Category Archives: DoNBrewer

CFEVA Artists @ Drexel University’s Pearlstein Gallery

Wednesday evening, Shoshana, Alden Cole and DoN attended Far Away From the Beginning A Departure from Childhood Idealism, an outstanding exhibit of contemporary art curated by Tara Caton, in cooperation with the Center for Emerging Visual Artists at Drexel University’s Leonard Pearlstein Gallery at 33rd and Market Streets. Tara Caton, a former intern at CFEVA, is graduating from Drexel with a degree in “Entertainment and Arts Management” and produced the show as her Senior Thesis Project. Caton tells DoN she, “looked for artists with commonalities of themes, a number of artists work with dark memories from childhood, a childhood perspective with adult melancholy, fantasies, toys, play, dreams and memory.” Tara selected all the works, wrote the text, produced the brochure and art card and installed the art; she will be the first to graduate with this degree and said it was a huge honor to do such a big job for an undergrad project. The exhibit in the Pearlstein Gallery includes many familiar CFEVA artists including Anne Canfield, Darla Jackson, Joelle Jenson, John Karpinski, Jedediah Morfit, Caleb Nussear, Scott Pellnat, Peter Prusinowski, Serena Perone, Matthew Neff, Cecelia Rembert and Nataliya Slinko. Far Away From the Beginning is on exhibit through September 5th.

Curator Tara Caton at The Leonard Pearlstein Gallery.

Artist Scott Pellnat with his adorable little girl explaining his sculpture which looks like it’s made of cast iron but is really “off the shelf” plastic parts. “Why create your own figures when you can buy a Barbie?”

Each section of Pellnat’s sculpture is rearrangeable so you can customize the surprisingly light pieces of surrealist art to suit your mood.

Jedediah Morfit explaining his bas-relief sculpture; working in common, forgotten, traditional genres (museums are full of them) Morfit re-fashions the method into new and vital art.

Detail from Jedediah Morfit‘s “The Price of Doing Business“.

Anne Canfield’s “The Mermaid and the Tiger Meet Halfway“, oil on linen.

John Karpinski is attracted to the paradox of comics and how they say a lot with so little. Through comics adults can regain time from their childhood; John’s childhood favorite comics were Daredevil # 158 and What If? # 15.

All photos by DoNBrewerMultimedia Photography.

CFEVA Introduction 2012

Blick Art Materials

NTPE4

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NTPE4 means NewsToday Print Exchange 4. Newstoday, which now is simply QBN.com , is a website where artists, designers and web coders network on-line. For the last four years someone organizes a print exchange with the first 20 people who sign up – the idea is to send 19 prints to other artists and they each send you one resulting in a collection of twenty artworks by some truly talented artists and designers from around the country. DoN has started receiving prints in the mail and it feels like Christmas in July; DoN will run a special edition of DoNArTNeWs featuring images of the works from NYC, Denver, Anaheim, Phoenix, OFallon, Il.,Brooklyn, Tampa, Portland, Or., Woodland Hills, Milwaukee…and of course, Philadelphia.

With all the art clubs in Philly, wouldn’t it be cool to so the same here? Let DoN know what you think. So far I’ve heard from Anthe – maybe we could do a drawing exchange.

Super Models @ The Plastic Club

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Last Sunday afternoon Shoshka, Alden Cole and DoN attended The Model Artist Show at The Plastic Club featureing art by artists/models with 71 artworks by Philly’s favorite models. Without the models there would be no life study at Fleisher, PSC, Plastic Club, UArts…

The models spend a lot of time with artists and obviously are exposed to trends, techniques, methods and procedures allowing them to develop their own singular styles, many of the models have their own fine art degrees. The Model Artist Show is superb with a wide variety of media from painting to prints to sculpture – now we know what they’re thinking about while they pose for hours on end.

Artist/Model Susan Stromquist won 2nd prize for No. 18 Folded Figure 1.

Artist/Model Veronica Meekins.

DoN has drawn or painted Veronica many times and even used a print of her for NTPE1 (more about NTPE later).

Mixed media by Jym Paris; the use of fabric and mixed media is unique and exciting.

DoN told Paris he’s stealing his idea (good artists copy, great artists steal – Picasso).

