome, where she received both the International Prize Giulio Cesare and the I Segnlati award. In December, she’ll be honored in Bruges, Belgium, with the International Biennial of Flanders. She is also being featured in the volume The Best Modern and Contemporary Artists 2018 curated by Salvatore Russo and…

Growing up in the exorbitantly politically charged environment of Jerusalem, artist Tslil Tsemet was bound to find some of that manifesting in her art. Her paintings lie at the intersection of creepy and humorous. Her subject matters are often telling a story dealing with social and cultural matters, which are clearly very much entwined in the fiber of her being. Artists paint what they know, what they’ve experienced or want to experience, and what topics are important to them. This is exactly what Tsemet is doing. She believes that laughter as well as art are both healing remedies in this sick, sad world, so those are the things she puts into action. Her slightly disturbing imagery demands your attention. Then after a longer look, the dark humor of it all…

The more Ian Ingram explores the intimacy of the self-portrait the more he finds within and beyond the self. A jungle wasp made its way into his Mexican studio in a converted shipping container. The fearless artist “battled the wasp and emerged victorious,” he boasts. “I picked up its body and saw that it was a magical jewel of black iridescence and had the same patterns I had found on my own skin. He was a brother.” The encounter inspired his painting Minotaur—half man, half beast. Minotaur will be in the exhibition Five Skin Ten Skin at Dimension Gallery in Austin, Texas, November 15 through January 5. The exhibition presents his emergence from two-dimensional work into three-dimensional. He and his wife, Jeri Lynn, and their two children lived among the…

BONNER DAVID GALLERIES 7040 E. Main Street, Scottsdale, AZ 85251, (480) 941-8500 www.bonnerdavid.com DAVID ALVARADO (323) 873-8499 d.alvarado008@gmail.com www.davidalvaradofineart.com JOHN C. DOYLE ART GALLERY 125 Church Street, Charleston, SC 29401, (843) 577-7344 www.johncdoyle.com JOHN CUTRUZZOLA (416) 706-3660 johncutruzzola@gmail.com www.theartsofjohncutruzzola.com K.L. MCKENNA Saugerties, NY, (845) 246-9590 www.klmckenna.com LEONID GERVITS info@gervits.com, www.gervits.com LOTTON GALLERY 900 N. Michigan Avenue, Level 6 Chicago, IL 60611, (312) 664-6203 www.lottongallery.com MICHAEL BERGT michael@mbergt.com www.mbergt.com RJD GALLERY 2385 Main Street, Bridgehampton, NY 11932, (631) 725-1161 www.rjdgallery.com STEPHANIE AMATO Milton, GA www.stephanieamato.com SUSANNAH MARTIN www.susannahmartin.de…

Throughout her career, Karen Hollingsworth has painted a number of different series. Among her most recognizable are her Windowscapes, placing the viewer in a room where stories unfold inside and outside the window, and her Perch paintings that feature birds resting atop any variety of objects. With each new exhibition, Hollingsworth revisits her series, expanding upon and adding to her existing oeuvre. On October 19, she will present her latest paintings during her fifth solo exhibition at Shain Gallery in Charlotte, North Carolina. “I’m revisiting a lot of the series from the past, which are the ones depicting paper bags, matches, crayons, water spigots. They’re objects I love to paint, but also paired with an animal—a bird or insect or a frog or something—so it makes them a little more…

Leslie Lewis Sigler paints still lifes of silverware, shiny, tarnished and each piece centered, full-size, on its own panel. She says, “By composing individual portraits of silver heirlooms, I explore the character evident in their inherent design and ever-changing patina. Each singular object’s form, condition and character transform an otherwise functional object into something rich with history and artistic beauty, with the power to reflect our own life stories and family histories in the process.” Sometimes objects appear again, either polished or tarnished, or reflecting their environment differently. Sigler’s early paintings had little color until she discovered that by wearing different colored and patterned clothing she could affect the appearance of the piece. Appearing again, they’re also able to tell another part of their story. A silver ice cream fork…

