DoNArTNeWs

DoN is extremely grateful and humbled by the wonderful turn out of old and new friends, fellow artists and enthusiasts who came out last Tuesday to hear him speak about his collection of photographs called “light beings”.   Thank you so much to the hard work of Amie Potsic of The Center for Emerging Visual Artists for arranging the event which drew about 70 people to hear DoN talk about the origin of the concept, how the photography and presentation is realized, which cameras DoN prefers and stories about the people in the titles.

To say that DoN’s mouth went dry when he saw the sea of faces is an understatement, at one point his upper lip curled up onto his dry teeth so much he had to reach up and un-stick it.  Everyone said they didn’t notice but DoN thinks they’re just happy it wasn’t them dealing with a bit of stage fright.  Luckily, DoN’s speech went well, even if the people in the back of the room stoically stood their ground while they mouthed, “I can’t hear you.”  People, if you can’t hear, sit in the front row - duh!?!  And the art raffle was a success, too - DoN offered art cards as raffle tickets and sold enough to raffle off an art work.  Ironically the winner of the drawing is one of DoN’s collectors who had already purchased one of the works from the exhibit.  Since the raffle was so successful, DoN is extending the offer because CFEVA has arranged for the show to hang three extra weeks!  If you have already purchased a raffle card you are still eligible to win, contact DoN to purchase your cards for a chance to own one of DoN’s photographs.  If you haven’t seen the show, please go, the space is beautiful, the staff is cute and the coffee will keep you awake all night.

Kathleen Rockwell, DoN, Lori Hess and Carly Valentine @ The Radisson Warwick Hotel’s, The Coffee Bar.

Back in the late 80’s, early 90’s, DoN was a member of The Regional Art Association, a grass roots arts club who met in the dilapidated Clementon Court House.  Kathleen, Lori & Carly’s grandmother, Jean Walsh, kept the group going for almost a decade, when DoN lost his job with a major communications company and returned to art school full time, these fine folks supported and encouraged him to push ahead and realize a dream.

Thank you to Shoshanna Aron, Alden Cole and Les Howard for helping to install the show and their continuing love and support.  Thanks to Ona Kalstein and Ted Warchal of Da Vinci Art Alliance Board of Directors for their confidence and encouragement.  Thanks to Danny Reilly of the Photographic Society of Philadelphia for taking pictures and just being there, Danny is a great photographer, it’s an honor to have him document the event.  Thanks to Lisa, Regina, Faith, Fran, Jean-Paul, Karen & Don, Sheila, Deb, Helen and all of the friends and family who came out to Center City on a hot Summer night to hear DoN.  Without the interest and recognition of art enthusiasts, making art can be a lonely pursuit, but, when you feel the love, it’s totally addictive.

LoVe

DoN 

light being (Anne D’Harnoncourt), DoN Brewer, art card @ The Coffee Bar, 17th & Locust Streets - A Center for Emerging Visual Artists Event.  This image did not make the show because of soot damage to the original photo - a tip:  frame your photos under glass, glare-free if possible.  DoN’s art cards are printed locally by Media Copy in Center City - thanks to Debbie and the crew for their great work.

Tuesday, July 20th, 2010 @ 5:30 PM, CFEVA will host a closing party and artist talk for DoN Brewer at The Radisson Warwick Plaza Hotel, The Coffee Bar, 17th & Locust Sts.  DoN is raffling off one of the photographs by selling limited edition greeting cards, signed and numbered, $5. each or 3 for $10.00 - 25% of sales is dedicated to a well deserved commission for CFEVA.  If all 200 cards sell, two pieces will be raffled off.  The exhibit is on display through the end of July.

Thanks so much to The Center for Emerging Visual Artists for their love and support.

Grotesque Profile / Dean’s Song, Michael DiPrinzio @ Da Vinci Art Alliance.

