"Art is the stored honey of the human soul, gathered on wings of misery and travail."

Theodore Dreiser"

"There's no retirement for an artist, it's your way of living so there's no end to it."

Henry Moore

"One can have no smaller or greater mastery than mastery of oneself."

Leonardo da Vinci

about the results of "Rediscovery of Wonder" competition

Lark (Larisa Pilinsky): Is there anything specifically that you can mention about this particular show? I personally noticed a big difference in scores between winners and the rest of the runners-up.
Peter Frank: This means that the winners’ nominations were easy to agree upon.

Lark: But is there something else that makes this show different from the other ones? For example two of our first-place winners are working in a realistic figurative style, which is pretty unusual for our gallery; it usually tends more to modernistic styles.
Peter: Simply put, no matter what their style, the winners were stronger, more skillful, less decorative, and/or more expressive.

Lark: Let’s start with one of the first place winners – Dan Pyle. Why have you chosen him?
Peter: I’ve chosen him for his skillful precision and his ability to render objects in some sort of space. He renders his objects in a strange way, but not surrealistically strange. From one angle the objects seem very familiar, but Pyle renders them so that they dissociate from their reality.

Lark: I also like the sense of humor that Dan applies to his art works. For example, in Unbalanced Diet.  But let’s move to our other First place winner – Erick Pedersen.
Peter: Pedersen’s stylizations are more painterly, although, his characters still have a strong sense of presence to them. He does not individuate his subjects to the point of their being portraits. But they come close to portraiture. They’re more than just models. They hover between model and portrait. Those figures have a mystery about them, about who they are and what is happening to them. Their seeming passivity is misleading. You feel some drama behind it.

Lark: Does Erick’s style help him make all of this happen in his art?
Peter: His method is itself quite stylized. And has influences from fin de siècle central Europe such as Klimt and Kupka.

Lark: Okay. Now about the Second Place winner – Sam Senack. She is more about childlike wonder than the theme of our competition might be.
Peter: Right. I think her subjects, figures or animals play their roles in the story she creates in her assemblages. I like her figures and animal sculptures – they are quite fanciful. But it is her imaginative use of light in the compositions that attracted my attention. And she actually animates her subjects – boots and gloves – with light.

Lark: Let’s proceed to the Third Place winner – Michael Chomick.
Peter: He is an assemblagist. I appreciate his heraldic compositions, which are very amusing – all these little toys and figures placed in architectural constructions in a neo-classical style.

Lark: Is it also his sense of humor that attracted you to his works?
Peter; Yes, although this aspect of his work is secondary for me. I most appreciate his ability to put things together, how he puts all these very different objects into harmonious compositions.

Lark: The next runner-up who was very close to the winners also does assemblages – Paul Baker.
Peter; Although Baker has a different kind of sensibility, but his skills and strengths are similar. He has that ability to find objects and put them together in a surprising and clever way... I should say poetic and clever. He proposes situations that integrate a sense of mystery. For example, he uses a regular dollhouse in different perspectives and in different contexts.

Lark: Next Artist is Kate Barrengos.
Peter: The shared factor between Paul Baker’s art and Kate Barrengos’ is that they both use common materials and objects in mysterious landscapes, which give their artworks a sense of ambiguity. Kate paints children’s toy blocks as constructing famous architectural buildings such as the Greek Pantheon and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater. Besides it being a clever idea, it’s well done. It’s lucidly painted and it’s visually rhythmic. She displays a good use of tonality. It’s philosophically interesting because it proposes microcosm and macrocosm. And it proposes an architectural structure in real space as oppose to flat space – the surface of a canvas. That gives her artworks a kind of third dimension.

Lark: Let’s talk about Tracy Harnish. What kind of style does her art belong to?
Peter: Her art is psychedelic and it also derives from animation.

Lark: It’s almost on the edge of decorative, but there is something that separates her work from other artists working in this style. It also reminds me a little bit of Gorky.
Peter: To a certain extent. She sets up a narrative and works with it. That creates the sense of ambiguity in space and meaning. She also displays a good application of color and a certain sense of volume, to the point that the two qualities speak to each other.

Lark:Let’s proceed too Roya Adjory. She has different series of works. But jurors judged these, which are, as far as I know, small scale. Does it matter?
Peter: It does not matter. What matters is how she expresses herself. I like her play with subtle tonalities, distinct colors and spaces.