Model/Artist Pam Cole.

Pam instigated the idea of multiple models at The Plastic Club which has become a popular motif for the artists – very challenging.

Artist/Model Susan Wierzbicki with her “Water Your Garden” acrylic painting.

Artist/Model Heidi Sterling‘s “The Island“, oil on panel.

Alden Cole LoVeD Sterling’s series of wildly abstract paintings; this image is one of five of the spectacular paintings.

Artist/Model Hannah Holby’s “Fisherman – T Rex“, oil on print. DoN LoVeS dinosaurs!!!

Artist/Model Hannah Taylor’s “Leelo“, oil on canvas. Is this super-pop or what!?!

Artist/Model Rob Willis‘ “Quiver“, mixed media.

Charcoal drawings by Rob Willis.

Rob Willis (with nephew) won first prize for his full body of work at The Plastic Club’s The Model Artist Show.

The exhibit is on display in the Camac Street gallery through August 24th – go see it!

Photo Synthesis @ DaVinci Art Alliance

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Photo Synthesis is –

A juried awards exhibition featuring photography and photographic processes

with art by:

Amy Ahearn, Tony Anthony, Keith Auerbach, DoN Brewer, Suzanne Comer, Judy Engle, Carlos Gil, Robert Grunke, Rikard Larma, Marilyn Lavins, Richard Marr, Karen McDonnell & Anthony Cortosi, Lee Muslin, Liz Nicklus, Mickie Rosen, Armand Scavo, Susan Van Selous, D.B. Stovall, Robert Waldeck, Ted Warchal, Julien Weitzenfeld, James Widerman.

Juror and Awards Judge: Internationally acclaimed photographer JON NAAR.

Mr. Naar was present at the opening reception, signing his books The Birth of Graffiti (2007) and Getting the Picture (2005). DoN purchased Birth of Graffiti and chatted with Naar about how to present photographs most effectively. “Naar’s photographs have been published in many of the world’s leading magazines and exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum, the Museum of Modern Art, the International Center of Photography, New York, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, and the Centre Pompidou, Paris. In 2005-06 at the Jan Cunen Museum in the Netherlands, his retrospective attracted a record-breaking 15,000 visitors (Jon Naar’s website).”

DoN with his entry “light beings (Dora & Pablo)”, photo by Rikard Larma.

Award winning photograph by Suzanne Comer. (DoN agrees it looks like a botanical drawing – just stunning.)

Suzanne Comer with Photo Synthesis juror Jon Naar. Comer was trained as a painter who used photography for reference but is now a primarily a photographer which explains her painterly eye. Comer was thrilled to win an award with such terrific competition at The DaVinci Art Alliance, she positively glowed with pride.

Artist Liz Nicklus with her photo montage/collage.

Liz Nicklus’ “Witness“, mixed media.

Susan Van Selous‘ “Carley’s Daisy“, digital design.

Photo by Rikard Larma @ Photo Synthesis.

Artist Marilyn Lavins with her entry in Photo Synthesis @ DaVinci Art Alliance.

Miller’s T-Shirt was created by Margharita Warhola, niece of Andy Warhol, exclusively for Deb. Andy would have been 80 years old this year and has been gone from our plane of existence for twenty years now – hard to believe. Dr. Deb explained the meaning of photography in her opening remarks, “Phos is Greek for “light,” and graphein is Greek for “to write”–so photography means writing with light.”

All photography by DoNBrewerMultimedia except where noted.

PANMA presents WEB 2.0 @ The Science Center

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Philadelphia Area New Media Association presented a primer on new web applications which was totally fascinating, fast-paced and intelligently presented, including talks by Kelani Nicholeof M, Johnnie Billota of Indy Hall and Nick Floro of Sealworks Interactive Studios. DoN learned so much cool stuff about the web, social networking, design and working with clients – PANMA is a wonderful resource for artists, designers, coders, videographers, photographers – if you are one of the afore mentioned you should join PANMA, it’s free, fun and informative. The presentation took place in the Buckminster Fuller room with a portrait of Bucky that seems to stare at you wherever you are in the room as well as his Dymaxion map of the world – very cool. Do you know what “FOAF” or “OWL” means? DoN does now.