DAVID DORSEY “Polarities: No Ideas But In Things”

DAVID DORSEY
“Polarities: No Ideas But In Things”
JUNE 10 – JUNE 28, 2014
Reception, Thursday, JUNE 12, 6 – 8 pm.

            CHELSEA: In his first solo in his three years as a member at Viridian, David Dorsey’s painting dwells on humble objects or commonplace scenes that bear little conceptual weight, yet in the way they come together for this exhibit, he shows how they can evoke life’s vital oppositions: life and death, dark and light, innocence and experience. Each individual painting, considered alone, represents an exploration of purely perceptual concerns, exploring how all the most traditional elements of painting—light, color, form, and the physical quality of paint—can trigger an immediate apprehension of life as a whole, in ways that words can’t reach.

“I like to focus on things and moments that might be so common, they’re taken for granted, so that you have a fresh impression of what you might see every day,” he says. “Jelly beans. A white clam sauce jar. A cheap stainless steel cream pitcher I bought at Wegman’s. Dahlias I grow for next to nothing by wintering the tubers in my basement and replanting them every spring. The skulls would otherwise be sitting in a box forgotten, somewhere in a college lab. The diaper pins I store in the clam sauce jar. But bullet casings you can buy in bulk from Etsy.”

Completed over the past five years, these eighteen paintings express basic oppositions, sometimes ironically, sometimes literally. The ideas are secondary and usually arise after the work is done. In choosing subjects, Dorsey is concerned with perceptual qualities As William Carlos Williams put it, “No ideas but in things.”

Dorsey lives and works in upstate New York, has shown his work extensively in the U.S., as well as in Europe. He has won various awards, and it is represented in collections throughout the U.S. He writes regularly about art at www.thedorseypost.com. Manifest has published his criticism.

“Eggplant and Bok Choy” and “Still Life with Pocket Door,” are painted so vividly with almost unreal, vibrant colors that they seize viewers’ attention, enticing with beautiful freshness. The living is cast against the long departed with his third painting, “Skull Unearthed Circa 1930,” a stark work of a pale room washed in clean light with a weathered skull propped atop a cardboard box. The quietude of the work is enhanced greatly by the single black audio speaker sitting silently on a shelf and the nearly toothless, gaping maw of the human remains.   —Rebecca Rafferty

In David Dorsey’s “Skull Unearthed Circa 1930″, the shipping box, scribble-marked “actual human skull”, presents the decapitated human remain in the . . . incongruous setting of a breezy open spring window. Study the sockets and cavities of the sculpted toothless mandible as the artist did in an intricately painted, multiple ridged landscape. One . . . is engrossed in the painter’s facility and fascination with his subject.                               –Marline Steel, AEQUI      

Alan Gaynor: "REMEMBRANCES"

ALAN GAYNOR
“REMEMBRANCES”
APRIL 29- MAY 17, 2014
Reception Thursday May 1 6-8PM

Chelsea, NYC: Viridian Artists is pleased to present new work by Alan Gaynor. His exhibition of photographs entitled “Remembrances” continues from April 29 through May 17, 2014 with an opening reception, Thursday May 1, 6-8PM.

 The images in this exhibit are a departure from Gaynor’s usual subject matter of urban architecture and instead are a tribute to his late wife Sharon Silbiger, a Professor of Medicine at Montefiore Medical Center and Albert Einstein School of Medicine. In these works, Gaynor uses the beauty of dying flowers, as a metaphor for her death after a long illness. 

Though he hopes to return to focusing on architectural patterns in his photographic work, changing his imagery during his grieving has provided solace. The images in this exhibit are another poignant example of the power and importance of art in our lives.  In these powerful floral portraits, Gaynor has gone beyond the usual imagery of flowers in art, instead creating a potent metaphor of the beauty and naturalness of the evolution of life and death.

Until this body of work, perhaps because he is also a licensed architect, Gaynor’s focus has been an all-encompassing examination of the architecture of the urban landscape. As architecture is often said to be “frozen music”, Gaynor’s photographs demonstrate that in a city, it is the layering of the buildings played against one another, creating an overall ensemble that one could say resembles music.  There is an equally powerful sense of rhythm in these unique flower images.

The artist has studied with the master photographers George Tice (urban landscapes), John Sexton (black & white imagery of nature and Ansel Adams’ assistant) & Jock Sturges noted for his B&W photographs of Naturists & beautiful people.

This will be the artist’s 2nd solo exhibit at Viridian. He has received many awards for his photography including a Bronze Award in the 2012 International Loupe Awards, Terabella MediaUrban Landscape, Epson International, Tank Photo Award and many others. His work has been featured in publications including Best of Photography 2012, The Photographer, CoverArt and Photo Review to name just a few. He has been exhibiting his photography since 2000 at many galleries, including FotoFusion, Spectra ’07, Saf-T-Gallery, Black Box Gallery, Camera Obscura, Soho Photo and others. 

ROBERT SMITH: "Not To Be Missed"

Robert Smith
“Not to be Missed”
 upclose, undisturbed, natural landscapes you didn’t see
April 8th- April 26th, 2014
Reception Thursday, April 10th, 6 – 8 p.m.

Viridian Artists takes pleasure in presenting Robert Smith’s new color photographs in an exhibition titled “Not to be Missed”, which is clarified by the subtitle “upclose, undisturbed, natural landscapes you didn’t see.” The exhibition opens April 8th through April 26th with a Reception on Thursday, April 10th from 6 to 8 p.m.

As in previous exhibitions of his imagery, Smith’s photography continues his love affair with that which lies close by his feet as he walks the natural landscape. It’s a focus rather foreign for most of us as we continue to look more at the vistas. He acknowledges the practice of “Sensory Awareness” that has been called the Western Zen, which brings him, in quiet, more into the present moment. This practice informs his vision, giving him a special way of seeing the nearby landscape that others do not see. He feels that his acute “seeing” of its richness is a gift worth sharing.