Lark: Does this kind of art also belong to the abstract expressionist style? Would you say that she also uses biological themes?
Peter: Pretty much so. But the biological theme is not as pronounced as in Tracy Harnish’s work. Adjory’s works also have a foggy feel to them, which I like a lot. It’s almost the same colors that Harnish uses, but with a more subtle transition from one tonality to another.

Lark: One artist’s colors are very bright, while the other’s are very subtle. So, what is that that speaks to you? Is it talent?
Peter: It’s what they do with what they have. It’s how they do what they do with what they have. It’s what they choose to have in their work and how they work with it.

Lark: To clarify: Roya could use a bright palette but she chooses to work with foggy colors and does it well.
Peter: Right.

Lark: Let’s proceed to Jenik Cook.
Peter: In her paintings Cook uses active colors, lines and forms, and as a result her compositions do not sit still.

Lark: Jenik is from the Jackson Pollock generation, and as we know he had a lot of followers. What is special about Jenik’s art? What does separate her from others?
Peter: Her compositions are quite distinctive for the way she gets the things in them to move.

Lark: I personally like that some of her abstract works move almost to the figurative…. One more of our Honorable Mentions, Sallie-Anne Swift, seems to belong also to the abstract expressionist style, right?
Peter: Yes, although her compositions tend to be more static. They are harmonious and very well balanced.

Lark: And the last one in our Honorary Mention list is Marlene Struss.
Peter: She puts colored areas into motion and breaks them up. The viewer has the feeling that something was put on hold. Her colors are pretty settled. This is collage. And the fact that it’s composed digitally, not materially on the paper surface, is significant, not because she uses different techniques, but because such different techniques provide a different angle on surface, edge and color.

Lark: And, again, there lots of digital collagists. What attracts you as a critic to her art?
Peter: In all cases what attracts me is the visual presence. We are not looking at the real thing. So the presence has to jump out of the image.

The Color That Wasn’t a Color

www.artnews.com

Of all the colors artists have had at their command throughout the ages, none has endured more reversals of fortune than black. Indeed, in his book Black: The History of a Color, published by Princeton University Press, historian Michel Pastoureau points out that for a few centuries after Isaac Newton’s discovery of the spectrum, around 1665, “black and white were considered and experienced as ‘noncolors.’”

Beginning with the earliest known cave paintings, Pastoureau charts the color’s passage through the realms of art, fashion, and society, noting that in ancient times black was associated with caverns and underground spaces, fearful places that nevertheless had their own sacred energy. In Egypt, black assured the safe passage of the deceased to the beyond and thus was the preferred color for divinities linked to death. By the early Middle Ages, in Europe, black had been “demonized,” assigned to harbingers of bad fortune and symbols of evil like the devil. Outcasts were clothed in black, and black cats and crows first acquired their reputation as ill omens. And, of course, there was the Black Death.

Meanwhile, black’s rehabilitation as a color worthy of esteem had begun in the Romanesque period, when it was the choice for robes in certain monastic orders and it had equal status in coats of arms with the five other colors that would form the basis of Western art for centuries to come: red, blue, yellow, green, and white. The black knight, later the bad guy in books and movies, was at first a prominent hero—Tristan, Lancelot, and Gawain—“who wanted to keep his identity secret while concealing himself in this color,” Pastoureau writes.

But black really came into its own with the Reformation, whose leaders and artists led a full-fledged revolt against the pomp and display of the Catholic Church. Martin Luther is generally depicted in the most sober of blacks, while the era’s painters began to favor tenebrous colors in even their most dramatic compositions. Rembrandt, notes the author, “often practices a kind of color asceticism, relying on dark tones, restrained and limited in number . . . to give precedence to the powerful effects of light.”

Closer to our own century, black was a popular choice for Romantic and Pre-Raphaelite painters and a potent means of expression for modernists like Piet Mondrian and Pierre Soulages. (Curiously, Pastoureau does not mention Americans such as Franz Kline or Louise Nevelson, who used black so forcefully.) Today, black has become something of a cliché, too often deployed by fashion designers and goth teenagers. And for the first time in history, according to Pastoureau, polls place black “in the middle of the gamut” of the six major hues. Not as popular as blue, nor as disliked as yellow, it is simply a “color like all the others.”

