Mixed Media Art

Artists Describing Their Art:

Donna Gallant - Art is a daily routine in my life. I see, hear, taste, feel and smell the life that surrounds me and I am inspired by the simplest aspects of this world. Whether it be the way the light hits an object or the way objects or forms move in space. I find it all so fascinating and alive. I try to portray these experiences and expressions through my art making....

John Gamache - If I come across something of interest that will be a focal point for me to build on, that excites my passion for elements of the pastaEUR"old, cast-off objects,aEUR"run down barns, old junk cars, and abandoned houses. These are the objects I collect and infuse with new life through my paintings. When I create such a piece, I wish to convey the emotions I feel for the scene or objects to the viewer. I want the viewer to be an active participant in my joy, melancholy, humor, nostalgia. Through my textures, layers, earth-tones, and choice of images, I strive to convey these feelings. To me, the process of creating a work is transcendental I am completely lost in the making, I am part of each piece. It does take time to finish each painting as I work on several at once. Each painting is a slow build up of many layers to reach the final detailing. My goal is to create and master my craft, not just in the painting but in the feelings Ive described previously to the viewer. To elicit emotion will make the piece and my goal complete as a work of art. ...

Dave Martsolf - Dave Martsolf Dave Martsolf was born in 1949 in Kansas, moved to Western Pennsylvania in early childhood and at age 12 moved to New Hampshire where he resides today. MartsolfaEURtms father and grandfather were architects and his mother a professional photographer. Martsolf attended MIT and later UNH where he earned a degree in Fine Arts. His early work was influenced by the great masters and others such as the post-impressionists Miro, Matisse, Kandinsky, Klee, Picasso, and the surrealist Salvador Dali. Architectural instincts developed due to his close association with architecture in his youth. DaveaEURtms focus has been in visual arts his entire life. His style extends from realism to surrealistic to fantasy and abstraction. His work uses the mediums of oils, watercolors, inks and pencils, to the more technically-oriented media of computer-based art. Beginning in the late 80aEURtms Martsolf spent productive time with the tools of Bryce, Poser, KaiaEURtms Power Tools, and similar photo editing and photo manipulation products. He was creator, owner and artistic director of Damsel Software Group in the 1990aEUR2s as a producer and manufacturer of original content screen savers. Today, Dave has returned to handmade art. He continues ...

John Sims - Following some thirty years working as a graphic designer and illustrator I began stone carving in 2000 and in 2002 I returned to college at Christ Church Canterbury in England to study BA Fine Art. In 2007 I went to the Cyprus College of Art to study for a Post Grad Diploma in Fine Art under the great Cypriot artist, Stass Paraskos. At the end of the course I was asked to stay on and run the Summer Schools and to be tutor on the Post Grad course. An incredible experience and an enormous influence on my work. My work now involves less stone carving more often found timber or kebab sticks My drawing in some respects has turned a full circle in the sense that prior to sculpture my illustration work was colourful but painstakingly detailed and stylised. At college I concentrated on measured observational life drawing in pencil which fed into the simple lines of my mainly figuratively based stone carvings. Whilst in Cyprus I re-discovered colour in both my drawing and sculpture. Dreams and mythology filled my waking and sleeping hours. Oil pastel and oil sticks became my favourite mediums to quickly capture these glimpses of ...

Becky Soria - "Subject matter in painting is merely the trigger that allows the expression of something more profound, unconscious and possibly hidden even from oneself, and therefore all inclusive, so viscerally immanent to humankind" ( R. Alonzo) Totems beyond Patriarchy" May 2014 Nature has been qualified as a female organic form by most ancient cultures, but for the last millennia or so, the world has been primarily perceived and shaped by the masculine side of the species. Our recent history however has seen a trend towards a natural reversion to a feminine bias, with women becoming increasingly more crucial to all aspects of society. These works serve to remind us about these issues and others that we continue to face the world while reinventing the female figure as an emblem for current conditions and a new Totem for the future. The juxtaposition between the representations of the animals and plants in compromised an ailing conditions and the female form that seems to swallow and revive the life- infused aspects of her creation, render a sense of hope for a future in which the maternal provides a healing force to an ailing planet. Signs. Symbols. Sentinels" February 2, 2013 The works of the present...

