“The exhibit is titled ‘Shapes,’ but for me it was all about materials,” wrote juror Laura Roulet about The Art League’s annual sculpture exhibit. Continue reading A Preview of Our Annual Sculpture Exhibit
A Preview of Our Annual Sculpture Exhibit
Month: July 2013
Artist Opportunities: July 30, 2013
See below for information on upcoming exhibits and other announcements. You can click the banner above to view past opportunities posts. Good luck!
Arlington Arts Center space
Deadline: August 1, 2013 (Thursday). AAC invites Washington-area visual artists to apply for this prestigious six-year residency program, which supports artists by providing spacious and light-filled studios, subsidized rent, and a creative community of emerging artists working in diverse media. In addition to well-appointed spaces, studio artists enjoy tremendous exposure and the opportunity to exhibit their work biennially in AAC’s Wyatt Gallery. The available space is within our group studio, to be shared with two other artists. For more information, click here.
Inside The Art League’s Fiber Studio
In our quixotic quest to showcase all the cool things happening in our art classes, last week we visited The Art League’s fiber studio and Marilyn Harrington’s weaving class. Watch the weavers in action and see what they make in the video above. More on the fiber arts department is here.
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’Scapes Inspiration
This looks like a great exhibit opening today at the American Art Museum. Gallery members might want to check it out as they decide what to enter for ’Scapes next month and look for new ways to approach landscapes. (See the call to artists for ’Scapes here.)
“Landscapes in Passing” is open through January 20, 2014 at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
Artful Links: Summer Reading, Part 2
What with all the heat waves and thunderstorms, no one can blame you if your summer reading happens inside instead of on the beach. Here’s our second edition of arts-related things to read, watch and do:
- [article] Colorful stories: Allison Meier on Hyperallergic wrote a series of posts on historical art materials: pigments, pigments part 2, and paper. Painters and art historians will love reading about paints that are hard or impossible to find today because they’re “incredibly poisonous, expensive, or just involving way too many snails.”
- For a long-form read on the subject of color, check out the comments section of that first Hyperallergic article. Several readers made suggestions for nonfiction books about color, such as Bright Earth: Art and the Invention of Color by Philip Ball. Continue reading Artful Links: Summer Reading, Part 2
The 2013/14 School Catalog is Here!
Click above to check out our classes for the next year! Registration starts August 5 and fall classes start September 16; stay tuned for the searchable online class listings and the print copies of the catalog.
Artist Opportunities: July 23, 2013
See below for details on upcoming exhibits and other announcements. You can click the banner above to see past opportunities posts. Good luck!
Call for photo portfolios
Deadline: July 28, 2013. (Late entry through August 4.) FotoDC’s Uncover/Discover will once again spotlight regional photographers’ work that displays a focused and consistent vision. Photographers from DC / MD / VA can enter portfolios into one of two categories or both, Fine Art or Photojournalism. For more information and to enter, click here.
Art History at the Target Gallery: Carol Dupre on “Optical Studies”
Currently on view at the Target Gallery here in the Torpedo Factory, Ruth Gowell’s “Optical Studies” joins glass with fiber, straight lines with bent, and organization with distortion.
Although Gowell’s pieces are made with woven fiber and kiln-formed glass — not paint and canvas — for Art League instructor Carol Dupre, the strong sense of pattern and culture brought to mind one of this area’s most famous art movements: the Washington Color School. Continue reading Art History at the Target Gallery: Carol Dupre on “Optical Studies”
Meet The Art League Store Staff: Chris Cardellino
We’re on a mission to spread the word about The Art League Store — a brick-and-mortar art supply store hidden in a second floor corner of the Torpedo Factory — by introducing its staff of working artists here on our blog. Last time, we interviewed Cindy Richmond. This time we talked to long-time Art Leaguer Chris Cardellino, who took her first Art League class in 1985 and joined the Gallery the next year. We asked Chris to tell us what makes The Art League Store special. Continue reading Meet The Art League Store Staff: Chris Cardellino
Q&A with Award Winner Blair Jackson
Amid the wealth of abstraction in our July All-Media Exhibit, juror Jerry Coulter selected one piece for best in show: a photograph masquerading as a painting. The photo, Clyfford Still’s Latch by Blair Jackson, was awarded the Larry Kirstein Award for best in show. Coulter said of the piece: “This photograph is a complete statement. The composition has a totality of subtlety. Every part contributes to the whole. The photographic surface is so slick, yet the impact is so textural.”