Copyright 2011, ARTnews LLC, 48 West 38th St 9th FL NY NY 10018. All rights reserved.

LACMA presents first survey of women surrealists in North America

Next January, LACMA will present In Wonderland: The Surrealist Adventures of Women Artists in Mexico and the United States. Co-organized by LACMA and the Museo de Arte Moderno (MAM) in Mexico City, In Wonderland is the first large-scale international survey of women surrealist artists in North America. Past surveys of surrealism have either largely excluded female artists or minimized their contributions. This landmark exhibition highlights the significant role of women surrealists who were active in these two countries, and the effects of geography and gender on the movement. Spanning more than four decades, In Wonderland features approximately 175 works by forty-seven extraordinary artists, including Frida Kahlo, Lee Miller, Leonora Carrington, Remedios Varo, Dorothea Tanning, Louise Bourgeois, and more.

For more details, please visit the following link or our online press room (lacma.org/about/press) to download the full press release: In Wonderland press release

We also have a great line-up of programs in December, including a Latin American art symposium (December 2–4); an LA print making and publishing fair (December 10); special Buddhist ceremony to celebrate our recently restored Korean Buddhist painting (December 11), and more. View the full listing here or visit us online for the most up-to-date information. We hope you have a wonderful holiday season ahead!

CHRISTINE CHOI

COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER

LOS ANGELES COUNTY MUSEUM OF ART

on our Facebook page

Dear friends and art lovers!
We started publishing on our Facebook page 
our favourite quotes of famous artists and they are very popular!
So we received the request to publish them also on our website.
Please feel free to put your comments and share your feelings on our
Facebook page (please click here)

Here is the first one:
"Art must be an expression of love or it is nothing." Marc Chagall

comment from our represented artist - Vered Galor:

Vered Galor 

http://www.VeredGalor.com

who won First and Second place in the American Art Award galleries competition in the Abstract Expressionism style.

Continued

"An artist is never ahead of his time but most people are far behind theirs."
Edgard Varese

"A good painting to me has always been like a friend. It keeps me company, comforts and inspires."  

Hedy Lamarr

A group of Larkgallery Online artists participated in a Master Class in Saint Petersburg, Russia, June 27 - July 3rd, 2011, just returned home and sent us very nice testimonials:

"Thank you for making this trip possible. The trip to St. Petersburg was fantastic. I had the best time of my life. When the Director of the Master Class Art Festival, Tamara, and her husband Azat picked me up at the airport at midnight, I knew it was going to be alright. By the time they took me to the charming Silver Age hotel, I was already warmed to place. Tamara and Azat, I came to feel, epitomized the generous and gracious spirit of St. Petersburg.

 
Their generosity went beyond the art supplies, such as canvases and paints given to us during the Master Class. They took us on the memorable excursions and invited us to dinners for the remaining time, even after the festival was over with the huge closing ceremony.
 
Thanks to their effort, we were able to visit the famous Hermitage Museum and Peterhof among others. Needless to say, these places were mindbogglingly fabulous and vast. Just amazing.
We also went to the Pavlovsk State Park to paint plein air and had the delicious picnic lunch of barbecue pork and cucumber salad. Afterward Tamara auctioned our paintings we made there, and mine was sold to a gallery owner, Jura who later invited me and Lisa to his studio/gallery.
 
Another unforgettable treat was an evening boat ride on Neva River. I will never forget the sight of the abundant food and drinks as I entered the boat. And everyone danced to the fast music  DJed by Boris, a fellow Russian artist. I said to myself, Russian people, young and old, could party.
 
My overall impression was that people of St. Petersburg were uncommonly kind and helpful. Everyone I asked for a direction, he or she would take time to show me the way, even by walking with me. One woman probably went more than a block, because I saw her turning around and crossing the street after helping me to the right place.
 
That niceness was also extended by the hotel employees (called administrators there). One of them, Olga, who spoke excellent English, had invited me to join other hotel guests to go out and watch the famous bridge opening. Unfortunately, that same night I was at the closing ceremony and dinner and couldn't get back to the hotel on time. But she scheduled another night just for me, so she and Tanya spent their night off, showing me around. I was humbled by their kindness. They made it all so enjoyable.
 