In recent years, Smith has come to view the landscape as presenting a window onto a short narrative, a story contained in a composition. Naturally, bringing with him his life experience, his mind’s eye sees the story unfolding within a particular aspect of the natural landscape that he captures with a clarity of composition that belies the need for cropping or rearranging. In the current atmosphere of increasingly more image manipulation, it’s refreshing to have a photographer reveal his subject with simplicity and directness and the un-manipulated reality of what it is.

In the current exhibition, “Hands to the Heavens” combines a symbolic reach of humanity to the cosmos within the microcosm of a square foot of landscape while “Seaweed Circus” offers a jambalaya of imagery in a caldron of shoreline, presenting both as unique narratives of storytelling of a highly personal nature and vision.

Smith’s photographs are in numerous collections across five Continents. He lives and works in New York City and has a summer studio on an island off the coast of Maine. There he offers “Steps to Seeing” walks to share his way of seeing with others. Smith comments that it’s a joy for him to hear the words “you’ve changed my life” from another human being. We invite you to share his unique vision in the hopes that you too will come to see the world upclose in a whole new light. 

For further information please contact the gallery at 212-414-4040 orviridianartistsinc@gmail.com or view our website: viridianartists.com

Renée Borkow: "In The City"

Renée Borkow
In The City
March 18 – April 5, 2014
Opening Reception: Thursday, March 27, 6-8 pm

Chelsea, NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present the recent work of Renée Borkow. This latest group of drawings and prints titled In The City was motivated by looking at cityscapes or environmental inspirations in many less-known locations throughout the city.

Borkow focuses on the juxtaposition and combination of geometric or architectural buildings, combined with the organic and natural lines and shapes of trees or nature. Color is a major emphasis, and each composition engages the eye of the viewer in a visual push-pull effect, creating a strong sense of movement throughout. The differences between the calm and quiet spaces and the energy-packed noisy ones are apparent, and make seeing the work both meditative and exciting.

Renée Borkow lives and works in New York City. She is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University, and has a Master of Fine Arts degree from Columbia University. She has exhibited in New York, Los Angeles, Florida, Lyon and Pittsburgh.

NAMIYO KUBO “Sailing Afloat in Namiyo Kubo‘s Ocean of Light”

NAMIYO KUBO
“Sailing Afloat in Namiyo Kubo‘s Ocean of Light”
February 25-March 15, 2014
Opening Reception: Wednesday, February 26, 5-7 pm 

Chelsea, NYC: Viridian Artists is pleased to present the new work of Tokyo artist Namiyo Kubo. Her exhibition of painting on paper entitled  “Sailing Afloat in Namiyo Kubo’s Ocean of Light” continues from February 25th through March 15th, 2014 with an opening reception Wednesday, February, 26th, 5-7 PM.     

This will be Namiyo Kubo’s third solo exhibit at Viridian Artists, the artist has again filled the gallery walls with large collages of blue and gold painted paper that put the viewer in the midst of a watery world. With intense color and the rippled painted paper, the artist creates the textured surface of oceans. This recent work was inspired by travels to India as the artist continues to search for imagery of earth and its seas.

“The Ocean of Light” is about many things. The artist states that she is continuing to create about nature, sometimes about the sea, a drop of rain, rivers, the waves of lakes, oceans and bays, but this work is also about cities and the human- made world. The “light” of stars, meteors, electricity reflecting off the waves & ripples of water reveal the cities of the world. One can discern the silhouettes of skyscrapers & the lights of Tokyo, Shanghai, London, New York City and other cities one recognizes by the shapes conjured by the “Ocean of Light” the artist has filled the gallery with. The artist “sees” twelve lights on the oceans of the Earth and the spirituality inherent in the symbol of light & water, of rebirth, discovery & unity is especially critical in our time of tsunamis, political and religious strife and nuclear disasters.  Despite the calamities of our times, this ambitious artwork reminds us that meteors, falling stars and “oceans of light” are signs of the enormity of and power in the Universe.

Namiyo Kubo is active in Japan creating murals, working with children in Iwate and doing much volunteer work in connection with art and the recent disaster in Northern Japan. Viewers not only will see her art, but will also have a chance to meet her as well at her reception on Feb 26, 5-7 pm. We hope to see you there.

“REAL/ IMAGINED” 9 VIRIDIAN AFFILIATES

“REAL/ IMAGINED”
9 VIRIDIAN AFFILIATES
Feb 4- 22, 2014
Reception Feb 6, 6-8pm

JOSHUA GREENBERG * RENEE KAHN* NANCY MACINA * JEFFREY MELZACK*
SARAH RILEY * KATHERINE ELLINGER SMITH * SHEILA SMITH *
TOTO TAKAMORI *MEREDETH TURSHEN

              Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present “REAL/ IMAGINED” an exhibition of outstanding art by nine artists who are part of the Affiliate program at the gallery. The exhibit will continue from February 4th to February 22nd, 2014. There will be an opening reception Thursday, February 6th, 6-8PM. The Viridian Artists Affiliate program is an important aspect of Viridian’s mission to expand exhibition and sales opportunities for outstanding contemporary artists, both emerging and well-known.

JOSHUA GREENBERG uses photo-based imagery to create abstract art. In Lines and Latitudes, he explores the lines which divide us and the latitude we use to bring about change.  “As a series of visual ideas, this is represented by reflections, shadows, segmentation and abstraction.  As lines turn into abstract forms, this action represents the flexibility and freedom that latitude brings.  The variation in color and texture brings movement to the work and highlights the abstraction.  The changing intensity of light shows the range of lines and latitudes, as does the contrast between foreground and background.  This series is intended to illustrate that from lines may come both latitude and art.”

RENEE KAHN’s “goal is to create the maximum intensity using the least amount of means. The purpose of this simplicity is for the viewer to focus on the colors, body language and design of the painting. Color rendering emotion is a prime ingredient of my work.”

