Curious To Know You!

Galal Ramadan, CPSA, CPX, UKCPS, UKPSO is an award-winning, self-taught master colored pencil artist and art instructor. His career had been in graphic design, marketing, and business. He participates in solo and curated national and international exhibitions. His artwork and himself were featured in several International Art Magazines. He is teaching colored pencil classes and workshops at several locations in South FL. He is a signature member of several prestige International art organizations. He was born and raised in Alexandria, Egypt, and lives and works in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, USA.

  • Signature, Colored Pencil Society of America (CPSA)
  • Signature Member, UK Colored Pencil Society (UKCPS, UKCPSO)
  • Member, American Artists Professional League (AAPL)
  • Member, International Guild of Realism (IGOR)
  • Member, Arts Council of Hillsborough County, FL

Colored Pencil allows me to move from extreme detail to simple impressions, texture, and vibrant colors and to travel anywhere in between. I would like to call my realistic style a painting.

While I use a variety of materials and processes in each project my methodology is consistent.

Surprising colors in unexpected places open my eyes and mind to new experimentation.

Colored pencil creative artwork has a therapeutic side to it. Since I started 7 years ago, my mental state drastically improved by increasing my focus and less anxiety and everything else in my life as well.

White I am creating artwork, I work in the Flow space with more and more frequency, and I could access the flow to put finishing touches on all my artwork.

My artwork reveals my fascination with cultural matters, passion and respect for the beauty of nature, and my appreciation of the basic elements of art and life.

My vision, as an artist, is to create out-of-the-box art that tells a story and makes people look at the world in a different way.

Cut Connection

I was born in Colorado and have lived my whole life in the same house since 2003. I have always been hungry for travel and passionate about learning about the world beyond. In middle school, my French teacher told me the human mind is a room with one window. When you learn about a new culture or travel to a new country, the experience opens a new window in that room. Creating and enjoying art became an outlet for that—a way to view the world in new ways.

From drawing to writing stories, I have loved creating art since childhood. However, I was introduced to photography in early high school. The COVID-19 pandemic interrupted the last fourth of my junior year and all of my senior year. Moving online for that period of time, I rarely left the house. My world shrunk to little more than my home. As someone desperate to explore—but cautious for my health—I began to reflect more on life and myself. Even as I renewed my love for nature, I discovered a passion for surrealism. I found a drive to care for and help the world around me, opening my eyes to the pain and beauty of life. I created art—writing stories and making photography—to compensate for the experience of containment. Art remolded my life and helped me endure challenging times. Before, I photographed to document, but my art took a drastic turn—now I create to express and change perspectives.

After high school, I continued to pursue photography at the University of Colorado Boulder. Over the past two years, I have joined photography classes and clubs, and I serve as the photography editor for “Roam Boulder,” a campus fashion magazine. I dedicate myself to improving my art and perception of the world.

My only model is one woman—myself—except for male hands in “Mother Nature.” This piece focuses on humanity’s destructive impact. Like jewelry, a globe dangles from my ear as a symbolic and feminine embodiment of nature. A pair of hands reach from the shadows as a symbol of human aggression and damage toward nature. One controlling hand threatens to seize Nature while the other attempts to grasp the globe. The words scrawled across my face reference Marvin Gaye’s song “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)” to exhibit the message of the decaying environment. A few lyrics cover nature’s face: “Where did all the blue skies go? Poison is the wind that blows. Fish full of mercury.” My solemn expression further conveys that pain. “Cut Connection” displays a sense of suffocating authority and being looked down upon. I cower while a trio of faceless phantoms hover behind and scrutinize me. The artwork features a message of human connection to unite against world issues, including environmental destruction and oppressive authority—conveyed through three hands in the mirrors. Two hands reach for each other, while the open palm in the middle mirror breaks the connection. A horizontal crack scores each mirror, depicting the shattering image of humanity’s connection. As in “Mother Nature,” Gaye’s words now exhibit a message of humanity watching and controlling nature. “Three Selves” reflects how we hide our multiple selves behind masks for social standards. Jung’s work on persona and Freud’s psycho-dynamic model inspired my artwork. The mirror’s face appears trapped, demanding to escape. My expression, the hand, and the cracked mirror illustrate the hidden self. The face behind uses the mirror as a mask, representing conformity to the social world. The left self’s expression reveals the melancholy of desire to live freely, yet still restrained from the other selves.