There was so much to see and learn in Russia. Meanwhile, I tried to learn Russian alphabets.
Finally, I got to produce and show a few of my artworks there. They are still on exhibit."
Young Summers

"We made it back from St. Petersburg! It is a beautiful city and we were treated very well. Thanks for all of your efforts."
Richard Jones

"Tamara, Azat and Masha are amazing. They just could not do enough for us. We all had a great time. Really really lovely people."
Lisa Bahouth

on the arttoartpalettejournal.com

“Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not.”  Ralph Waldo Emerson

Works of beauty

     To Felice Willat, photography is an invaluable tool in presenting the common denominator of beauty within a world too far divided.  Her travels have provided a closer view of our neighbors that inhabit seemingly strange places to most.  Felice has made it her life to capture the essence of beauty through the realism of countries foreign and uncomfortable to us, presenting a view that moves us closer to their lives.

     Willat began her interest in photography and far away lands in 1989 when she attended the Kumbh Mela in India.  Her tourist front quickly faded as she sat in a small boat, surrounded by a group of pilgrims, women and children, on the way to the sacred waters.  The small camera that kept her distance from the natives suddenly stopped working and she found herself face-to-face with strange people in a strange land.  Forcing herself to look around and mingle with the foreigners, Felice began to blend in with the sameness of a world that suddenly, was not that far divided. 

     Returning home, Felice couldn’t stop thinking about the people halfway across the world and studied her photos carefully, seeing the scenes in an entirely different life.  It was then that photography became her life.  Studying with Claire Steinberg on the elements of the design in photography, a discovery of how color, space, form and texture could portray feeling to lives that many have never known.  David Skernick was also a leading figure for Felice in the digital world of technology, one that she continues to work with today.

To read more click here

on the arttoartpalettejournal.com

Her works speak to all cultures

"Watching the Clouds" oil on canvas, 30" x 40"

     Artists seem to share a unique quality in seeing the world as one instead of categorizing people into hundreds of different languages, cultures and appearances. Elisse Pogofsky-Harris is one such artist that is fascinated by the sameness in religions, angels, Immaculate Conception and other areas of the world that thousands of people share.  Through still life and landscapes that present the beginning of a story, the viewer is left to complete the journey as seen in their own mind.  It doesn’t matter what your nationality is because Elisse’s work speaks to them all.

     Pogofsky-Harris was but a five-year-old child when her artistic senses entered her small mind with a trip to California, where nature filled her mind with mountains and surrounding mists and clouds that was picture perfect.  At age ten, she took this vivid scene and started to paint and has never stopped.  Later, Florence, Italy presented to Elisse the opportunity to drink up the culture, the food, the architecture and the Italian art, seeing similarities in the people and their beliefs, just like us.

     When you look at her work, you almost feel a hand come across your shoulder that says, “It’s okay to go there.”  Our thoughts and blinders attached by society have so engrained in us a sense of fear in choosing our own way and seeing through our own eyes that embracing a scene and running with it seems almost a sin.  Pogofsky-Harris brings the comfort to dare and dream, take an unknown path and create your own finish.

Read more here

Art, Music & Dance

Reception, Saturday, - May 14, 6 - 10 pm
at 216 The Promenade, Long Beach
Opening night in conjunction with the Long Beach Art Walk

Participating Artists: Armineh Teimourian, Sally-Anne Swift, Patricia Ferber, Roy Anthony Shabla, Randal Reel, David Oldrieve, William Emboden, William Haugse, Eva Montealegre, Lark, Sel Sarkin and Susanne Swanson-Bernard.

8:00 pm Live Music by SangomaBeat - Enjoy African Fusion Jazz with vocalist Pashyo Sarkin.

Experiential Painting by Eva Montealegre Eva will begin with a near-naked canvas with only its “under-painting” and create an experiential painting. This is the recipe she uses for all her paintings.   Eva’s organic spiritual connection is always present as a through-line in her ingenious artistic expression.  

Springing from the foundation of the artist’s personal experience there is a harmonious community with the Medicine Dance Members which will continue to take root. To this already potent recipe we will be adding the spice of the lively sounds of Sangomabeat. In this multi-dimensional creative environment Eva will paint. The combination of artist, paint, canvas & the alchemical potion of audience, dancers & musicians is a venue for connoisseurs of artistic ambience.

It will be a gumbo, a jambalaya of creative delicacy. Please come with an open heart & mind with no pre-conception but merely the willingness to discover what this might mean. If the flavor of the creative dish is right, audience members will be invited to participate in the movement. Don’t miss it!