Growing up in Southern California, Mike Kershnar distinctly remembers the very first time he saw a skateboard. “I was in second grade,” says Kershnar, “and there was this kid skateboarding down the sidewalk and it seemed like he was flying. Not like a labored riding of a bicycle but literally gliding toward me. He showed me his board and the entire thing was a monster face. It was a Rob Roskopp drawn by Jim Phillips. It looked like the whole board itself was alive. And that is what pulled me in, even at that young age.” Since that day, Kershnar has always connected art with skateboarding, an association that has seen him over the years create T-shirts and wall murals for Thrasher Magazine, skateboard graphics for companies such as Toy…

When working through potential titles for a two-man show with Daniel J. Keys, artist and Montana Gallery owner Tyler Murphy very quickly settled on Bridges because it just clicked in all the right places, but mostly as a method of transition from one place, or time, to another. Keys, the gallery’s most well-known painter, helped bridge the gap between Montana Gallery and the rest of the art world. And the gallery helped create throughways for Keys in Montana and its natural splendor. There were bridges in the gallery’s current history, which was propelling over some of the early chasms that come with the gallery business, and bridges in some of the titles of the works. The title also worked because Keys and Murphy liked to see how pieces progressed, so…

November 16 through January 12, 2019, the international group exhibition titled Bloom—curated by _Lo Collective artists and owners Emilio Villalba, Justin Hopkins and Daniel Segrove and presented in partnership with Booth Gallery—will be on view at the latter’s New York City location. The show features the artwork of the three _Lo owners as well as Phil Hale, Camilla Taylor, Daniel Martin, Zoey Frank, Karim Hamid, Grant Yoshino, Sarah Sitkin, Felipe Alonso and Sid Watters. They are at various stages in their careers, but they “all have a high level of commitment to quality. The show aspires to bring a collection of work that will stir the psyche of the viewer to create a fervor of inspiration.” Among Segrove’s mixed media pieces is the work Philophobia, which gets its title from…

Since his first real art show at the age of 19, Andre Kohn has remained loyal to traditional, representational figurative expressionism. “I always said that I look for the extraordinary in the ordinary, in my own perhaps poetic way, but it is so much more than that,” Kohn says. “My favorite quote by Nicolai Fechin says, ‘What an artist fills his canvas with is not so important. What is always important is how he does it.’” Following in the footsteps of Russian and French impressionism, Kohn has found the journey to be the most exciting part. He acquired classical art training in three different countries, and while he was there he experienced the cultures by walking the streets where the masters did. “It led me to such a strong and…

For as long as he can remember, Mitch Caster has been drawing and painting, capturing the essence of the good that is around him. As a teenager, he would ditch high school and take the bus to a downtown Denver art gallery to see Richard Schmid’s work. When he was even younger, and not able to go to galleries and museums, he would study art through looking at postage stamps. He started as a figurative painter, having studied with Phil Steele, and he now teaches a structural approach to drawing at Art Students League of Denver. For many years, he did paintings of dance from the Colorado Ballet, which were honored at New York City’s Lincoln Center in celebration of the New York City Ballet’s 50th anniversary. “My love of…

Since studying at the American Academy of Art, William A. Schneider’s artwork has evolved. Workshops with Daniel Gerhartz, Harley Brown and Richard Schmid, among others, solidified his understanding of the basics. But the many hours he spent studying and copying masterworks by Nicolai Fechin was his training for brushwork and edges. “I also found four days of intense study and analysis at an exhibit of the works of J.W. Waterhouse in Montreal to be an epiphany in understanding composition,” he says. “The wonderful thing about art is that you can always get better. I view myself as a perpetual student.” Although Schneider paints landscapes and still lifes, he is particularly drawn to the figure. “Nothing approaches the beauty of a graceful curve or wistful smile. When setting up the live…