 Nancy Macina is exhibiting oil on canvas images 16” x 20” of four of the boroughs of New York City: Brooklyn, Queens, Bronx and Manhattan.  The artist says ” I painted my feelings inspired by the gestalt type of energy emanated by the various boroughs during recent times, since I perceive they keep changing under our gaze, as time passes.”

JEFFREY MELZACK states: “The work I’m presenting represents geographies of my own random thoughts about place and longings.  The work is intimate. One has to get close to explore the details. The work is personal, yet universal, in that we all share in the human experience of exploring all that is around us and what defines us. This is the core of my visual imagery. What defines your space, your longings? My love of playing violin and the allure of the ballet are woven throughout my visual thinking and infuses my creative impulse.”

Sarah Riley is Prof. Emeritus and former Head of Printmaking at Southeast Missouri State University.  Her book, “Practical Mixed-Media Printmaking Techniques”, published in   2012 by A & C Black, London is available on Amazon. Her artwork, combining drawing, collage, printmaking and paint, frequently contains feminist overtones drawn from myth, literature and personal history; the juxtaposition of images suggesting both memories and re-imaginings. In the works exhibited this year she explores alignments of olychrome abstract watercolor monotypes with monochrome photographic imagery printed from polyester plate lithos. Her work was recently included in Four Great Printmakers, anexhibition at Truro Center for the Arts at Castle Hill in Truro, Massachusetts.

Katherine Ellinger Smith ‘s new series of paintings and drawings is an exploration of her favorite films with female characters like Rebecca or Bette Davis in ‘Whatever Happened to Baby Jane’ who have double-edged personalities. To begin the development of a painting or drawing, she first photographs film “moments” with a digital camera while viewing the movie on television and then edits the shots until she finds an image that she feels directly connected to. Her intent is to draw the viewer directly and powerfully into the content of the piece. She is a tenured art professor at South East Missouri State University.

SHEILA SMITH continues to experiment with digital imagery both abstractly & with photos from life. 

 TOTO TAKAMORI ‘s paintings involve thick layers of paint that he works & reworks more than 60 times. The primary concept in his work he feels is contrast, by which he attempts in some of his paintings to contrast a somewhat realistic element with a heavily textured multi-colored background. In others, his desire is simply to contrast light & dark or to explore opposites in a more general way. Takamori lives in Tokyo.

MEREDETH TURSHEN is an artist/writer, feminist, lover of poetry, and New Yorker who yearns for distant shores. These images, painted on paper with oil sticks, reflect on nature in landscape; the ideas are represented non-figuratively in abstract compositions. “The freedom and immediacy of drawing is related to handwriting, and the rapidity of the process enables me to express a wide range of moods.” The titles are taken from poems by contemporary women poets.

VALERII KLYMCHUK:“Cultural Differences”

VALERII KLYMCHUK

“Cultural Differences”
January 14th – February 1st, 2014
Reception Thursday, January 23, 6-8 PM

Chelsea: Viridian Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of paintings by the artist VALERII KLYMCHUK entitled “Cultural Differences”. The show opens January 14th and continues through February 1st, 2014. In celebration, a reception will be held on Thursday, January 23, 6-8 PM.

Valerii Klymchuk is an artist who is also a System Analyst mathematician from Artemovsk in the Ukraine. Artemovsk is in Donetska Oblast, about an hour north of Donetsk, the heart of eastern Ukraine, a part of the country made up of industrial towns, factories and smokestacks. Like many before him, he came to America seeking to discover his dream and even his purpose for being on this planet.

Valerii was the first in his family to gain the honor of a gold medal at school, graduate from college, and learn English. Though mathematically gifted, he decided to trade his Artemovsk destiny as a mathematician for a New York dream to find freedom and came to the US full of hope and confidence that he would succeed in whatever he attempted. After struggling to find a job and a home here, purely by accident he discovered Art, the dream he had not realized he had, the magic of painting.

The choice of the title for this exhibit is curiously interesting. For Klymchuk, the concept of Cultural Differences arose from of his own idea of personal knowledge and his realization about nature of differences between each of us. The artist says “Concept of Cultural Differences is a pure illusion. Every time we see Cultural Differences, that’s the time to wake up and to see…”

Valerii confessed, “In my search for my cultural identity I saw the absurdity of trying to describe a Spiritual Human in short sentences. That’s how I discovered new exciting way of expressing myself through art. It gives me freedom to choose my own ways to deliver my message; it is my best way to be honest … Freedom of artistic expression will no more be restrained by logic it will convey our meaning or thought.”

In 2011, Valerii got lucky when he entered Viridian’s 22nd Annual Juried Competition and was selected by the curator Elisabeth Sussman of the Whitney Museum who was the Juror that year. Subsequently, he became a Viridian Artist and as they say, the rest is history.

The artist goes on to saying “Only with respect to Cultural uniqueness of every human can we discover true answers to core questions of our life, see much greater truth about other people, cultures, and even about ourselves. Finding our own self-identity and embracing it will make us see the dawn of our civilization. Sunrise will bring joy of seeing how much we are all alike. As we open the doors guarding the truth, light of knowing ourselves will end suffering and our world will turn into garden. And there will be no logic left to justify wars…”

We hope that you will be able to meet this fascinating artist and share his vision of the future of respect to our Cultural Uniqueness seen behind doors of Cultural Differences.

“Once Upon A Time” Viridian Artists & Friends

“Once Upon A Time”
Viridian Artists & Friends
December 17th to January 11th, 2014
Opening reception Thursday December 19th, 6-8PM

Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present “Once Upon A Time” an exhibition of Viridian Artists & Friends, December 17th to January 11th, 2014 at 548 West 28thStreet, also accessible from 547 W 27th Street. There will be an opening reception Thursday December 19th, 6-8PM. In addition, Viridian is bringing back Ye Olde Art Shoppe of art cards, prints, books, and other artist-made gifts available for under $99, so that everyone has a chance to do some last minute holiday gift shopping.