Complete statement or no, we asked Blair to tell us more about her photography and her drawing (she is President of the Metropolitan Washington Colored Pencil Society). Read our Q&A, below, and see the exhibit through August 5!
When and where was the photo taken? What caught your attention about the latch?
Blair Jackson: The photo was taken in Georgia in April 2012. It was in the rear of a shop of new and used furniture, leading out to an alley. I browsed around the shop, but the only thing that caught my eye was that door and latch. I fixated on the scene immediately.
What brought Clyfford Still to mind? Did that happen when you took the photo or looking at it later?
The name Clyfford Still’s Latch came about because the image looked to have been created with thick layers of paint applied with a palette knife, which was, of course, the artists’ signature style. It reminded me of a Clyfford Still color field painting from the 1940’s-60’s. Continue reading Q&A with Award Winner Blair Jackson
Sarah Dale: Accepting Rejection as a Challenge
Interested in guest blogging for The Art League? Click here to learn more.
Sarah Dale is an emerging Alexandria artist who uses upcycled materials to experiment with color and visual elements. Her 3D pieces bridge the gap from painting to sculpture where she focuses on trying to find her own voice using color and form. Learn more on her website or by following her on Twitter.
My first official rejection letter was an accolade — it marked the climax of a hard year spent launching my fine art practice. I felt so strongly about it that I posted my rejection letter on my blog for the world to see.
When I began working as a fine artist, I was an art director at an advertising agency by day, working on nights and weekends to reawaken the fine artist in me that had been tucked away. I had to start somewhere so I started with a blog. If I was serious about my journey I needed accountability. Together with my family I began Yates Family Artisans. Posting on the blog every week required me to consistently pursue my art — if I didn’t, what would I write about that week? Continue reading Sarah Dale: Accepting Rejection as a Challenge
Artist Opportunities: July 16, 2013
See below for info on upcoming shows and exhibits. In this week’s post: Artomatic@Frederick, Crafty Bastards, and more! You can click the banner above to view past opportunities posts. Good luck!
Landscapes
Deadline: July 17, 2013. On September 2, Capitol Arts Network will open “The Land”, a juried gallery exhibition featuring landscapes and plein air painting of the mid-Atlantic region. This area is home to amazing ecological diversity that is celebrated and captured by talented artists who recognize beauty when they see it. Photography, painting, and mixed media will be considered. For more information and to enter, click here. Continue reading Artist Opportunities: July 16, 2013
Partners in Purpose: The Art League & The Seaport Foundation
One rainy day in March 2011, The Art League approached the Alexandria Seaport Foundation with an idea. Now, this wasn’t the first time the League and Seaport Foundation had worked together — we’ve had great success through the years placing talented seaport program participants in art classes through The Art League’s Geri Gordon Scholarship Program.
This idea would take our relationship in a new direction: creative problem-solving!
The problem: The Art League needed good quality classroom easels built to our specifications.
The solution: The Art League would employ the Seaport Foundation’s carpentry skills and talents to produce our easel fleet and, thereby, serve our students while helping another worthy mission.
Through this ongoing creative partnership, the League works with SPF to design custom equipment and furniture to meet the challenging needs of our organization. The Art League pays the Seaport Foundation to build equipment and the project allows for seaport participant skill-training as well as funding the programs and mission of the Foundation. Another creative win-win for Alexandria!