Michael DiPrinzio encourages his son, Dean, age 5, to grab some art supplies and work with his Dad in the studio while he creates his abstract expressionist /naive primitivist paintings.  Unlike the Philly Dad who let’s his kid swig beer at a ball game, DiPrinzio is familiarizing Dean with the arts and culture of all kinds - Dean was a cool art star at the opening, drawing and posing for pictures.  DiPrinzio the Younger’s work was hung on clothes pins scattered around the gallery among DiPrinzio the Elder’s paintings.  Seeing familiar household objects and surfaces incorporated into DiPrinzio’s dream-scapes plucks on childhood nerves like time traveling back to a younger day when a clothes-pin was the coolest thing ever.

Michael DiPrinzio, Give Thanks, A Heart Felt Toast @ Da Vinci Art Gallery in South Philly.

Michael DiPrinzio, Year of the Rat @ Da Vinci Art Alliance. 

Dinosaur by Dean DiPrinzio, crayon on ceiling tile.  Having a kid’s art perspective bouncing off the adult abstractions creates a vibration between childish mark-making and child-like abandon.

With Dali-esque coloration, Michael DiPrinzio gets down & dirty with this large scale mixed media painting, the paint battles across the canvas, mixing like a wacko fractal model.

Learn more about the DiPrinzio family project @ the Da Vinci Art Alliance website including info on Daniel DiPrinzio’s novel, “New U“.

Untitled, Michael DiPrinzio @ Da Vinci Art Alliance @ 7th & Catharine Streets.  The gallery is a hidden gem in South Philly, offering artists the opportunity to have one-person or group shows along with themed members only exhibits throughout the year.  Just a few blocks from The Italian Market, Da Vinci Art Alliance offers contemporary art in a lovely town-house gallery across the street from Fleisher Art Memorial.

Photos by DoNBrewerPhotography.com

While you’re visiting Center City this weekend to celebrate Memorial Day consider dropping in the Coffee Bar @ 17th & Locust to see DoN’s show of photographs titled “light beings” presented by The Center for Emerging Visual Artists - their gallery @ 15th & Locust is uber-cool.  And Bonte’s Waffle Cafe’ @ 17th & Sansom is hosting Photographic Society of Philadelphia’s solo artist show of Alan Richter photos.  The Photo Society & CFEVA both tirelessly promote photography as an art form and Philly photographers as artists with on-going shows and promotion; without organizations like these the Philly art scene is a much tougher field to navigate.  And somehow photography and coffee just go great together.

light being (JRR Tolkien), digital photograph by DoN Brewer @ The Coffee Bar, 17th & Locust in The Radisson Warwick Hotel through the end of July 2010.

2010 Philadelphia Open Studio Tours -  pdf

Register @ http://www.philaopenstudios.com/Opportunities.aspx

DoN Brewer @ his artist reception.  All event photos by Peter Prusinowski.

The Center for Emerging Visual Artists hosted an artist reception for DoN Brewer and the Philadelphia Art-erati turned out in full force - friends & colleagues from the past, present & future converged on the Coffee Bar @ 17th & Locust to support DoN’s explorations into photography.  Amie Potsic of CFEVA (& fellow photographer) and Ann Koivunen worked with the Coffee Bar to have a POST (Philadelphia Open Studio Tours) artist show in their recently remodeled cafe - the buttery walls and excellent lighting is so satisfying and easy on the eyes the photos have never looked better - and out of 30 artists the team presented, they picked DoN.  What an incredible honor & pleasure to represent Philadelphia Artists in the venerable Warwick Hotel, a landmark & planetary crossroad; DoN overheard languages from all over the world, it is so gratifying to have the work stand on it’s own, this being the largest collection of DoN’s “light being” series to date.

Muralist David Guinn, his Dad & Plastic Club former President Mike Guinn, the back of Ted Warschal’s head, Cynthia Arkin (manager of The Plastic Club website), UArts’ Regina Barthmeier, DoN, Ona Kalstein and Rob Stauffer (Rob mounted, matted and framed most of the show, his outstanding presentation skills enhances the work immeasurably) @ the Artist Reception for “light beings“.

