Spring Storm
I was an artist from an early age, experimenting in drawing, charcoal, acrylic painting, and mixed media in grade school through high school. However, I largely put art on hold while I pursued a finance career. After retiring and moving to Colorado, I attended a soft pastels art class in February 2023 and rediscovered a passion for art. Art has become my “next act’ and I am exploring various mediums and subjects.
I am proud to have been accepted into numerous juried art shows and asked to donate pieces directly to charity fundraisers. I call my business Do Good Art since I donate 100% of the profits of all sales to charities that focus on issues like cancer, food insecurity, and homelessness. In so doing, my goal is to make the world a better place through art and giving.
So join me in Doing Good (through) Art.
My mission for my art is to Do Good (through) Art by creating inspiring art and by donating 100% of the net proceeds of all sales to charity. My current focus is supporting the American Cancer Association’s efforts to eliminate cancer, as this is a cause close to my family’s heart. I often take inspiration for my art from my travels, whether it be hiking in the mountains around my home, throughout the US, or across the globe. My pieces often include landscapes that highlight sunsets, clouds, and the interplay of light and shadows. That said, I have diverse collections including landscapes, sunsets, water (oceans, rivers, lakes), National Park-inspired works, birds, animals, and flowers. My primary medium is soft pastels, but I also do watercolors and colored pencil pieces.
Spring Stroll
Gayle Faulkner, with over 35 years of artistic exploration and creativity, stands as a seasoned watercolor, acrylic, and mural artist. Her journey has been marked by constant exploration, a playful engagement with diverse media, and an unwavering commitment to growth in the world of art.
Her academic journey, rooted in a BA in Sociology from William Jewell College in Liberty, Missouri, initially led her to work with children, integrating art into their day-to-day experiences. Gayle’s passion for art eventually pulled her into a more immersive pursuit. She delved into Art and Design courses at Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, unlocking her artistic soul. The willingness to ”put herself out there”, coupled with years of hard work and a penchant for thinking outside the box, allowed her to undergo a major growth period.
Finally, the challenges posed by the COVID-19 quarantine became a catalyst for Gayle’s artistic metamorphosis, leading her to focus on acrylic paintings on canvas. Engaging in an online cou
In my art practice, I describe my creations as Textural Acrylics. This term represents the exciting experience of observing paint flow from the palette knife, forming captivating textures and colors. Each stroke channels emotion, and every canvas captures a moment of creative inspiration.
My process is spontaneous – I start with a loose outline, sketch the composition, and then fully immerse myself in the act of creating. Throughout the process, music is my closest companion, its volume soaring. I dance to the rhythm, losing myself in the beats, and, on occasion, even letting out a song. My painting process is a multisensory experience, an immersive journey into the fusion of sound and color, where each note becomes a brushstroke, and every stroke on the canvas is a dance of creation. I often liken my paintings to cherished children—it’s a relationship that involves nurturing, engaging in heartfelt conversations, and weathering the challenges of creative adolescence with boundless love and patience.
Springs Surprise
Susan is a member of the South Jersey Camera Club and the “Medford Art Center,” which sells her work. Susan has participated in multiple exhibits at The Historic Smithville Mansion, winning “Best in Show” for her Great Blue Heron image, “Misty Morning Memories,” and obtaining an award during the Hopkins House Gallery exhibition, “Haddonfield Dreams.” Other juried shows in which she has participated include “Artistic Impressions of Haddonfield”, the fall exhibit at Markeims Art Center, “Russet, Rouge, and Bronze,” and many exhibits organized by “Norm Hinsey” at The Markeim, including “Inspired” and “Mysterious.” Susan’s work has been in the “Croft Farms Arts Center” in Cherry Hill, “Main Street Arts” in Maple Shade’s awarded exhibit, and a Deptford Galleria exhibit. Recently Atlanta-care purchased two of her pieces for their new medical building.
Susan considers “nature and wildlife” to be her favorite style of photography. That is where her heart is. She enjoys photographing both magnificent landscapes and delicate close-ups of bumblebees gathering nectar from delicate flowers in the summertime. Another passion of hers is photographing neglected architecture and things from the past, capturing their beauty and preserving their history with her camera. Susan enjoys integrating photographs she’s taken and creating a single image from them, in order to create a lovely, surreal vision.