*Theatrical Performance “Cavafy’s Caress”
Saturday, April 2nd, 2pm and 7 pm, 216 The Promenade, Long Beach, CA

Cavafy’s Caress is an intimate theatrical performance exploring the vibrant and passionate words and world of renowned Greek gay poet, Constantine P. Cavafy (1863-1933). The performance was created by and features Los Angeles based multimedia performing artist and writer, Jason Jenn. The show is approximately 1 hour in length and contains adult themes.

*Art and Music Reception at Artistic Voyage
Sunday, April 3, Gallery viewing 6.30 pm, Concert 7.30 pm at Messiah Lutheran Church in Yorba Linda,
4861 Liverpool Street, Yorba Linda, CA 92886

French chevalier Tony Clark and LGO curator Larisa Pilinsky will lead through the gallery exhibition starting at 6.30 pm. This is an extension of our Celebration of Equinox and features the works of several outstanding contemporary international and local artists. The chamber music concert Windy Voyage performes works from Ludwig van Beethoven and Francis Poulenc.  Musicians are Yana Reznik – piano, Janice Tipton – flute, Allan Vogel – oboe, Joshua Ranz – clarinet, Richard Beene - bassoon and Johanna Yarbrough - horn. You can buy tickets at artisticvoyage.org

Participating artists: Monika Steiner, William Emboden, J. Reto, Michelle Oppenheimer, Albert Vass, Ione Citrin, Shirley Finton, Stan Howard, Melanie Manos, Sallie-Anne Swift, Andrea Holte, Anne B Schwartz, Lark, Dan Pyle, William Haugse, Felice Willa, David Gardner, Ralf Willruth and Ray Klausen

*Art Reception „SOUND ART” - Marriage of Art and Music
Thursday April 7, 6 - 9 pm, coincides with San Pedro’s Art Walk, The Loft Galleries,
401 S. Mesa St., 2nd floor, San Pedro, CA 90731

“SOUND ART”  is the first in a series of brick-and-mortar exhibitions based on LarkGallery Online’s 2010 international competition "COLORS OF LIFE" which involved interactively matching art and music. The competing musicians and artists, including several artist-and-musician entrants, were fascinated by the resemblance and reflection between music and art. It’s why we say, “There’s Music in our Art and there is Art in our Music”

Program of the evening:

6:30 pm our overall Music Competition "Colors of life" winner, Recipient of the Certificate "Best in category classical modern opera and ballet composition" S. J. Pettersson will present his award wining music from  his recent works.

Originally from Sweden, S. J. Pettersson resides in Los Angeles where he teaches and composes music. An autodidact of sorts, he privately studied counterpoint, orchestration and orchestral scores by composers as diverse as Bach, Prokofiev, Weil and Michael Nyman eventually forging his own unique style – an anachronistic blend of 20th century minimalism with romanticism, classicism and jazz. Current project is a chamber opera based on a revisionist view of Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet projected to be finished in late spring 2011.

7:00 pm Kinsey Michal - recipient of Special Certificate of Recognition as non-classical vocalist and composer will sing a few songs from her concert program.
Kinsey Michal is a vibrant, emerging artist with a sincere desire to bless, inspire and entertain her audience.  Kinsey has a gift for getting to the heart of the people who surround her and communicating personal experiences with an honest voice. "Art contains a beautiful purpose to unify people through a common thought, feeling or experience.  Engaging in this process is the amazing part of being an artist."  - says  Kinsey Michal

7:30 pm Ensemble "Project Eranos" - recipient of certificate: Best in category "Classical Ensemble performance" will include in their program solos and duets  from Mozart, Rossini, Strauss and others.

Project ERANOS combines musical styles, eras and idioms with live instruments and inspired singing in one fluid, continuous presentation of classical, folk, jazz, music theater, opera, rock and world music. It is made up of like-minded young artists offering ideas and innovation that come together in exciting and unexpected ways. Established in June, 2009, by soprano Ann Gresham, the ensemble of classically-trained singers and instrumentalists has been presented on CD, in concert and in full production of their 2010 show, "Fitting In: The Immigrant Life" by Rio Hondo College in Whittier, California.