Enhabitues of the Philly art scene, Regina & Lisa lounge below light being (Thelma) @ the artist reception for DoN Brewer’s light beings show @ The Coffee Bar - these intrepid art crawlers have been extremely supportive of DoN’s career and have been present at almost every art event important to his reputation.  Having friends be there when you need them is so important to an artists ego - Merci!

Ann Koivunen of The Center for Emerging Visual Artists manages the Philadelphia Open Studio Tours submissions (going on now) and took DoN’s feeble attempt at image size accuracy and created the terrific transparent labels, a beautiful bio book and documentation - Thank you Ann for your patience!

light being (Leo Seeger), DoN Brewer @ The Coffee Bar, The Radisson Warwick Hotel through July 2010.  This image has appeared in several art shows from the Philadelphia Sketch Club’s Absolutely Abstract Show to The University of Princeton Medical Center’s ArtFirst show to The Beauty Shop Cafe @ 20th & Fitzwater - DoN LoVeS it when people start seeing “light beings” in the wild.

Thanks to Shoshana Aron, Alden Cole & Les Howard for helping hang the show, Rob Stauffer for framing and the Center for Emerging Visual Artists for their tireless support of artists in Philadelphia.  DoN will be announcing an artist talk date soon.

Special thanks to Peter Prusinowski for photographing the event and his support and friendship, it’s such a good feeling to be recognized as an artist by peers - Philadelphia XOXO.

light being (Diana), DoN Brewer, digital photograph.

light being (Carl Sagan), DoNBrewerMultimedia Photography @ The Radisson Warwick Hotel, The Coffee Bar.

light beings (May & Andy), DoN Brewer, digital photograph.

The Coffee Bar at The Radisson Warwick Hotel @ 17th & Locust Streets in Philly is spotlighting fourteen photographs from DoN’s series titled “light beings“, February 26th through July 30th, 2010.  Strictly landscape, the images of reflections on urban surfaces seem mysterious or manipulated, the photographs evoke thoughts of what we may become - beings of light traveling at unimaginable speeds in all directions of the universe at once.

DoN was contacted by Amy Potsic of the Center for Emerging Visual Artists inquiring if he could mount a one person show with only two weeks notice?  Duh?  Amy and Ann Koivunen selected 14 images out of twenty-two, Rob Stauffer helped DoN with framing, custom mats & non-glare glass, Shoshka, Aldy & Les helped install the show - art is hard work, man!  You have to know math!?!  The Coffee Bar space is fabu, good light, great Einstein coffee, yummy food and it’s a bar at night!  How cool is that?

Artist Reception: April 7, 2010, 5-7PM.

Photos by DoNBrewerMultimedia Photography.

Lilliana Didovic LoVeS Philly!  DoN inquired what the Best of 5 means?  The artist explained the hidden, deeper enigma of the number 5 - 16 years ago when her son Gordon was only 5 he had a liver transplant, on the same date 5 years ago (both happened on her birthday, February 23), he had an emergency surgery-open trache in order to be on ventilator and doctors put him in induced coma. Iimagine you must trust the expertise of others to heal the one you love.  Five years ago just that happened to Lilliana, the doctors and hospitals in Philly came through for her family with futuristic expertise, Gordon is in his early twenties now.  A miracle.  While she handed the life of her son over to the doctors, Lilliana returned to painting, a skill she practiced in her former home in Sarajevo-Bosnia.  She and her husband escaped from the war there in the 90s and emigrated to the US with their young son, painting was not a priority but suddenly art returned to her world and helped heal her during the unimaginably stressful process which began five years ago.

Now she paints because she loves it, producing exuberant modernist paintings in a style which is recognizably Lilliana, DoN knows people who collect Didovic’s art cards, frame them and give as gifts - DoN LoVeS steal-able art ideas.

