STANDARD FINE ART DIVISION
Click to see Interview with Charles by Barbara Lohbeck
Judge – Charles Iarrobino
Shapes and color have always fascinated me. For several years after finishing art school, abstract art was my focus, but I moved away from that when I began to appreciate that abstraction could be explored within the realm of representational work. For example, I consider abstraction to be an intrinsic element of good composition. An awareness of abstraction also comes into play during the painting process, helping to see our everyday world not in terms of identifying one object after another, but rather as an intriguing array of colors and shapes, lights and darks.
Following many years of painting New Mexican landscapes and my Santa Fe neighborhood, visits to France and Italy have led to paintings of street scenes and cafés, evidence of a growing fascination with human interaction, personal space and body language as well as a continuing appreciation of interior space and exterior architecture.
Living in New Mexico has provided something of a “continuing education experience” owing to the lessons taught daily not only by the radiant light but through the cross-pollinating conversations regarding technique and aesthetics that are inevitable in an area teeming with painters. Influenced early on by the Impressionists, I later found inspiration (as have so many others) in the masterworks of John Singer Sargent, Joaquin Sorolla and Anders Zorn. I am greatly indebted to 20th century masters Henri Matisse and Richard Diebenkorn as well as contemporary luminaries such as Quang Ho, Dan McCaw, Jon Redmond, Terry Miura and Ben Aronson – and way too many others to list.
Raised in the suburbs of Washington DC, Charles studied painting and printmaking at Virginia Commonwealth University and Syracuse University, graduating with a BFA in Painting and Printmaking. A signature member of Oil Painters of America and the American Impressionist Society, he has had numerous one-man shows on the East Coast as well as in his adopted state of New Mexico.
Juror – Frank Fuchs
A native of the Pacific Northwest, Frank spent his childhood playing in orchards and camping with his family in the Cascade Mountains and on the shores of the Pacific Ocean. After touring Europe and North Africa, Frank married a New Mexican and moved to Albuquerque to study architecture and art at the University of New Mexico. A registered architect, he has worked throughout the United States and China.
Frank is equally at home with watercolors and oils. His landscapes, still-lifes and portraits reflect his love of the places and people where he has lived and traveled. His paintings are in private collections throughout the western US and have been in many juried shows including the Western Federation of Watercolor Societies, New Mexico Watercolor Society, Masterworks, New Mexico State Fair, and the Los Alamos Art Center.
Juror – Bill Gallen
Growing up along the shores of Lake Michigan and wandering the woods and fields of his native Wisconsin gave Bill Gallen an early appreciation for the wonders of the natural world. Gallen graduated from the University of Wisconsin having studied German and History and spent a year abroad at the University of Freiburg in Germany. Plans to pursue an academic career gave way when he moved to Colorado with his brother, following the call of a boyhood interest in the Rocky Mountains. Nurturing a lifelong interest in art, Gallen studied painting and drawing in his free time. A fortuitous encounter with the landscape painter David Ballew lead him to a lineage of teachers that remain lifelong mentors, principally Michael J. Lynch and Ned Jacob.
Gallen currently resides in Santa Fe.
Juror – Rebecca Nolda
Following threads of ideas and influenced by what I read, think about, and see in the environment, my recent and current series, Mapping the Strata and Parallel Geographies, resulted from a mish-mash of interests: mapping, geological formations, symbology, and psychogeography. I am as influenced by what I observe as by the content I find in researching published materials. Both stimulate new work for me. I love to explore the subtle relationships between what we see and what we imagine. The interpretation of that often appears as the disguised reflection of something that has happened.—a suggestion of a story, a hint at the elapse of time, a history of occurrences and events.
My background is an MA in studio art and MS in instructional design for online learning, 25 years in graphic design and media development for a major corporation, and for the past 12 years, I have been a practicing full-time artist. I am a member of the New Mexico Women in the Arts, the New Mexico Art League, the New Mexico Museum Foundation, the Albuquerque Museum, and the Society of Layerists in Multi-Media and a signature member of both the New Mexico Watercolor Society and the National Collage Society. Participating in organizations is, for me, a great way to share interests and dialogue in a diverse community.
MINIATURE/SMALL FINE ART DIVISION
Judge – Filomeno Martinez
Filomeno is a native New Mexican artist who has been practicing and perfecting his art for over 50 years. He is basically a self taught artist who has been inspired by many people in the art world to help create a style that is all his own.
As an award winning artist, he has shown his pastel, colored pencil and even crayon drawings in Taos, Santa Fe and Albuquerque. Currently his work can be seen at the Spanish Mercantile in Old Town as well in state and county buildings in the Albuquerque area.
In miniature works he will be looking for the creative use of space in a small area that includes depth, scale and proportion as well as detail that can make a miniature drawing seem much bigger than one would think.
Juror – Rex Barron
Even in a digital age of complete data and visual information overload, some of us still stand, crude drawing tool in hand, and try to make meaning by making marks. I grew up fascinated by American animation. Hanna-Barbera, Disney, Walter Lantz, the UPA studios, and brilliantly drawn television commercials were a large part of my childhood inspiration. I spent many hours copying the Flintstones and various comic book characters along with Old Master drawings
The Art Center College of Design’s curriculum in the 1970s still included a heavy dose of actual drawing, often from the model. To this day, I feel it is so important to have good drawing basics. Period. It will add something vital, even when working with computers.
I did enjoy the post-pop work like Claus Oldenberg. It was fun. It was still concerned with craft. And it delighted in illusion. Some of my blowups of found objects painted in a very compressed but illusionistic space go back to those classes. That shallow and well-crated space is a fundamental tool in the work of many American painters, from John Sloan, to the WPA artists, to figurative artists Alan Feltus and George Tooker.
Ultimately, eleven years of working in the animation studios of Los Angeles and later illustrating seven children’s picture books for G.P.Putnam’s Sons, along with decades of doing my own work have led me to this belief: The true challenge for a representational figurative painter is to use the visual tools one has absorbed to come up with a composition that will function as a visual poem. That is, a distillation of aspects of one’s own time that touches on both the human and the eternal, and that compels sustained viewer interest. It’s a challenge that I have come close to meeting only a few times.
Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight
Juror – Pamela Hostetler
I am a watercolorist from Albuquerque. I have studied with Bob Cox, Dorothy Vorhees and Bud Edmondson. I have taken many workshops with excellent instructors.
I am a signature member of the New Mexico Watercolor Society and am currently a member of the Artist Studio in Hoffmantown Center.
I am honored to be a juror for the miniatures. I love miniature paintings and have been entering this show for many years. The first time I saw miniatures was in Barbara’s gallery over 25 years ago and I was hooked! I think they say a lot in a small space in an amazing way.
Juror – Tricia Love
Tricia began her formal art education in 1969 in commercial art, illustration and design. In 1974 she and her family moved to Mainz, West Germany. She enrolled at Herzfeld-Wiesbaden School of Fine Art. Her paintings and drawings moved in a new direction as she studied the classical approach to fine art. Returning to the states in 1977 Tricia began teaching art to children and adults. In 1994 she graduated cum laude from the University of New Mexico with a BFA degree.
Tricia’s detailed drawings and colorful watercolors have been juried into many art shows and exhibitions and have won numerous awards. Many of her drawings and paintings are available as Giclee prints.
https://jerryandtricialove.com
Preening Time – Miniature