Each year, in a spirit of holiday giving and sharing, Viridian Artists takes time to share the spirit of the holidays by inviting guest artists to show their creations along with us. Dress festively & come join us on Thursday, December 19th to celebrate and remember how things were “Once Upon A Time”.

Once upon a Time
there was a pay phone on every corner & you could make a call for a quarter
children were spanked when they disobeyed the teacher
business lunches were 2 martinis
we didn’t kiss ’til the third date
we could go to Europe on $5 a Day
we wore backpacks only when we went camping
we could have a delicious lunch for $5
the frame was not more important than the picture
women didn’t dream of becoming President
only men wore the pants in the family
we used to write each other letters in script & mail them at the post office…
we could have a cigarette with our drink
we did our grocery shopping on Saturday, etc, etc…

Janet Bohman, Renee Borkow, Henry Coupe, May DeViney, David Dorsey, Arthur Dworin, Bernice Faegenburg, Tazuko Fujii, Alan Gaynor, Wally Gilbert, Joshua Greenberg, Elizabeth Featherstone Hoff, Renee Kahn, Kathleen King, Valerii Klymchuk, Namiyo Kubo, Elvira Lantenhammer, Nancy Macina, Jeffrey Melzack, Matthias Merdan, Michael Miller, Stacey Clarfield Newman, Oi Sawa, Barbara K Schwartz, Susan Sills, Virginia Evans Smit, Angela Smith, Robert Smith, Sheila Smith, Deborah Sudran, Bob Tomlinson, Meredeth Turshen,

With Guest Artists: Adrienne Ankuda, Barrett Benton, Richard Brachman, Benjamin Briggs, Robert Cenendella, Ursula Clark, Lee Cordray, Gloria Cunnick, Abby DuBow, Phyllis Featherstone, Flashlight & Bill Rabinovitch, Celia Gilbert, Elizabeth Ginsberg, Brenda Hernandez, Jacqui Joseph, Mary Frances Judge, Jae Young Kim, Minjung Kim, Angela LaMonte, John Lloyd, Marcia Lloyd, Dee Dee Maguire, Bob Marvin, Robert Mielenhausen, Barbara Minsky, Darryl Moody, Eileen Mullan, Vernita N’Cognita, Sunanda Parikh, Shirley Pasternak, Lauren Purje, William Rodwell, Joseph J Roy, Leonard Rosenfeld, Stephen Salek, Jane Talcott, Daniel Victor, Vicky Wojcik

ARTHUR DWORIN “IRON-Y: From Swords to Plowshares”

ARTHUR DWORIN
“IRON-Y: From Swords to Plowshares”
November 26 – December 14, 2013
Reception, Thursday, December 5, 6-8pm
Wine & Words Saturday, December 14, 4-6PM

Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present a solo exhibition of paintings by the artist ARTHUR DWORIN. The exhibit will continue from November 26 – December 14, 2013 with a reception, Thursday, December 5, 6-8pm.

Arthur Dworin’s most recent work is inspired by iron, the core of our planet Earth. Skills he acquired as a scenic artist creating props for movies with faux rusted surfaces, and his discovery of a process by which he could create a real rusted surface on paintings instigated the creation of the works in this exhibition. The imagery of this latest body of work is also influenced by the structure of DNA.

In addition to using rust as pigmentation, the artist’s new work brings the image off the surface plane through the use of textures and sculptural techniques he learned as a child and that carve into the painting surface. Many of these patterns he has created are suggestive of aerial views of crop rows or archeological forms built by ancient civilizations. Too, patterns frozen and yet moving against each other, form juxtapositions reminiscent of movements in music resulted in “Ode to MJQ”, a work inspired by the Modern Jazz Quartet.

Another ongoing theme that has become an important aspect of this body of work is the symbol of the DNA ribbon, reminding him of our “source” that connects us to the evolutionary process and to the beings of millions of years ago.  The artist feels that “the creature that is our body finds it’s constitutional spec sheet in our DNA, something I find a key element to awakening understanding of who we are and even perhaps a glimpses into our purpose in being.”

A Detroit native, Dworin lived and worked in Manhattan from 1967 until recently purchasing a church in Pennsylvania that he has that he has used to create these works. Previous to creating art full time, he was a Scenic Artist for TV, movies, ballet, opera and theater. The recipient of several grants, he has regularly exhibited in Europe and the US. This is his fourth solo show at Viridian.

Dworin’s numerous private collectors include MoMA’s former Chief Curator of Painting and Sculpture, Peter Selz. Dr. Selz, author of 15 books on 20th century art, wrote in 2010: “Arthur Dworin’s paintings … abstract as they are, … bring a new sense of visual order to organic forms of nature.”

“Refined, complex and visually deep”—Dr. Anna Aragno, psychoanalyst and former principal ballerina in the Bolshoi and Metropolitan Opera Ballets.

“Dworin today has reached a dazzling display of lyrical passion, motion and light.”—Jerelle Kraus, former NYTimes Art Director; Author, “All the Art That’s Fit to Print (& Some That Wasn’t): Inside The New York Times Op-Ed Page,” 2010.

Deborah Sudran: "Paintings"

DEBORAH SUDRAN
“PAINTINGS”
November 5- November 23, 2013
Reception: Thursday, November 7, 6-8pm

 Chelsea:  Viridian Artists, Inc. is pleased to present an exhibition at our gallery by the artist DEBORAH SUDRAN entitled “PAINTINGS”. The show will extend from November 5th to November 23rd, 2013, with a reception to meet the artist on Thursday, November 7th, 6-8pm.

Deborah Sudran finds infinite inspiration in nature and has been experiencing that inspiration for decades. She’s not an ordinary nature painter, but paints out of a love for the colors, forms and space that nature presents, particularly up close. There is no horizon line seen in these works for the viewer’s vision is immersed in the elements and forms of plants.

