florida day three

well I fully intended to take a long walk on the beach this morning but it was too delicious to just take a photo from the balcony and go back to bed until 8. I have lots of work to do, but have the day to myself.

got back to the hotel after a long day of jury, ate a little anti pasta, had a glass of wine, went for a swim, took my book - fully intending to read but instead fell sound asleep for an hour. lovely! My favorite time at the beach, late afternoon.

The festival in old town this September will be wonderful! It was much more difficult to jury this year. Simply astonishing paintings - I can still see them. Everyone at Howard Allen Events is such a delight.

Alexandria Festival of the Arts
September 13-14
King Street between Union & Washington streets.
Alexandria, VA 22314
http://www.artfestival.com/
703/838-5005

More than 200 juried artists display and sell fine art ranging from paintings, sculpture, prints and photography to pottery, glass, jewelry and ceramics. Old Town. 10a.m.-7 p.m. Sat.; 10 .m.-5 p.m. Sun. Free!

quick trip down, nice balcony, quiet beach

I really enjoyed Katie's workshop, I had forgotten how wonderful it was to work with a teacher who can give constructive criticism. She taught me a number of new encaustic techniques and gave me great advice, especially on my weakness - composition. It was also really interesting to have to do specific class projects - I'm so used to just doing my own thing it was a good challenge for me. Also I had a lovely companion at my table, Linda, we suited each other perfectly.

I'm off to Florida tomorrow, so most likely won't blog until late in the day.

workshop with Katie Dell Kaufman @ the Lee Arts Center, it was lovely!

sweet boys

one of my favorite artists

Lots going on, we have a meeting with Hopkins today about the Art & Addiction show for next year. Gretchen and I are trying to reign in the changing exhibits so we (she) can get the contracts out. I'll be posting a call for entries shortly for exhibits to celebrate Darwin Day in Feb 09. This weekend I'm taking an encaustic workshop at the Lee Art Center - can't wait for that! Monday I leave for Florida to jury the Festival of the Arts (which happens in Old Town in Sept). Home in time for a meeting at SF with the artists exhibiting in the fall. Another quick trip to Harrisonburg and Charlottesville, then Broxville NY at the end of the month.

Our new journal for the Society for Arts in Healthcare

info about the journal here

www.thesah.org

thank you Ellyn!

for the post about our new show... read Ellyn's blog here

LOOK 3 - Festival of the Photograph 2008

speaking of Charlottesville...

I'm in Cville

But at 5:45am I accidentally put my mp3 download cable in my suitcase instead of my camera download cable. So instead I'll post some of the things I never got to last month when I was in Philadelphia. These were my favorite works of art from the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
And it was great to see this Duchamp in person.

a fascinating web site about Duchamp here

Billy Colbert

Go to Hoogrrl! to see a great documentary about Billy who will be showing with us (along with Michael Janis and Paul Andrew Wandless) in July @ Smith Farm

see it here

nice interview @ french laundry at home here

Today Shanti, pc, Koan, Sandra and I met for lunch at busboys & poets. We helped Sandra catch a cab for the airport and then looked around the galleries. We went to plan b, hemphill, g street, irving and transformer's Here & Now. very nice day.

Immersed in the Natural World - opening

I hope you were there last night, because if you weren't you missed an astonishing opening. From 5:30 on just tremendous crowds. A big thank you again to the artists - Novie Trump (who has also curated a major ceramic show at artomatic), Tai Hwa Goh (who also has a one-person show at Flashpoint opening May 22) Elizabeth Burger and of course Shanti, Sandy, the amazing staff at Smith Farm Center. And I have to thank my lovely SAH board member, Sandra who came all the way from Boston for the opening.

Come to our grand opening at Smith Farm Center for the Healing Arts

This exhibit Immersed in the Natural World gives us a glimpse into three artist’s personal journeys. Elizabeth Burger, Tai Hwa Goh and Novie Trump create images inspired from nature. Each artist arrives at the work from a unique direction, with clearly distinct motivations. There is an immediacy and presence in the work on exhibit. It is rich in not only as an exploration of imagery and scale but also natural materials, paper, wax, clay.

Elizabeth Burger works with materials found in her rural environment, this gives her to an intense awareness of things that live and die on the land. Using algae, seedpods, roots, reeds, thorn bushes and other natural materials, she creates a series of animal/plant hybrids that are inspired by nature. Each of Ms. Burger’s works on exhibit seems to embody life or death. Contrast Apart , three immense beautiful forms that feel as if they are slowly decaying before our eyes, with her series of eighteen of Pod pieces that positively dance with life. Twisted moves in yet another direction. Created from plastic and paper pulp, it’s orange color and obvious reference to plastic construction barricades turns commonly discarded materials into an incandescent work of art.


Tai Hwa Goh’s art is deeply rooted in nature. She sees making art as the effort to search for her identity, and her art work is the diary recording her experiences. The process of layering tissue thin papers and wax breathes an air of mystery to her work, it reveals and at the same time obscures. The imagery, like the titles are delicately ominous – Suspicious Seeds, Lull, Suspicious Spore. The work has a lovely intimate scale and luminous transparent quality to the color.


Novie Trump’s art is very much about the tenacity of nature. It is informed by ancient myths and inspired by her travel to Ireland, Wales and the Galapagos Islands. Her formal training as an archeologist and love of relics and past civilizations is a great influence on her work.
The poetry in her work, the relationships of light and dark, loss and hope, death and rebirth are explored using rough hewn clay tablets, black birds, delicate egg shells, bones.

In an installation created for this exhibit she describes the Temple of the Phoenix. This work “evokes a sacred place of ritual. A ring of pillars inspired by ancient temples and burned trees encircles a nest of blackened bones, which holds a luminous ivory egg. A fierce bird perched on one of the pillars watches over the egg, which waits to be born. In this piece, iconic images of death are deliberately juxtaposed with images of birth to convey the inevitable cycle of life.”

For more information visit www.SmithFarm.com/gallery.

phone: 202.483.8600
1632 U Street NW Washington DC 20009

Reception 5:30 - 8pm
Regular Gallery Hours will be Wednesday-Friday 11AM-5PM, Saturday 11AM-3PM
and by appointment.
We look forward to seeing you Tonight!

we had a lovely lovely event at Smith Farm last night. Very touching remarks and such good humor. As I said last night I really feel this curatorial opportunity is a gift given to me after 27 years of hard work in the arts and health care field. The show is everything I could have hoped for.