Cutting Edge

Gabriele spent the majority of her life believing she had no artistic talent. An unexpected twist of fate in her sixties led her to discover a potential talent for digital art. After this life-altering event, she spent over two years totally immersed in her craft, teaching herself all aspects of the medium and exploring her newfound passion. During this time she developed a proprietary technique to create images that she continuously explores and enhances. Eventually, she emerged with the ability and confidence to present her art to the public. Gabriele’s work has been exhibited virtually nationally and internationally. Her images have been juried for numerous awards. She states, “My life has been enriched far beyond anything I could have imagined. My creative experience is pure delight.”

I am an intuitive artist, exploring my inner awareness by circumventing my conscious mind in order to create directly from my subconscious or unconscious mind. My art is an emotional reflection of my inner landscape. Each image is simultaneously a reflection from my past, a snapshot of the present, and a preview of the future waiting to be revealed. Allowing my images to take the lead in their actualization accesses the power of flexibility, freeing me from expectations and control. Working intuitively invites and empowers mystery, delight, and surprise in my artwork. I strive for profoundly personal communication with the viewer. It’s my vision to capture their wonder and imagination with an image of visual poetry that is unique, deeply personal, and extends an invitation to contemplate the possibility of entering the extraordinary digital realm.

Cycles III

Athanasia Karatza is an award-winning artist who creates mainly abstract works inspired by the rhythms of nature where every change causes a number of consequences. After graduating from the Borgias School of Fine Arts, she has participated in art exhibitions all over the world and won several prizes in international and pan-Hellenic competitions. She has also attended several seminars in order to enrich her knowledge and to develop herself continuously.

In nature, even a small change causes a series of consequences as everything is connected to everything else. The effects spread everywhere, from the surface to the core of the ecosystem, and we face the consequences of a phenomenon that takes place far away. This fragile balance and complex interlinking is an inspiration to create works where fragile lines and forms are gently connected to each other, inviting the eye to look beyond the boundaries of the surface. Water and its ability to change forms, move in cycles, and affect the balance of the ecosystem is my main inspiration. My photos of wetlands, rivers, and the sea as well as my previous projects give me inspiration for the next project. I start from a landscape, study the lines and forms and gradually end up with abstract works that show how fragile the balance of the world around us is.

Daffodils

Born in Scotland, and childhood in Guyana on the edge of the jungle, I planted my feet at the foot of the green goddess.

I performed with magician Doug Henning as Maya, the Goddess of Magic in ‘Spellbound’ at the Royal Alexandra Theatre. I was part of two women’s magic acts that toured with the Canadian Armed Forces to Europe and the Middle East. I have been attacked and held in the jaws of a lion. This experience has given me a new perspective and great respect for Mother Nature and the life force. (mayafair.ca ‘One Bone’).

Self-portraits became a tool within which I could view and integrate the sorrows and challenges of my life which included the struggle and commitment to my seriously physically disabled brother, my corporate-sponsored health injuries, my great concern for the health of our planet, my experiences as a performer, researcher and teacher as well as the suffering I see in the world around me. These explorations represented a great desire to dive through the layers of the human psyche from masque to molten core.

I began by photographing my disabled brother as a young child. I used my camera to show the world his spirit and his humanity when most of the world saw only his disability.

I strive to show how wrong is violent conflict. As a drama and movement artist, I have researched and presented hundreds of workshops with an anti-war theme. I feel a direct and poignant line to the experience and horror of WW1 through my childhood relationship to my grandfather who suffered through many of that war’s most horrific battles. Since WW1 there has been an unrelenting increase in the death and maiming of civilians in war. There is an undisputed correlation between militarism and environmental degradation.

In the seminal spirituality of Nature, I find my faith. In the current fragmented Eden on Earth, I find pain, sorrow, and fear. I seek the deep beauty of Earth’s life mystery, the promise of Eden. In the sacredness of plants, I discover my roots, expose my heart, and flow with the current of the universal Mind.

Mother Nature is at the tipping point. Our choice; bountiful garden or devastation. Through word, image, and concept I explore an artistic perception of nature and elemental forces. With older beliefs in mind, I seek new earth-saving visions. I desire to nurture a ‘compassionate heart’.

My inner being is a Nature Spirit, a ‘post-industrialization / pre-Raphaelite’. Original Pre-Raphaelites fore-saw industrial destruction of the natural world.