Lilliana Didovic @ Smile Gallery on 22nd Street.

Red Untitled II, acrylic on canvas, Lilliana Didovic.

5 is fabulous!  Bold color, iconic imagery, glittering sparkles and energetic compositions represent love, hope and power, Lilliana’s art transmits happy peacefulness with a touch of rock n’ roll wildness not moribund hopelessness.  Didovic lives in the moment, her 2010 paintings are heroic in scale, molten color fields in cool blues and hot reds hung in pairs, one wall is covered with a zillion miniature city-scapes with glimmering crystals representing the lights of our great city.  The gallery @ Smile on 22nd St. is a great showcase for Didovic’s five year time trip though love, life and the pursuit of happiness.  Lilliana LoVeS Philly - Back at ya, Girl!

Lilliana Didovic @ Smile Gallery.

Photography by DoNBrewerMultimedia.

Trina Mansfield, Eiffel Tower, quilted fabric collage @ The Cosmopolitan Club.

Trina Mansfield is a multi-media artist working primarily in fabrics but she also takes the photographs, plots the designs on the computer then pieces together elaborate “quilts”.

Trina Mansfield’s labels for her exhibition @ The Cosmopolitan Club are truly exceptional - hand-written notes in pencil with tiny sketches like getting a nice letter from a friend.

Trina Mansfield @ The Cosmopolitan Club.

DoN LoVeS quilts and fabric art (he watches all those geeky sewing shows on TV), maybe because there’s an emotional link to Grandma’s crazy quilts from childhood.  Mansfield’s quilts are painterly and impressionistic, even though the concept is based on crazy quilts these designs are exceptionally lucid and lush with witty contrasts and meticulous details.

When DoN entered the Cosmopolitan Club on Latimer Street to see the Karl Olsen exhibit the first thing he did was take his hat off, it’s that kind of place.  Quiet and plush it feels like a set from a Ginger Rogers movie with soft tones, tufted fabrics and multi-tiered rooms and a reception area where DoN pictured a Judy Holiday type answering the phone, “Good Evening, Cosmopolitan Club.”  The historic space is the perfect space to show Karl Olsen’s metropolitan style, artistic swagger and consummate artistry.

The gallery walls in the Cosmopolitan Club are 20′ long panels framed with moulding, a chic presentation space for ongoing exhibits of fine art. Currently Karl Olsen is showing a selection of art works from his vast stash of images created in various media from lino-cut prints to paintings to pastels, each piece special since Karl had to winnow out a group which is representative of his style with drawings, paintings and prints.  Olsen is a role model for DoN with his dedication to proficiency to many modes of communication through image making; sometimes Karl will contentedly draw quick figure studies in linoleum block with sharp tools next he’s scrawling broad swathes of color with soft pastels on huge sheets of fine paper then perhaps a wet, juicy painting always with an eye on finding an image he believes signifies his vision of art.

 Karl Olsen @ The Cosmopolitan Club.

DoN loves watching Karl Olsen work, he is very intense and focused on creating movement, emotional contact, energetic mark-making, lucid dream states - you can watch him drift off into an alpha state and let the universal energy pass through him onto the surface.  Olsen monitors workshops @ The Plastic Club and until recently held weekly gatherings at his own studio but Olsen is taking time now to do his own thing and the result is really innovative, exciting art evocative of another era yet really cool and contemporary.

Karl Olsen, Olga, oil on panel @ The Cosmopolitan Club.  DoN has been in the presence of Olga before, she always makes a powerful impact on a room, but at the Cosmopolitan Club, a proper woman’s club of high esteem, Olga is able to fully express the story of an artist’s struggle to a achieve a level of virtuosity she knew the painter held all along.  Olga represents modern sensibilities with bold color and urgent brushwork yet feels timeless with an impressionist style time-tripping to centuries passed.

Karl Olsen @ The Cosmopolitan Club.