This idea blossomed into an ongoing production partnership for easels, sculpture stands, and our latest endeavor: the new store counter. To find out more about how you can help support this project and our other outreach programs, click here. Continue reading Partners in Purpose: The Art League & The Seaport Foundation
Drawing From Life in Our Open Studio Sessions
Have you heard about our Open-Life Drawing Sessions? Our monitored open studios are a way for artists of all levels to work from a model, using their own media, in a quiet, focused environment. (For an idea of what a typical open studio is like, read our blog post, “A Visit to the Open-Life Class.”)
Five-week sessions are held twice a term on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, for a tuition of only $65, or $55 for the shorter Friday session. Students are free to work on what they like during the poses — Wednesday’s open studio is for long poses, while the others are shorter.
The next three sessions this summer start Monday, July 29, Wednesday, July 31, and Friday, August 2. Current Art League students, members, and benefactors may also drop in for a $20 fee. (Sessions require a set enrollment, so registration is encouraged over dropping in.) Click here for the full schedule of open-life drawing sessions.
What’s New at Summer Art Camp
We’re four weeks into Summer Art Camp at The Art League, with six weeks still to come and open for registration! Whether they’ve been before or it’s their first time, art campers ages five and up and budding teenage artists can find fun new activities at our day camps and workshops scheduled weekly throughout July and August.
New this summer: a Jewelry Workshop for Teens taught by Whitney Staiger, where teens will make their own sterling silver ring, and a Photo Camp for 8- to 11-year-olds — covering things like the darkroom and pinhole photography — previously only available for teenagers. See below for the full list of this summer’s upcoming camps and teen workshops: Continue reading What’s New at Summer Art Camp
Artist Opportunities: July 9, 2013
See below for info on exhibits and studio space. You can view past opportunities posts by clicking the banner above. Good luck!
Shapes at The Art League
Deadline: July 12, 2013. Enter The Art League’s annual sculpture exhibit by this Friday at 6:00 pm! “Shapes” is digital entry only. To download the prospectus and entry form, visit the exhibit page here.
artdc Gallery
Deadline: July 24, 2013. The artdc Gallery in Hyattsville, MD has issued a call for art that is: interactive, kinetic, performance, multimedia, sculpture, graffiti, digital media, mixed media and more. For more information and to apply, click here.
Arlington Arts Center studio space Continue reading Artist Opportunities: July 9, 2013
Join a Summer Art Class!
It’s never too late to take that art class you’ve been eyeing, and this summer is the perfect time to do it!
The Art League’s summer classes are going on now, and you can join a class in session at a prorated fee by contacting the School (703-683-2323). There are also a number of classes and workshops still to come, including classes starting this week in painting and sculpture: Continue reading Join a Summer Art Class!
Opening Friday: “Fantasy of the Real”
“Fantasy of the Real”
Paintings by Jennifer Brewer Stone
July 5–August 5, 2013
The vibrant, tropical paintings pictured above will be yours to discover tomorrow, July 5, when “Fantasy of the Real” opens in The Art League Gallery. The exhibit of oil paintings by Jennifer Brewer Stone will have an opening reception next Thursday, July 11, at 6:30 pm, and will be up through August 5.
Stay tuned for an upcoming video with the artist!
Reminder: The Art League is Closed July 4
The Torpedo Factory and The Art League will be closed tomorrow, Thursday, July 4 in observance of Independence Day. Classes and Art Camps will not meet and the Gallery will be closed. Enjoy the holiday, and come visit Friday for the first day of “Fantasy of the Real”!
Artist Opportunities: July 2, 2013
See below for upcoming exhibits to enter, studio spaces available to rent, and other announcements. You can click the banner above to view past opportunities posts. Good luck!
Shapes at The Art League
Deadline: July 12, 2013. Time is running out to enter The Art League’s annual sculpture exhibit! “Shapes” is digital entry only. To download the prospectus and entry form, visit the exhibit page here.