Carrying her camera, she aims close up, and though the paintings that result are realistic, the artist is primarily interested in the abstract patterns created by the plants, the light and the atmosphere surrounding them. Her approach to composition creates almost a carpet of color and texture.

In this exhibit of new work, Sudran continues her passionate involvement with nature as the primary subject matter of her oil paintings.  The nature she is inspired by can be found close to home in the New York Botanical Gardens or on her frequent travels throughout the world. She finds garden, jungle and desert flora equally inspiring. The artist confesses she rarely does paintings of tulips or roses because she doesn’t find the compositions they create so interesting, preferring more dramatic compositions of color and form.

Sudran studied at the Kansas City Art Institute and the University of Michigan. The artist has shown in numerous group and solo shows including the Aldrich Museum, the Museum of the Hudson Highlands and Cornwall on Hudson. Her paintings were recently featured at TAI Exhibits where the TAI Group cultivates an intersection between art and business through its exhibitions.  She is in numerous prestigious corporate collections, including AT&T, IBM and Pfizer.

We look forward to your joining us at this exciting new exhibit at Viridian Artists.

ROBERT MIELENHAUSEN “BIKE WORKS”

ROBERT MIELENHAUSEN
“BIKE WORKS”

October 15- November 2, 2013
Reception, Saturday, Oct. 19th, 4:00 – 7:00 pm.
Wine and words: Sat. Nov. 2nd, 4:00 – 6:00pm.

 Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present “BIKE WORKS”, a solo exhibition of mixed media works by the artist ROBERT MIELENHAUSEN. The exhibit will continue from October 15th to November 2, 2013 with an opening reception on Saturday October 19th, 4:00 – 7:00 pm and a Wine and Words event with the artist on Saturday, November 2nd, 4:00 – 6:00pm.

In this body of work, Robert Mielenhausen explores the bicycle as a sculptural form in the streets of Manhattan, finding the combination of lines, angles, and the symmetry of the circles of the wheels, visually compelling. He begins the works by photographing bicycles that are marked with age and miles rather than those that are new, comparing their bodies to the bodies of people- meant to function well in a certain way, but never everlasting. For the artist, the bike represents freedom, and learning to ride a bike gives a child their first expression of freedom.

As an artist, Mielenhausen’s focus has been to combine the immediacy of photography with painting and mixed-media to emphasize the texture, color, form, and light in the images he has created. He sees this series to be as much about the street as it is about bicycles, using the street as an environment with the bicycle as the subject.  The artist utilizes a variety of materials in the building of the work, some traditional, some not. He incorporates objects saved and found on the street and combines them with photographs mounted on board, then coated with wall board compound, sand, acrylic pigment, and spray paint.

Mielenhausen’s images expand beyond the picture plane with both elements of abstraction as well as literal renderings of pictorial images depicted in the work. In these works, the bike is a witness to life for no one is riding them as they sit surrounded by life. They wait for their rider to return, or for life to just happen as in “LingeringThoughts” with its heightened shadows and air of mystery or “Passing” with the people watching or “School’s Out” or “Guess” with the poster reminscent of Marilyn in the background.

Robert Mielenhausen has been showing art since the late 70’s at OK Harris Works of Art, the 2012 Architectural Digest Home and Design Show, Water Mill Museum, Guild Hall, Islip Art Museum, and Onward Gallery in Tokyo, Japan. His work is included in the collections of private, corporate, and educational institutions.

KIYOSHI KAWAGUCHI “The Window: People in the City”

KIYOSHI KAWAGUCHI
“The Window: People in the City”
September 3 – September 21, 2013
Reception Saturday, September 7, 4-6pm

Chelsea: Viridian Artists, Inc. is pleased to present KIYOSHI KAWAGUCHI’s exhibition of acrylic paintings, “The window: People in the City” September 3 – September 21,  with a reception Saturday, September 7th, 4-6pm.

Tokyo artist Kiyoshi Kawaguchi’s artistic aims involve giving confidence & encouragement to people “who” in the words of the artist “were tossed by the hard wave of the age”. Kiyoshi Kawaguchi’s paintings of urban life synthesize with irony and humor the exuberance and rhythms of city life in paintings that are a perfect blend of his native Japan’s love of Jazz improvisation and the classical sophistication of early modernist painters of the 30’s.

He returns to Viridian, showing here in 1978 and more recently in 2010, with paintings that are stronger and more enigmatically telling of the craziness of today’s world.

In this show, his focus is on the profiles of people in the city as seen through the windows of urban life. Like Stuart Davis in the 30’s, his art contains strong vibes of social activism. He feels the weigh of living with today’s pressures to be hard on the people of the world but is conscious of the strength of individuals. Because of his belief in the suffering of the poor and the powers of the super-rich, Kawaguchi uses his paintings to convey a sense of the common man’s energy and resilience.

Walter Wickiser of Walter Wickiser Gallery, Inc. says ” Kiyoshi Kawaguchi …synthesizes classical American 30′s and 40′s traditionalism with Japanese modern day technology and craziness of city life… While other artists ignore the world situation and brand their works with Louie Vuitton, Kawaguchi foresees the future and tells it through his cryptic paintings.”

Deidre S. Greben, former Managing Editor of ARTnews, speaking of Kawaguchi’s paintings, states “Like Piet Mondrian and Stuart Davis, Kawaguchi captures the exuberance and complex rhythms of city life with simple geometry and vibrant color. Kawaguchi paints bright pictures of a hyperlinked humankind full of possibilities– including being tangled by it’s own connections.”

Following his exhibition at Viridian, he will be showing his Jazz paintings at Gallery Okabe in Tokyo in December.  We look forward to your joining us at this exciting new exhibit at Viridian Artists.