Participating artists include Art Venti, Sandra Cooper, Felice Willat, Elena Beresnjak, Amy Galaudet, Kaleeka Bond, Jolanta Badyna-Budny, Michael Chearney, Pat Rayman, Georganne Heller, Ruth Dutoit, Dasha Guilliam, Lark, Juan Rosenfeldt, Elisse Pogofsky-Harris, Narine Isajanian, Vered Galor, Sallie-Anne Swift, Armineh Teimourian, Annemarie Rawlinson, Rachael McCampbell

Live and recorded musicians include Artie Q, Parviz Azad, Elena Beresnjak, Alan Derian, Devin Galaudet, Burton Goldstein, Kinsey Michal, Kevin Nolan, Nyee Moses, S.J. Pettersson, Norman Sachs, Katherine Semple, Andrew Swift, Susan Thampi, Julia Torgovitskaya, Pamela Stein, Jeannette Koekkoek Rusty Wickell and Project ERANOS. 

*Sacre du Printemps - Art, Music & Dance Thursday April 9, 6 - 10 pm
Exihibition at 216 The Promenade, Long Beach
Opening night in conjunction with the Long Beach Art Walk

 Sacre du Printemps  is the Rite of Spring combining the visual and performing arts. This is the season to rejoice in all the arts and in our day to day lives. It is a new beginning and a rebirth of our world that has been in the dark, and now we are filled with happiness and wonder. We are celebrating with music from all genres, dance and art from all over the world.

Participating Artists: Roy Anthony Shabla, Randal Reel, David Oldrieve, William Emboden, William Haugse, J. Reto, Eva Montealegre, Lark, Sel Sarkin, Saule Piktys

8:00 pm Live Music by SangomaBeat - Enjoy Brazilian Bossa Novas and smooth Jazz Standards with vocalist Pashyo Sarkin accompanied by Rome on guitar, Marvin Bonds on saxophone and Joe Kohanski on bass. With their laid back melodies and exotic grooves they deliver the perfect entertainment for music and art lovers.

Experiental Painting by Eva Montealegre Eva will begin with a near-naked canvas with only its “under-painting” and create an experiental painting. This is the recipe she uses for all her paintings.   Eva’s organic spiritual connection is always present as a through-line in her ingenious artistic expression. Her studio, in Topanga, oversees a wild life conservancy, providing her with a view of the mountains of Santa Monica down to the ocean. 

Springing from the foundation of the artist’s personal experience there is a harmonious community with the Medicine Dance Members which will continue to take root. To this already potent recipe we will be adding the spice of the lively sounds of Sangomabeat. In this multi-dimensional creative environment Eva will paint. The combination of artist, paint, canvas & the alchemical potion of audience, dancers & musicians is a venue for connoisseurs of artistic ambience.

It will be a gumbo, a jambalaya of creative delicacy. Please come with an open heart & mind with no pre-conception but merely the willingness to discover what this might mean. If the flavor of the creative dish is right, audience members will be invited to participate in the movement. Don’t miss it!

. 

 

About the results of Music competition "Colors of Life"

We asked our main juror, Laurence Vittes, to share with us his thoughts about the results of "Marriage" of Art and Music in our on-line show "Colors of LIfe"

Parviz Azad Lower Upper Canyon 
Artwork chosen by musician: Upper Canyon by Felice Willat

Serious, abstract in a very genuine way, adhered to the contours of Willat's photograph in such a way as to emphasize and bring out its already striking dimensionality. The brilliance with which the solo violin opens the piece, evoking all the great predecessors of the genre, give way, with the entrance of piano and cello, to a wild ecstasy of short-lived intensity.

Catherine Semple Morning Glory 
Artwork chosen by musician: Light As Sound by Juan Rosenfeldt

It's so charming, using instruments that the Toy Story characters would have in their silly happy symphonies. Alone among the harps, chimes, bells, xylo and mellophones, flutes, a clarinet emerges from the instrumental sound as it had been given life by the other sounds. The picture itself is a series of brilliant radiant symmetries broken by color patterns corresponding to the player's fingers and the instrument's keys.

Elena Beresnjak Autumn Valse and Ragtimes 2 
Artwork chosen by musician: Chat"  & You and Me by Elena Beresnjak

Seems impossible to choose only one; together they are dynamite. The ordinary rhythms of popular song is caught in moments of fleeting emotional intensity; otherwise, it's total mindless mechanistic insanity as danced by Nijinsky. The art work is strikingly reminiscent of inuit drawings especially in the curvature of the lines and the highly individualistic use of color, both for accent and, less frequently, background.