Hope Brooks - I am often asked the question what is my work about which is a little like being asked what is life about because in art as in life each person must bring their own experience and provide their own answers. Quite simply my work is about life and the enigma that surrounds existence. I make reference to specific experiences or draw on visual reality to act as a frame to the broader content and people bring their own interpretations as well. When I began painting in the 60's I was focused on talking about natural phenomena that I found around me in Jamaica, such as the sea, the mountains, or the moon but I was also trying to find a language that expressed the essence of that place I called home. In 1980 I travelled to Baltimore USA and my visual surroundings changed completely. This city had none of the natural landscape but it had beautiful stained glass windows and during my year at the Maryland Institute I produced a large body of work called "Windows". This included prints as well as paintings of the secular as well as the ecclesiastical windows. Someone looking at the work once said ...

Lynda Lehmann - I have participated in numerous juried shows and had solo shows of my paintings. Ive sold my photography and digital art online, in galleries and other real-time venues, although I am currently marketing my work primarily online. My stock art sells well and Ive sold at least 2400 images in that venue. Life events had steered me away from painting but I am jumping back into that part of my process and hope to have new paintings online within the next few months. OTHER STUFF My painting Bibliophiles Dream has been featured on the cover of the Insights Journal of Austin Seminary. My paining Damariscotta Dream has been used for the cover of Chuck Sweetmans poetry chapbook published by Dream Horse Press. My image Enchanted Forest was used by the Sierra Club in their online feature Daily Ray of Hope. The Yellow Door has been published in Long Islands Canvas Magazine. I was a featured artist at Imagekind in July and have been featured from time to time on my other sites as well. February 1 - 28, 2009 - Metrimorphic III featuring new abstract paintings combining biomorphic and geometric elements, Harborfields Library, Greenlawn, NY. Due to time constraints I will ...

Jerry Di Falco - Photography inspires my art and acts as a vital element in my etchings. The images I employ originate from my own photographs, as well as from the images I find from my research into the digital archives of universities, historical societies, libraries, and museums. Upon locating a documented scene I wish to etch, my first step involves the execution of two to five original drawings of the photograph. My collaboration between photography and printmaking allows me the independence to integrate my personal interpretations into the scene. Moreover, I create bridges between the physical and metaphysical visual realities in the same way that a camera intersects with human creativity . . . the nexus between the mechanical and the cerebral art tools. Art unveils everything that we mask behind our belief systems conversely, I strive in my creations to clarify those phenomena we overlook as a result of our egocentric assumptions. Ironically enough, I blame this failure to notice things, a process I label, the phenomenology of connectedness, on todayaEURtms very infatuation with and addiction to the new communicational technologies of social media. My artworks therefore become like windows through which to examine the mysteries of aEURoeeveryday consciousnessaEUR. In fact, my use of ...

C. A. Hoffman - For me, my artwork is very personal. It reflects a lot about how I am feeling at any given time and place. I feel that art has to be on this personal level to completely capture how the artist is feeling daily, or trying to convey a certain thought or emotion at that particular moment. We all, at one time or another try to express our thoughts or ideas, whether it is to others or just to ourselves, by words, actions, ideas or pictures. If we are sucessful in this attempt, I think it shows through in our everyday work or art. I believe that one is either born to create art naturally or by learning. For me, I feel that I was born with this wonderful gift, and I try to improve upon it every day. In my photos and art, I hope to show how everyday objects and nature can capture our imaginations and feelings. Sometimes I work with an image to improve it, inhance it, or just to fuel the imagination. I truly hope this shows in all of my art. ...