DARRYL MOODY A MOMENT ON THE WALLS

DARRYL MOODY
A MOMENT ON THE WALLS
September 24th – October 12th, 2013
Reception Saturday, September 28th, 4-6pm

Chelsea:  Viridian Gallery is pleased to present DARRYL MOODY’s exhibition of photographs entitled “A MOMENT ON THE WALLS” from September 24th to October 12th, 2013. There will be a reception for the artist Saturday, September 28th, 4-6pm. Gallery hours are Tuesday- Saturdays 12-6pm.

The images in Darryl Moody’s first solo exhibition at Viridian are a culmination of an extensive photographic investigation of remnant images.  These images are left behind, by the ebb and flow of humanity, in the streets of major cities throughout the world.  The pictorial focus upon this aspect of the urban tumult captures a moment of the transformational act of messaging over time.

Messages deeply layered and telling abound in the images Moody carefully crops in the view finder of his camera. Fragments of an array of expressive forms (i.e., slings of paint, postings, stickers, stencils, calligraphic tags) become revelatory in the inter-mix.  His process encapsulates an esthetic record and manages to return the “moment” for greater deconstructive reconsideration apart from its disappearance into the exposed.  The observer is then able to see the beauty, poetry and politics, once screamed, whispered in a more meaningful context.

Moody states, “Within certain frames I unmask the sequential. The photograph provides a continuous field relationship inviting the viewer to re-associate images with events into a new cognitive whole. When editing in Photoshop, certain digital images—congeal.” The result, as quoted from the art critic Peter Schjeldahl is “…visual paintings…photographically akin to the work of Aaron Siskind.”

Darryl Moody has taught digital, and black and white photography in a wide variety of college settings, and is a Master Digital Printer.  He holds a BA in Graphic Arts from the University of Illinois in Chicago, combined with an MFA in sculpture from The School of the Art Institute in Chicago.  He has written “Photography as a Psychological Narrative” while working at Indiana University.

“HOT” A Group Exhibition of Steamy Art

“HOT”
A Group Exhibition of Steamy Art
July 23 – August 10, 2013
Reception Thursday July 25, 6-8pm

Chelsea: Viridian Artists, Inc. is pleased to present “Hot”: A Group Exhibition of Steamy Art, July 23 – August 10, 2013 with a reception Thursday, July 25, 6-8pm. 

 HOT, a tiny little three-letter word with a host of meanings if your vocabulary entertains slang. From stolen to steamily erotic and all that falls in between, as well as just plain too hot to handle.

Going to the web, the definition began with the usual and then proceeded to list over 30 different meanings for the word when used as an adjective that seemed to provide the right amount of variety for the diversity of the art in this exhibition.

For hot weather respite, Elizabeth Featherstone Hoff’s Mountain Landscape, David Dorsey’s swimming pool and Barbara K Schwartz’ palm trees. For the reality oriented, Bob Smith’s fruit, Susan Sills cutout of a Japanese Lady with a hot cup of tea, N’Cognita’s drawing of a burning iron as the “Housewife’s Revenge”, Matthias Merdan’s and Angela Smith’s nakedness. For lovers of color, Wally Gilbert’s and Arthur Dworin’s hot abstractions. For the fantasy-bent Kat King’s organic flame-breathing dragon and Michael Miller’s “Gridhead” and for nature lovers, Viriginia Smit’s red daisies, Alan Gaynor’s and Bob Tomlinson’s hot flowers.  And a host of other steamy surprises!

We look forward to seeing you then and sharing our various hot pursuits with you!

  JANET L. BOHMAN, RENÉE BORKOW, MAY DeVINEY, ARTHUR DWORIN, DAVID DORSEY, BERNICE FAEGENBURG, TAZUKO FUJII, ALAN GAYNOR, WALLY GILBERT, ELIZABETH FEATHERSTONE HOFF, KATHLEEN KING, KIYOSHI KAWAGUCHI, YOUNG SAM KIM,
VALERII KLYMCHUK, MATTHIAS MERDAN, MICHAEL MILLER, DARRYL MOODY,VERNITA N’COGNITA,
STACEY CLARFIELD NEWMAN, LAUREN PURJE, BRUCE ROSEN, OI SAWA, BARBARA K. SCHWARTZ,
SUSAN SILLS, VIRGINIA EVANS SMIT, ANGELA SMITH, ROBERT SMITH, DEBORAH SUDRAN

Viridian Artists’ 24th International Juried Exhibition

Viridian Artists’ 24th International Juried Exhibition
Juried by Elisabeth Sussman, Curator, Whitney Museum, New York
July 2 – July 20, 2013

Opening reception Thursday, July 18th, 6:00 – 8:00 pm.

            Chelsea: Viridian Artists Inc. is pleased to present their 24th International Juried Exhibition. Curated by Elisabeth Sussman, Curator, Whitney Museum, New York, the exhibition opens  July 2nd and continues through July 20th, 2013. In celebration, a special reception will be held on Thursday, July 18th 6:00 – 8:00 pm. At that time, meet the curator and many of the artists.

Viridian’s International Juried Exhibitions are a series of exhibitions that serve to encompass a diverse selection of outstanding art from around the world that might not otherwise be seen in New York City. This marks the 24th year that the gallery has offered artists the opportunity to have a major museum curator see a selection of their work.

As the recipient of the sixteenth CCS Bard Award for Curatorial Excellence, Elisabeth Sussman was recently recognized for her dynamic curatorial vision and her dedication to the field. She is Curator and Sondra Gilman Curator of Photography at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Most recently, along with co-curator Jay Sanders, she curated the 2012 Whitney Biennial.

During her time curating this exhibition at Viridian, she spent many long hours viewing over 1000 images sent from around the world.  In her curatorial statement, Sussman states: “New York City, considers itself, rightly or wrongly, the center of the art world. In the week when the jurying of this exhibition took place, another art fair, Frieze, was in town, the contemporary auctions at Sotheby’s and Christie’s were bringing in tons of money and mega galleries in Chelsea were featuring gigantic shows of globally branded artists. Jurying an exhibition like Viridian’s at that time was an essential activity, a relief from the horrifying realization that, at least in New York, little separates the art world from global financial markets and the entertainment industry.”