Stig Pettersson Romeo and Juliet Prologue 
Artwork chosen by musician: Breeze Of Eternity by Lark

It is the ultimate love duet, the waltz between Romeo and Juliet in their only moments of physical contact, extremely detailed foreplay for intimacy that was denied them. Pettersson's music revolves around the dancing couple, reflecting each thought, each slight twinge of love and desire. Lark's serene landscape seen from inside the palace, tells of pastoral delights with no hints of the prison that they ultimately become trapped in. 

Alan Derian "Father and Son" 
Artwork chosen by musician: "Broken Earth" by Narine Isajanyan

Who could not like a song with this title, especially when the two voices, of father and son, are so deeply, affectionately and gently handled that they cannot help being reflected in the strange landscape on a satellite map in someone's life that the artist, Derian's wife has created. Even more, there is the composer's ability to create moments of indelible beauty that must surely paint the intimacy of his love for Narine. 

Jeannette Koekkoek Schubert Sonata in A major Andantino part 1
Artwork chosen by musician: Friends by Elisse Pogofsky-Harris

One of Schubert's most beautiful, sad melodies, played by the great Dutch pianist herself with the kind of tender, touching empathy with the innocent unreality and fantasy of wolves lying down with sheep which has been forever lost to us. The elements which make the painting so striking, the doglike pose by the sheep, the red landscape, the animals grazing in the fields, are mirrored in Schubert's parallel universe waltz.

Pamela Stein Stockhausen: Wassermann (Tierkreis) 
Artwork chosen by musician: Pray for best days by Yelena Kutuzova

Stockhausen's cycle following the signs of the Zodiac, originally written for a series of Swiss musical boxes and here sung by a soprano deep in emotional thought, continues to exert its charm due to the brevity of each piece, and the intrinsic fascination of hearing your astrological personality so clearly and yet so abstractly realized. The music creates a perfect foil for Kutuzova's vivid Klimt-like woodcuts brought to life by the demons that inspired them.

Project Eranos - Sous le dome epais- Delibes 
Artwork chosen by musicians: The Direction of Cranes by Rachael McCampbell

There is something undeniably charming about collegians taking on one of opera's greatest love duets. At first, it seems clearly intended for the couple of birds in the medium background of Rachel's painting peering skyward. However, McCampbell's exploitation of the eye's naivete leads to a complex, large space inhabited equally by nature and artifice. Deeply involving.

Julia Torgovitskaya - Zdes' Horosho by Rachmaninov
Artwork chosen by musician: Colors of Palouse at Sunset by Felice Willat

This is a well-known, much loved song that was better known in Russia than the piano concertos or the Paganini Rhapsody. It is sung with a kind of bright-eyed shining warmth that immediately draws you to the "there's no place like home" detailing of Willat's landscape. It is an affirmation of why music and art are so powerfully and expressively linked together, and it is a striking reminder of how subtly Willat transforms her photography into art masterpieces.

Norman Sachs - musical Beautiful
Artwork chosen by musician: Box Lady by Georganne Heller

Sachs, who has enriched the musical stage on both coasts and earned the love of one of the most exceptional women on any coasts, here performs a sad love song which is a perfect tribute to the woman Heller has created in her collage. It is a portrait that is true in a way that only collage can be, like a tattered cloak of colors, shapes and sounds inhabited by a face of perfect beauty.

Who recently won an art competition

with Contemporary Fine Art International and received this wonderful e-mail from CFAI:
"You are the February FEATURED artist on CFAI and you will be in our next year's calendar.
The judges adored your pears. EVERY judge placed it in first place 100 percent.  
First time we had all judges vote for one painting."

Jewish Women Recording, Reflecting, Revisioning the Torah

This midrashic  (interpretive) scroll has been based on the form and content of a traditional Torah scroll. 54 Jewish women artists from around the world are participating in this traveling exhibition.

Vered Galor, a LarkGallery Online artist, created a photographic collage about the Midgal Bavel, the Tower of Babel. She says: "The story about Migdal Bavel intrigued me with its complex messages about the importance of verbal communication and human cooperation in words and actions."

Read more at http://womenofthebook.org/artists/vered-galor/