Susan finds it enjoyable and fulfilling to participate in competitive photography shows. Her ultimate gratification comes from producing something beautiful for others to appreciate and connect with. She receives joy from creating images that speak from her heart, in order to bring that joy into other people’s lives. That is what she feels is the ultimate purpose of her art.
Springtime Color Burst
Kylo-Patrick Hart is an award-winning photographer (Budapest International Foto Awards, European Photography Awards, Global Photography Awards, Golden Shot International Photography Awards, London Photography Awards, New York Photography Awards, Pollux Awards, Tokyo International Foto Awards, etc.) and chair of the Department of Film, Television and Digital Media at Texas Christian University (Fort Worth, Texas, USA). He received his formal training in digital media arts while a student at the University of Michigan and Wayne State University, with additional instruction provided by offerings of the Maine Media Workshops and Santa Fe Workshops. As an artist, his motivation is to discover and capture the beauty, even when it is not always readily self-evident, that surrounds us continuously in all areas of our everyday lives. His photographs have been exhibited in numerous cities throughout the United States and several countries on four continents.
Photography has been my passion since early childhood. My motivation is to discover and capture the beauty, even when it is not always readily self-evident, that surrounds us continuously in all areas of our everyday lives. I believe the finest images are those that are serious yet playful, aesthetically appealing yet a bit quirky. As both an artist and an admirer, my favorite photographs tend to be ones whose contents speak loudly for themselves — even when it is not immediately clear exactly what they are saying. They seek to inspire their viewers to wrestle with their intriguing content and, as a result, ponder various aspects of our surrounding world in new and unique ways.
St Barth
M.E. Leaver is a talented artist whose main focus is painting and mixed media. Her work ranges from oil to India inks, watercolors to acrylic, spanning contemporary to abstract styles. Based in Davidson, North Carolina, M.E. creates art that aims to bring joy to those who experience it. Explore the beauty that emerges from the chaos of life that has motivated her creative process.
• DAVIDSON, NORTH CAROLINA •
Finding joy in the challenges of life is what drives my creative energy.
Escaping from the reality of my own life, and while seeking peace was where it started. My painting is about color and feelings. My intent is to provide a positive emotional source for people who view my work. I embrace the live in the moment and dive right in.
St George And The Dragon
Born in North Dakota, Mark Kaufman came of age during the 1960s. A champion for gender equality, Mark paints the female figure in sometimes absurd, sometimes haunting locations. Far from creating emotionless family portraits, Mark blends color and imagery to explore themes of mythology, literature and philosophy, and emotion.
He studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Mark’s work has been shown in Galleries across the nation. He is a signature member of the Baltimore, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and Philadelphia watercolor societies. He chooses watercolor as a medium because it is fluid and sometimes serendipitous.
Thirty years ago, Mark was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. In addition to painting, he is highly visible in the community providing support and advocacy for all those who suffer from mental illness. The bipolar helps shape his work, more in some collections than in others.
I draw inspiration from my bipolar, a dragon that must be fought each day, a love of figurative art, dancers in particular, and my love of the beach.
I came of age during the 1960s. As a lawyer and citizen, I was and am a champion for gender equality. I paint the female figure in sometimes absurd, sometimes haunting locations. Far from creating emotionless family portraits, I blend color and imagery to explore themes of mythology, literature and philosophy, and emotion. Here and there I will do floral or landscapes and faces too.
Thirty years ago, I was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. In addition to painting, I am highly visible in the community providing support and advocacy for all those who suffer from mental illness. The bipolar helps shape my work, more in some collections than in others.
Stage Light
Barbara Clements (married name Barber) is an oil painter who paints under her maiden name Clements and grew up on Long Island, NY, later moved to Phoenix, Arizona, and ‘fell in love’ with the Western landscape and is inspired to paint the Arizona natural landscape.
She paints in oils on both canvas and panel using meticulous brush strokes and natural colors. Her subject matter is usually nature, whether it is a landscape or a bird and flower, painting using traditional materials.
She feels most people do agree when they see something beautiful it is beautiful and attempts to show what she finds beauty in her own art by a diligent effort to paint as well as she can to bring that out. Her brush strokes are painstakingly executed. Colors of nature rendered as closely as nature has created, and compositions were chosen carefully to present a pleasing effect. The subject matter has been chosen to elevate one’s thoughts.
It takes a long time to finish her paintings. Most of her paintings take over a month of long days at the easel consisting of 8 or more hours a day, 6 to 7 days a week. Larger paintings as long as 3 months on this schedule. It is what it takes to create and what she is trying to achieve.