Daffs 2

Jan Kessel is a nature photographer now based in the PNW. In her youth, she won UNICEF’s Child of the Year international competition. Kessel is especially interested in using photography in healing, and her work can be found in medical and non-medical spaces around the world. Her photographs are included in the LA Art Association Open Show (juried by Peter Frank, December 2021), the 21st Japan International Art Exchange Exhibition at the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum (juried by Julienne Johnson, April 2022), the Anacortes Arts Festival Juried Fine Art Show (juried by Greg Robinson, August 2022). Jan is also part of an upcoming 2023 use of her photos as part of a juried public art partnership between Photographic Center NW/ King County WA Metro, where her photos will be murals in public spaces. Jan’s photos are included in the upcoming 22nd Japan International Art Exchange Exhibition at the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum (juried by Julienne Johnson, June 2023)

I have held a camera in my hands all of my life. It’s the magic in nature that speaks to me. With my photography, I try and capture the beauty I see, so others can see it too. I photograph the natural world. Whether a beautiful landscape, the magic of flowers and color, or an abstract photograph, the world can be seen and experienced in a new way. A native of Los Angeles, I now live in the majestic Pacific Northwest. I also love to travel and be in the ocean. I am constantly inspired and restored by the beauty of nature.

Dahlia Fuzz

Douglas Wolters is known for his unusual abstract photographs as well as his close-up portraits of botanical subjects. Recently, he participated in numerous group shows, both at local Washington, DC-area galleries and online. In 2024, he participated in two shows at the HMVC Gallery in New York, three shows with Gallerium, and had four images accepted by the Delaware Photographic Society Circuit. Two of Mr. Wolters’s images were selected for the Cape Cod Art Center’s “Black and White” 2023 online photography exhibit, in which 142 photographers entered and only 35 images were selected. One of Mr. Wolters’s images was selected for Exhibizone’s “Curves 2023,” an international online exhibit in which 15 countries were represented. He was also selected for the Artistonish International January 2023 exhibit. Lenswork published Mr. Wolters’s images in three recent monographs. He has also won numerous awards, including first place in B & H Photo Video’s 2021 Optic contest (which came with over $1000 worth of gear) and Best in the Macro Division in the 2020 Mid-Atlantic Photo Visions exhibit. For four years, he won a Special Award in the annual Joe Miller International Abstract exhibits. In addition, he won 3rd place in the 86th Annual Wilmington International Exhibition of Photography, for which there were 2900 entries.

As a professional cellist and educator, I came to photography only after retirement. And as a musician, I bring a somewhat unusual set of perceptions to photography. Line, rhythm, harmony, and structure in music find their counterparts naturally in images.

One of my specialties is abstract photography, using a technique I have developed. Its starting point is always an actual photograph. I then manipulate the form and color with software, transforming it into a wholly new image. I am also devoted to photographing a series of botanical close-ups (or macro photography). These images resemble a theme with endless variations in detail, color, form, and beauty.

Daisy Girl

My name is Barbara Page I live in Belle Plaine, Minnesota. Originally, I am from a dairy farm in northern Wisconsin. I started by drawing the markings on our cows, beginning my artistic journey. I attended the University of Wisconsin–River Falls. I have a bachelor’s degree in Fine Art. At 30 years old I was in an auto accident. The accident left me with traumatic brain and spinal injuries. I love to draw and paint realistic art with the mediums of watercolor, pen, and ink. My inspiration is the artwork of Alphonse Mucha; with my focus on nature, florals, and human figures. Because of my injuries, I visualize things differently. My injuries resulted in clouded thinking and hand tremors. Unsteady hands made it difficult to do fine details. Today my artwork is influenced by the traumas and blessings I endured.

At a young age, I was so intrigued that I could draw what I saw and share my art with others. Throughout my life, I have used my imagination to have it be my outlet – my therapy – and my passion. As an artist, I love to see and create artwork that evokes emotion and different perceptions of what my piece says to the viewer. I love to use color to evoke emotion and black-and-white pointillism to get high contrast in my artwork of the female/floral portrayal.

Daisy Series 2

Melanie Guerra is an award-winning photographer specializing in fine art, portrait, and commercial photography. Her work has been shown at galleries and shows nationwide, and she enjoys sharing her passion through teaching the art of photography to adults and children of all ages.

I see the world around me in terms of light and captured moments – and often the tiniest details become the focus of a larger story. In addition to photography, I am an accomplished jewelry designer, and I think that perhaps this attention to minute detail stems from this work. Another result of this work with metal, gems, and other natural materials is my obsession with texture. In recent years I have gone beyond the visual texture of my photographs to the tangible textures created by printing to various surfaces. I currently print all of my fine art images on non-traditional paper, metal, or wood.