In addition to the exhibition juried by Sussman, Viridian’s director, Vernita Nemec, also views the hundreds of images submitted and curates a selection that she feels have merit for a power point presentation viewable for the duration of the exhibition. This “Director’s Choice” selection is another opportunity that Viridian presents as part of its mission is to give exposure to outstanding under-known artists.

John Cullen “All About Reflections”

John Cullen
“All About Reflections”
June 11- June 29, 2013
Reception: Thursday, June 13, 5-8pm

Chelsea:  Viridian Artists, Inc. is pleased to present John Cullen’s first solo exhibition at our gallery entitled  “All About Reflections” from June 11 to June 29, 2013. There will be a reception to meet the artist on Thursday June 13, 5-8pm.

The focus of Cullen’s imagery is water, presented abstractly, with flowing lines that echo the fluidity of water’s movement and currents. His acrylic paintings on wood panels are not large and are described by the artist as “abstract impressionism”.  Sometimes he is painting the rhythms of flowing water in such a way that narratives of movement are created and filled with the simplicity of nature abstracted. Occasionally other forms overlay the liquefied tendrils, but always the viewer is confronted with water’s beautifully rhythmic journey.

Though he has worked many years and in many differing ways studying and recording the waves and currents of streams and rivers, the current selection of work encompasses selections from the last five years with a concentration on the “rhythm” series of the past two years up to the present.

Cullen feels his most inspired work comes through a sheer force of labor that ultimately fills him with a renewed sense of insight and revelation.

The artist studied at Newark School of Fine and Industrial Art, New York University and Pratt Institute, where he received a Masters Degree in Art Education in 1970. He taught art on both the secondary and college level. He has been exhibiting his paintings since 1988, receiving many awards in exhibitions throughout New York State and the Northeastern coast as well as at the Vera Beach Museum of Art, the Schweinfurth Museum and the Cooperstown Museum of Art.

We look forward to your joining us at this exciting new exhibit at Viridian Artists.

For further information please contact the gallery at 212-414-4040 or  viridianartistsinc@gmail.com  orview our website: viridia

BOB TOMLINSON “Divas & Heroes”

BOB TOMLINSON
“Divas & Heroes”
oil and collage paintings
May 21 – June 8, 2013

Reception: Thurs. May 23, 5-8 pm
Coffee/Conversation with the artist:  Saturday, June 1, 3-4 pm

Chelsea, NYC: Viridian Artists is pleased to present recent oil and collage paintings by Bob Tomlinson on the ironic theme “Divas & Heroes”.  The exhibit opens May 21st with a reception on Thursday May 23rd, 5-8pm PM. The work will be on view through Saturday June 8th. The artist will be at the gallery on Saturday, June 1st, for coffee and conversation from 3-4 PM.

The dictionary defines diva as “a great woman singer, a prima donna.”  These are present in the person of Josephine Baker etc but the word is also taken in the broader sense of a flamboyant heroine, here historical or literary.  The same holds true for the heroes.  Whether heroes and heroines are possible in the modern world is open to question.  The paintings are of modest format; the focus is on single or three-quarter figures.  Having said that, the usual suspects are present, Genghi, Marie Antoinette (at least in painted versions) as well as James Baldwin, Lena Horne, Chet Baker etc.

The paintings are combinations of areas painted in oil, elaborately textured and printed papers, as well as computer manipulated photographs.  These papers are collaged on canvas and represent elements of costume or abstracted background areas.  The painter believes that the frontier between figuration and abstraction is an illusion. There is no monolithic distinction between the two modes. Whether naturalistically depicted or abstracted in various degrees, the “object” perceived in a painting (a figure or a bowl of fruit) is in fact only a combination of visual cues. Such objects are not “natural signs” (to use the terminology of semiotics) but “arbitrary” ones, that is to say only constituted at a second degree by true natural signs: colors, lines and shapes.

Art critic Lawrence Downes wrote: “Tomlinson employs classical anatomy as a vehicle for gestural abstraction.” Focusing on form and rhythm as formal autonomous entities, the artist sets his figures hovering in baroque atmospheres awash with subtle color harmonies.

Tomlinson’s themes are substantial and implore us to search our memories and connections to myth as well as to reality, but they are executed with an elegant surface treatment that often belies the anguish & emotions that lie deep in the layers of the work.

Bob Tomlinson is a Jamaican-American painter born in Brooklyn, New York.  A graduate of Pratt Institute and the City University Graduate Center, he is also a scholar of French Literature and Aesthetics. Tomlinson has shown widely in Paris, London, Amsterdam and New York and is represented in many international public and private collections including those of the Clark-Atlanta University Museum, Dr. Maya Angelou, Lord and Lady Hirshfield, M. Franco Trecanni di Montichiari, M. Pierre Cochet and Herr Waldo Klick.  He figures in the recent books, 100 New York Painters by Cynthia M. Dantzic (Schiffer, 2006), Black Paris Profiles by Monique E. Wells (2012) and is also the subject of a projected film by the well-known documentary filmmaker Louis Massiah.

SUSAN SILLS “CUTTING LOOSE/ A Walk Through Art History”

SUSAN SILLS
“CUTTING LOOSE/ A Walk Through Art History”
April 30- May 18, 2013
Reception Thursday May 2, 6-8pm

 Chelsea:  Viridian Artists, Inc. is pleased to present Susan Sills’ exhibition “CUTTING LOOSE/ A Walk Through Art History” from April 30 to May 18, 2013. There will be a reception on Thursday May 2, 2013 6-8pm.  Sills has been a featured artist in the book “100 New York Painters” and will be interviewed by the author, Cynthia Dantzic on Saturday, May 11th at 4pm.   On the last day of the exhibition, Saturday May 18th, there will be a closing reception from 4-6pm.  Gallery hours are Tuesday- Saturdays 12-6pm.