C. A. Hoffman - Caren Keyser - My expressionist paintings are done using an intuitive process. I begin with the paint and then allow the paint and my subconscious to lead me to the subject matter. Exciting interactions between colors evolve from brushwork, pouring, glazing, spraying and other techniques. I strive to show the essence of the subject rather than paint an overly realistic image. I never know what I will find next in my work. I hope it will be dramatic and emotional. Note that the paintings are not framed. ------------------------------------- I began painting professionally in 1977 after studying art at Florida Atlantic University. There I explored the many styles and techniques available to the acrylic painter. My first photo-realism style piece was created while attending FAU. I knew from that moment that realistic nature scenes would be my style of choice. This remained my theme and style until after 2005. As time has passed my work has changed and become more creative in its processes. Color is still the dominant feature in my work. As my focus has shifted toward expressionism I stored my realism pieces. The originals of many of them are still available for purchase and are included in my inventory here at ...

Jim Lively - Whether portrayed in the abstract, realism, or somewhere in between, I am most influenced by both the beautiful and unattractive components of contemporary urban culture. Many times, one painting will reflect both components. My art tends to focus upon interesting juxtapositions of close-up images of human faces. Often, the larger images border upon realism and are caught expressing a panoply of emotions usually directed at the other images that share the canvas. Several of my recent works such as the tongue in cheek entitled "Lenin and Things" contain unlikely combinations of images such as a statue of Lenin which is dwarfed by a billboard size fashion model displaying a vacuous stare. A number of works contain both large images and interrelated small images. For example in the painting "Staring at Natalie", all the smaller images are a depiction of a collective group of voyeurs staring at a larger image of a posed fashion model. I want those viewing the painting to be the ultimate voyeur. The viewer is not only drawn initially to the larger image in its own right but also cannot help but then notice the relationship of the smaller images to the large image. Works displayed ...

Jim Lively - Kathryn Arnold - Artist Statement Kathryn Arnold c2018 My work contains two intertwining veins. One is filled with large, colorful oils on canvas. The other are my drawings which are black and white mixed media works on paper. Both display the density and layered mark-making that points to my process and content. The work is a result of intuitive nonobjective processes and contains my search for visual magic. The sense of touch and chaotic energy of color and marks play an important role in building up layers that function to create an encompassing, enveloping field and bewildering space. Sometimes there is an introduction of a grid-like form with recognizable imagery playing upon it. These become reference points and their intrinsic relating form poetry, a type of interplay between subjective and objective reality. from Ginsberg Howl ...and who therefore ran through the icy streets obsessed witha sudden flash of the alchemy... PAINTINGS marks kinetic sensation chaotic energy a building a destruction emotional complex bewildering spaces autobiographical references major dreams minor non-dreams Materials oil canvas composition leaf gouache ink watercolor acrylic charcoal conte soft pastels oil pastels pencil polymer medium spray paint enamel varnishes rice papers newspapers collage Arches hot-pressed 100 ...

Tamara Sorkin - I have always worked from organic subjects- plants, animals, or the human body, but usually I arrive at an abstract, "zoomorphic" description, that enables me a wider perspective. ...

Stephen Mead - In the early 1990's Stephen Mead's poems began appearing in such journals as Onionhead, Bellowing Ark, and Invert, but upon moving to Provincetown, Mass., Stephen decided to concentrate more on visual work. It was in the year 2000, after moving back to NY, that Stephen started seeking publication again for both his writing and his art combined. Since, then, thanks to the wonders of the World Wide Web, his work has appeared internationally both in cyberspace, hard copy, and physical Gallery Space. Often the writing has appeared along side his paintings, and at other times with the text superimposed. In 2004 Stephen began experimenting even more with these poetry/art hybrids creating a series of e books, including the award winning "We Are More Than Our Wounds". From there Stephen began experimenting with his art and poems as films, at first creating slideshows with captions, and then doing his own soundtracks and voice overdubs. These DVDs are available through Indieflix.com In 2006 Stephen put this technology to use releasing a CD of poems set to music "Safe & Other Love Poems" (CDBaby.com), as well as two print editions of his image/art hybrids, "Selected Works" and "Tree ...