Earth Day 2014 - A Few Things Worth Protecting

Fresh Flowers, Rhode Island - 2012

Beekeeping Apprenticeship, City Island, New York - 2012

Little Compton, Rhode Island - 2013

Longwood Gardens, Pennsylvania - 2012

Monterey, California - 2014

Anchovies, Monterey Aquarium - 2014

 Farm Stand Flowers, Rhode Island - 2013

 Seaweed, Rhode Island - 2012

New Jersey, 2010

Virginia Beach, Virginia - 2013

 Little Compton, Rhode Island - 2013

 Lancaster, Pennsylvania - 2012

Meeting Monet at the New York Botanical Gardens

"Monet's Garden" at the New York Botanical Gardens was both an outdoor in and indoor experience. Like the famous waterlily paintings, the blooming water lily ponds at the Botanical Garden displayed the aquatic flora in all their glory in a wide variety of types and colors. The exhibit overall was a reproduction of Monet's home in Giverny, France comprised of flower beds and also some of the paintings themselves. In collaboration with the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a side exhibition called "Paintings and Plants" featured paintings, photographs, and artifacts on display in the Mertz Library to compliment the plants outdoors in the ponds and in the Haupt Conservatory. Through such a comprehensive display, you see how important gardening was to the artist. Monet claims his lucrative career is owed to bright and colorful flowers. His lush grounds and colorful home are reflective of his work. 

Inside the glass arboretum, the façade of Monet's home, a slice of the existing gardens, and even the famous green bridge are represented. Dotted with millions of colors, you can see how the light is constantly changing in the flowers and foliage as were the ever-changing images that Monet painted repeatedly. 

The show at The New York Botanical Gardens in the Bronx runs through October 21st.
The real thing in Giverny below (from 2005) 

 

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Latest Work - Science and Math for Back To School

Blow off the dust from that old book! My latest inspirations come from the worlds of science and math. Vintage Coral and Seaweed (left) is like discovering an 18th or 19th century print from an old botany book  uncovered from the spiderwebs of the lost stacks in the Natural History Museum. Pie Shell (right) is a visual math pun based on the Pythagorean Theorem for triangles and pi.

The Glass Art of Dale Chihuly - Film Review and Exhibit

Here is a bright dash of bold color for these hot summer days after combating those long winter blahs.....the film about Chihuly's exhibit at the V&A is a treat for the eyes- as is all of Chihuly's work. There are several movies about Chihuly's work, and as I suspected, they are all fairly similar. Each one offers site-specific installations from far-flung locales like Venice and Jerusalem. This particular movie follows the preparations for his exhibition at a famous London institution. With this show, held back in  2001, the museum broke its normal rules having a one-person show for a living, contemporary artist.

The artist is consumed with organic forms and surprises that take shape in the glass. He rarely uses tools and molds relying more on gravity and centrifugal force to create his glasswork- the more organic and unusual, the better. His work is based on the "happy accident" yielding even stranger, more embraceable biology. For this exhibit, he also broke with tradition, using molds and then later seeing where physics would take the resulting form. These creations are modern sculptures amidst the arms and armor in the medieval art section of the museum. Both Chihuly's work and medieval art are colorful and exhuberant. He views his work as a collection that is ongoing. He enjoys playing with natural light and water. As the forms are placed, Chihuly likes the viewer to wonder if the work is manmade or is it natural? He doesn't want it to be overly designed with predictible placement but rather looking like it grew there naturally. When it comes to production, he stresses experimentation and teamwork.

Back in 2006, I was overjoyed when Chihuly's colorful work was featured in a similar exhibit at the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx. I went at night and again during the day to experience the exhibit in two different lights. As intended by the artist, I noticed the placement was natural. But somehow the organic forms were strange. They seemed to fit, yet were like nothing I had ever seen. Were they natural and real or some sort of alien life form that was placed in these gardens by an unknown hand?

Earth Day 2012 - Spring At Longwood Gardens

The View From My Window - Spring!

New Paintings with Scientific Undertones - October 2011

Below are some new paintings I've been working on this month. They appear on scientific book pages that have been carefully chosen to relate to the subject matter. The topics range from human anatomy to physics. Sometimes, the text underneath lends itself to the title. These pieces (among others) can be found here. Enjoy!

Of Sound (left) and Lift (right)

Elements of the Ocean (left) and Spring Bud (right)

Vitamin Chart (left) and Candyland (right)