With her life-size freestanding painted 2-D sculptures, the artist Susan Sills whimsically restructures and re-constructs art history. Enlarged to life size, they are cut out of birch plywood and skillfully painted in oils in the style of each Old Master. Using a jigsaw, she releases familiar images from the confinement of the frame and thrusts them into real space to confront the contemporary viewer.

Continuing a project she started 20 years ago, Sills’ sculptures explore the magic of encountering familiar personages from Art History in a totally new context, often putting them together in combinations that tell a completely new story. This time however, the artist is not only adding new characters to the mix, but she is bringing them together in today’s world, juxtaposing them in their differing times and histories with an insouciant disregard for ordinary reality.

“Sills takes us on a journey through art history with wit and humor.” Pensacola Museum of Art, 2004.“… her groupings provide fresh insights and evoke quiet chuckles as she gently challenges our established beliefs about art history.” Vernita Nemec, 2005.  “As with all of Sills’ delightful post-Pop takes of familiar figures from art history, encountering them out of context, blown up to … life-size, is like spotting one’s favorite movie stars on the street. They look just as good in person!” Ed McCormack, Gallery and Studio, 2003.

Ms. Sills has had 16 Solo shows, has shown in Tokyo 6 times, and has been in group shows too numerous to mention. Her work is included in the Sylvia Sleigh Collection of Women Artists at Rowan University. She has had solo exhibitions at the Queens College Art Center and Pensacola Museum of Art which sponsored an educational experience for 4500 children and their teachers. Her 2-D sculptures have also been used as a set for a dance performance at the Whitney Museum.

We look forward to your joining us at this exciting new exhibit at Viridian Artists.

For further information please contact the gallery at 212-414-4040 or  viridianartistsinc@gmail.com  orview our website: viridianartists.com

VIRGINIA EVANS SMIT: “F” IS FOR FLOWERS, FISH AND FRAGMENTS “

VIRGINIA EVANS SMIT

  “F” IS FOR FLOWERS, FISH AND FRAGMENTS “

 April 9 – April 27, 2013
Reception, Saturday, April 13, 4 – 6 pm.

Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present a solo exhibition of prints of all sorts by the artist VIRGINIA EVANS SMIT. The exhibit will continue from April 9 – April 27, 2013 with a reception, Saturday, April 13, 4 – 6 pm.

The “F” word usually brings to mind a host of either negative or at the very least controversial associations, but in the case of the art in this exhibit, Virginia Evans Smit is instead showing us the beautiful and the flamboyant of the floral and aquatic side of nature, then playing with it ingeniously. Smit is an artist of diverse skills & interests. Foremost in her artistic explorations are the varieties of printmaking and the artist expands the media to its fullest. In this group of works she is presenting a wide range of silk screen, monoprinting, Chine colle – a unique technique in printmaking in which the image is transferred to a surface that is recollaged in the printing process- solar etchings and digital prints that echo and evoke variations on all the above.

She loves color so the floral life in Barbados, where she spends her winters, accounts for much of the subject matter in this exhibition. In her last exhibition at Viridian in 2007, the focus of the work was the blooming beauty of the Caribbean plant life residing in her garden and in 2003, the images were remembrance of travels in Japan and across the U.S. In this current exhibit, she pushes her skills to encompass a wide range of experimental approaches to both her printmaking techniques and her subject matter.

The artist has the distinction of being the first African American female to receive a Masters of Arts degree from the University of Pennsylvania where she received The Thornton Oakly Creative Achievement Award. She has been associated with Viridian Artists since 1978. Over that time period she has had more than fifteen solo exhibitions at Farleigh Dickenson and Columbia University’s Teacher’s College, Mehu Gallery in Manhattan, the James E Lewis Museum at Morgan State University, the Barbados Museum and Historical Society and others. Her work is in many collections including General Foods, the Hewitt Collection of African American Art, the Library of Congress, The Fuba Collection in Johannesburg South Africa, Colgate Palmolive and many other private and public collections in the U.S. and abroad.

“Wally Gilbert: New Black and White Images”

“Wally Gilbert: New Black and White Images”
March 19th – April 6th, 2013
reception Saturday, March 23, 4-6
closing reception Saturday April 6, 4-6

Chelsea: Viridian Artists Inc. is pleased to present the exhibition “Wally Gilbert: New Black and White Images”. The show opens March 19th and continues through April 6th, 2013. In celebration, a reception will be held on Saturday, March 23rd, 4-6 pm and a closing reception will be held Saturday April 6th, 4-6PM.

Wally Gilbert’s latest works play with the effects of monochromatic light. These newworks range from images taken in his travels, such as the “Roof Tiles – Tuscany” and “Chimneys – Paris” as well at the series of Water Tower studies taken in New York City, to abstractions created by overlapping images in the computer.

A world renowned scientist, Gilbert explores the medium of photography zealously, working in the past primarily with color and focusing on a wide variety of subjects. In this exhibition however, he has omitted color entirely, instead translating all the images into black, white and shades of grey, focusing on the contrast of the forms and shapes, sometimes as pattern, sometimes as objects against a background. Chimneys, roofs, stairs and other architectural elements are most often the subject translated by Gilbert into artistic images enhanced digitally both creatively and scientifically.

The Artist states, “While most of these are photographic images, converted to a grayscale continuum, some of the images were further modified in the computer to alter and to rearrange the dark and light portions in extreme ways. This procedure produces effects akin to the process of solarization that was used with wet photography and creates novel, enhanced views of the world. The printing of these images directly onto aluminum metal emphasizes the contrast between light and dark and brings out the force of the whites and the blacks.”

We hope that you will be able to meet this outstanding artist and share his vision through seeing these incredibly fascinating artworks.