Beat the heat by visiting museums and galleries

Rhode Island Rocks  5"x7" acrylic - on view at the Wickford Art Assocition Gallery

This summer the southern New England weather has been fierce! Between the heat and humidity, we've been all melty here. So it's a great time for visiting the beach, and finding ways to escape the heat. You can do both by taking a road trip to Wickford, RI to see North Kingston town beach, and check out the Wickford Art Association right next door. My acrylic painting Rhode Island Rocks was accepted into their current exhibition Art of the Ocean State.

Exhibition info:

• Wickford Art Association Gallery - 36 Beach Street, Wickford, RI 
• July 25th - August 9th
• Tuesday - Saturday 11-3, Sunday 12-3

Warwick Museum of Art

Another great venue to visit for free air conditioning is the Warwick Museum of Art in Apponaug, RI. The current show Life in the Round - Remembering the Warwick Musical Theatre is concluding today, so if you haven't seen in yet, I urge you to check it out ASAP! The exhibit features a documentary film and loads of memorabilia from the theater.

In My Garden  16"x20"  mixed-media encaustic - on view at the Warwick Museum of Art

The upcoming exhibit at the Warwick Museum of Art is The Elements, on display August 2nd through the 28th, and features artwork depicting earth, air, fire and water. My mixed-media encaustic work In My Garden will be included in the show. This is the first large-format painting I've tried with the encaustic, so I'm glad it made it into the show. Please come check it out and support the WMOA!

Exhibition info:

• Warwick Museum of Art - 3259 Post Road, Warwick, RI 
• August 3rd - August 31st
• Tues, Wed, Fri 12-4
• Thur 4-8
• Sat 10-2 

Stay cool out there folks!

Teaching opportunities ahead!

So things have been a bit busy here in the studio. I took a brief hiatus from blogging as I was working on syllabi for several upcoming teaching opportunities. Just last week I completed my first children's class, "Bug Week" at the Warwick Museum of Art for their summer art camp. I have assisted with some classes at the museum, and teaching Bug Week was both challenging and fun. The students learned about various bugs and drew out their anatomy, were very creative with the art projects, and even had a visitor during one class - a large (and noisy) beetle! Luckily we were able to catch our guest and release him gently outside. But it was a good opportunity to see and review what we learned about beetle anatomy. 

Opening Lace  5"x5" pastel

This fall I will be back at WMOA to teach a four-week pastel series for adults in September, on Thursday nights. This series will focus on floral paintings, using different techniques from light pastel drawing, layered pastel painting, and even pastel over underpaintings. If you are interested in taking the pastel class (Sept 1st - 22nd, please feel free to contact Patty Martucci for more information.

examples of drawing styles from Flash

I also am scheduled to teach a ten-week class "From Hand to Screen: Drawing with Adobe Flash" coming this September at the Worcester Art Museum. I've been a multimedia designer and animator for years (more than I'd care to admit) and Flash is my program of choice. I use a Wacom tablet to sketch and often draw right in the software. For this class, students will learn about the drawing tools in Flash, and how to create graphics, illustrations, fine art and animation in different styles. More information is online for my class, and online registration is available.

My acrylic painting featured on Zibbet!

Bowl of Lilacs  5"x7" acrylic

Here's a nice little Monday morning perk! Zibbet has included my acrylic painting "Bowl of Lilacs" in their current Fantastic Five collection. Please check it out!

Fantastic Five: Make Mine Purple