Exhibition Duration: November 1st – December 30th, 2015
Opening Reception: November 13th at 7:30 pm
(New Jersey, November 2015) Alfa Art Gallery is pleased to announce the third and final New Brunswick Art Salon of 2015: The Oil and Mixed Media Exhibition. Alfa is excited to introduce new artists, as well as previously exhibited artists: John Hawaka, Sean Carney, and Merrille Drakulich. A wide variety of mediums include oil, lacquer, wood stain, relief, and acrylic. The contrast of styles, from abstraction, to surrealism and more traditional realism, gives the show a dynamic eye of contemporary fine art. These carefully selected twelve artists bring to Alfa their unique spin on the artistic process and a new take on universal concepts.
The exhibition has no admission fees and is open to the public. An Opening Reception will be held Friday, November 13th @ 7:30pm. There will be a live musical performance by the New Brunswick Chamber Orchestra and refreshments will be served.
Musicians: (Elizaveta Laskova: Violin ; Nina Vieru: Violin; Ana Tsinadze: Viola; and Jordan Enzinder: Cello)
Exhibiting Artists: Curatorial Notes
Barry Altman, M.D.: He was previously a surgeon who began painting after retirement. Although most of his work is abstract, he also includes representational objects that are highlighted through his use of collage and relief artistry. His subject matter varies from tigers to naturalistic diorama scenes, all bearing interesting Latin titles.
Jan ten Broeke: His work incorporates biomorphic objects, shapes and forms that resemble those which are found in nature. His use of color combined with the round, natural forms of these objects, evokes a balance between organism and structure.
Jane Zamost: Her work is driven by emotions and dreams, which are captured at the moment of their formation. She uses a variety of colors and different forms of applying paint to display the emotion she wishes to capture.
John Hawaka: He uses lacquer as his primary medium because of its reaction to water, resulting in an explosion of forms across the canvas. Hawaka is inspired by life, his subject matter is capturing the burst of color in an aesthetically pleasing manner, as it expands towards the edges.
Sean Carney: He received a BFA with a focus on Portrait and Figure Painting from New Jersey City University, and has also studied at the School of Visual Arts and The Fashion Institute of Technology in NY. Carney uses wood stain and dremel for his work. He experiments with water based stains as to expand his palette and texture. The overall tone of his work embodies some variance of shades and color.
Sarah Smith: She works with mainly oil, in an attempt to focus on endangered species that she considers to be works of art themselves. She hopes to achieve a sense of protection within the canvas as to help the viewer reconsider their relationship with wildlife. When painting a person, nature tends to be her central focus rather than the figure.
Ritch Gaiti: He primarily works in oils with mixed media like sand to give a sense of the setting and time. Focusing on western themes, he attempts to capture not only movement but also the heart and soul of the subject. He includes a strong use of impasto to add dimension as well as the use of yellow and orange to add an antiquated feeling. He juxtaposes the time and culture from the far past with shades of blue.
Ria Glassman: She studied studio art at Drew University and is inspired by her life drawing classes at the Fashion Institute of Technology in NY. Focusing on the female nude, she practices the discipline approach working best with structured pre ordained forms. She uses dark colors juxtaposed with skin tones, giving little visibility to the face by the portrayal of hands over the woman’s face or turning her body away from the viewer.
Pia de Girolamo: She grew up in NYC yet traveled to Italy to study paintings privately and continued to explore fine arts in college. However, she became a physician and shortly after leaving the practice began to experiment with large spaces of color. She works mainly with large charcoal marks as well as working with drawing and painting to characterize the movement of lines and swirls. The dark violent lines juxtapose to the soft color.
Miriam Stern: She works with highly abstracted versions of objects, places, and people from the photographs she takes. These photographs include places the artist has visited, becoming a new place with each manipulation. She begins with photography and uses a combination of digital manipulation, traditional printmaking, and painting. After creating unique prints, she uses oil paint to give a more abstract feel.
Merrilee Drakulich: Attaining both a BFA and an MA in studio art, Merrilee uses large portions of color to approach the subject matter. With a high contrast of light and dark, she uses a loose application of paint adhering to prominence of her brushwork. She works with close views of objects, striving to avoid a full view in its entirety. Much of her influence derives from Caribbean and French landscape.