She considers herself an aesthetic.
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Other works include portraits, still life, animals, birds, flowers, and seascapes. An occasional dab at fantasy as her childhood evokes from play.
Her work has often been featured in American Art Collector magazine and the Fountain Hills Times.
She is a member of the International Guild of Realism, The National Oil and Acrylic Painters Society, and has shown in their juried shows. Currently, locally she is showing in 9theGallery, The Shemer Art Center, Ground Floor Artists, and The Herberger Art Gallery.
I feel I also have a Romantic aesthetic. The character of art and beauty reflects my own nature. I find the world a place of chaos, cruelty, and ugliness and I want to eliminate these negative aspects and conform my art to my appreciation of beauty. My aim with painting is to seek harmony in my vision of the world, tidying up that chaos on my canvases. Choosing my subject matter to reflect a world I’d rather live in. My hope is that my art invites viewers to find solace in the chaos of the world and enjoy the beauty that is really out there. Works worthwhile to contemplate for their own sake in a more quiet time of their own. To bring to them a more pleasant experience and to transcend the world of chaos, cruelty, and ugliness and see it in a more poeticized way.
My intent is to portray that which is beautiful and continue to perfect that direction in my progress forward as an artist.
Stand Still
Formally trained with a Bachelor’s in Fine Art and a Master’s In Fine Art in painting. Her exhibition record was extensive in the early years, then was quiet during the marriage. During the isolation of COVID, she began to paint again and found a genuine newness and expression in her work. The use of online art shows enabled her to start exhibiting again. She is deeply influenced by street art and architecture. In addition, she worked with papermaking and was amazed at texture which can be seen in recent work with paint.
My work utilizes color, shapes, and lines. The use of lines centers on the thought that the shortest distance between two spots is a straight line. The core of my work focuses on color and the use of color theory. Through observation, it was found that if I placed a black box on a page, it became stagnant – a black box. However, when I drew a jagged red line through the box, it became dynamic, a new form of energy. Using circles, swatches of color, and lines, gave liveliness to the painting, creating movement. When painting, I find it beneficial to execute a series of works either similar in color, expression, or design. During my education at Rochester Institute of Technology – (MFA, BFA), I began to follow T. S. Elliot’s Objective Correlative. This is a means of expressing emotion in art by using either a set of objects, a situation, or a chain of events. Through this method, the painting becomes that emotion. The choice is to do the abstract painting because it supplies the necessary tools to allow the portrayal of thoughts and emotions in work. In my work, I do not dictate the emotion found in the painting; but leave it for the viewer’s own discovery and interpretation. This work subjective in nature, utilizes color to illustrate feelings, dreams, or emotions. It is not a portrait or landscape or still life, it is passion, sensation, or a reaction. This gut feeling leaves the hand and heart of the individual and leaps to a medium to portray that fervor and intensity.
Tools such as spray paint, Conte crayons, graphite, charcoal, and acrylic paint are used. Color draws the eye over the piece to the core. The lines keep the eyes moving, while symbols quietly state, “Look at me”. This is her story,
Standing Tall
During the late 1970s, artist Nancy Marie Barnes officially began her career in abstract art, using mostly pencil and pen&ink. Since the early 1990’s she has sold dozens of her pieces throughout the United States and Canada. She displays and sells her work on her website while maintaining her own personal collection on display in their home studio.
Nancy enjoys and creates contemporary abstract art, seeking to achieve its effect using shapes, forms, colors, and textures. Her art pieces are a study of lines, free-flowing curves, space, contrast, natural abstract forms, and shapes. In her art, she strives for fluid movement, creating grace, freedom, and airy lightness. Her artwork embraces, the ordinary or simple, immense beauty in its utter simplicity.
Nancy is basically “self-taught” but has taken art classes. Mostly, she “expresses herself” in a free-form technique, and her art has been categorized by some as surrealism. She has worked in oil, watercolor, ink, and pencil, but her love is black ink on white, with double or triple white matting accompanied by a narrow black trim and a simple black or silver frame.
Artist Nancy Marie Barnes enjoys and creates contemporary abstract art seeking to achieve its effect using shapes, forms, colors, and textures, in a study of lines, free-flowing curves, space, contrast, natural abstract forms and shapes, and fluid movement, creating grace, freedom, and airy lightness-with the ordinary or simple in reality full of immense beauty in its utter simplicity.