Beyond Networks: Work by New Image Artists

2024-11-22T20:52:06+00:00November 15, 2024|

A Network (n): an arrangement of intersecting horizontal and vertical lines.
To Network (v): to connect as or operate with a network.
To Weave (v): To make (a complex story or pattern) from a number of interconnected elements.

November 4, 2024 – January 4, 2025
Brentwood Arts Exchange
Artist Talk: Saturday, December 7, 2024, 2pm-4pm

New Image Artists is a group of professional fiber and mix media artists who have been exhibiting together and individually for over 40 years. They are trailblazers and innovators working in a medium that has only recently gained solid support from the leading institutions in the art world. While each artist has her own studio process and conceptual aims, they are united by their dedication to their art and a creative camaraderie which has grown over years of meeting and exhibiting together.

This group exhibit, Beyond Networks, highlights work by New Images Artists that explores the meaning of networks and is intended to draw attention to how the processes inherent in the creation of textile art as well as the “encoding of meaning” have been mirrored in the invention and development of digital social networks.

Unlike the recent advent of online networks, the cultural and artistic history of textiles has developed internationally over millennia. Indeed, the invention of the Jacquard Loom in the 19th century in Europe which used punch cards to automate the weaving of complex patterns inspired the creation of the first computer.

Beyond Networks seeks to create a conversation about meaning and personal expression in a complex, wired and networked world.  The viewer will experience a variety of styles and techniques in Beyond Networks from the gestural work of Dominie Nash to the more structured work of Cathy Kleeman. While Nash and Kleeman work with quilted fabric, their studio methods and imagery are different . The variety of techniques is also demonstrated by contrasting the crisp representational work of B.J. Adams that is created with thread and a sewing machine with the hand built work of Joan Dreyer’ “Multiverse”, Saaraliisa Yitalo’s “Flooding In”, or Mary Beth Bellah’s “Mend the Web”.

-Mary Welch Higgins

Photo Credit: Greg Staley 

  • Beyond Networks: Work by New Image Artists
  • Beyond Networks: Work by New Image Artists
  • Beyond Networks: Work by New Image Artists
  • Beyond Networks: Work by New Image Artists
  • Beyond Networks: Work by New Image Artists

The Word Shepard by Linda Colsh

2024-02-27T23:12:35+00:00February 27, 2024|

The Word Shepard by Linda Colsh

The Word Shepard by Linda Colsh

48" x 24", Fiber Art

The art of Linda Colsh explores humanist themes in three areas of interest: ageing, the environment, and migration. With an affinity for the unnoticed, the displaced and the invisible, she chooses her subject matter from urban streets or rural woods, farms and creeks. Growing up on a small island in the Chesapeake Bay gave her a keen appreciation of nature. Her interest in people and cultures derives from a quarter century of experience as an American expat traveling the cities of Europe and Asia. In 2014, the family returned to Maryland, settling on a quiet hilltop in the Middletown Valley.

Each work begins with plain cloth or paper that she alters with paint, stain, dye, discharge and ink. Her instinct is to work in a minimal neutral palette within a wide value range. Her process is weighted to designing content from her photographs and drawings, before layering and stitching together as fiber art for the wall or pedestal- or ceiling-mounted pieces.

A lifelong artist with degrees in the history of art, Linda Colsh exhibits internationally. Highlights include selection for Latvia’s International Textile & Fibre Art Triennial, the Fuller Craft Biennial and several Fiber Art Now Excellence in Fibers exhibitions. Her career includes solo exhibitions in Germany, Belgium, Hungary, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, France, Korea; and the United States. She has juried, judged and curated major international exhibitions, including Quilt Nihon, Visions, Quilt National and the National Quilt Museum’s 20th Anniversary. Her work is published worldwide and is held in public, private and corporate collections, including the Collection of John M. Walsh III, Lore Degenstein Gallery Permanent Collection, International Quilt Museum and Germany’s Nordwolle Textile Museum. Among her awards are the European Quilt Triennial first prize, Maryland Federation of Art’s Art on Paper Juror’s Choice Award and Nihon Vogue’s Quilts Japan Prize.

Please follow Linda Colsh on Instagram at @lcolsh

Halloween, Childhood and Magic

2023-10-31T21:23:04+00:00October 31, 2023|

Halloween, Childhood and Magic

This day – October 31st – Halloween has brought me back to my early childhood through memory.

It was magic for me! As a hypersensitive, already bookish, artistic child, my dreams came alive on this night.

I am the 4th of nine children (2nd girl after my eldest sister and two brothers) For Halloween, this fact created a built in “Charlie Brown” like gang wandering through the streets of our neighborhood in Northwest Washington as we treat or treated with home made costumes and pillow case bags for as long as we could. Returning home, we ate the spoils from our candy haul until we collapsed into our night dreams.

What do I mean by magic? Do I mean creativity?

Do I mean developing the ability to create your own story –  even as a child?

Perhaps,  I mean allowing imagination to exist, to grow, to be nurtured.

Or, it may mean to create something undefinable that carries meaning. – A sense of a something that is being created from nothing.  Magic?

This Halloween, I share my friend, Theresa Martin’s work as an example of an artist who continues to nurture her imagination to create meaning in a magical way.

Thank you for reading. Happy Halloween.

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Mixed Media Collage by Theresa Martin

( Tap on the image to magnify, Tap out to go back to the full image.)

Artist Talk for Open Latitudes – Saturday, July 15, 2023 2-4pm

2023-07-10T20:22:10+00:00July 10, 2023|

Artist Talk for Open Latitudes: Mixed Media by Alonzo Davis and Chee Keong Kung

Date: Saturday, July 15, 2023, 2-4PM

Location: Workhouse Center for the Arts, Vulcan Gallery W-16, Lorton, Va.

GPS Address:  9518 Workhouse Way Lorton, VA 22079

We hope that you will join us this coming Saturday for an insightful conversation into the creative processes of Alonzo Davis and Chee Keong Kung at the Workhouse Center for the Arts in the Vulcan Gallery.  There is plenty of parking at Lorton – North and South Parking Lots.

If this is your first time coming out to Workhouse,  please check the campus map as well as the visitors information on the website.

Look for the Love Size on the campus central quad.

Campus Map

The exhibit is on the first level of the building W-16.

Visitors Information. 

Alonzo J. Davis

Alonzo J. Davis’ career as an artist spans four decades.  A native of Tuskegee, Alabama, Davis moved with his family to Los Angeles in his early teens.  After acquiring an undergraduate degree at Pepperdine College he earned an MFA in Printmaking and Design at Otis Art Institute.  Influenced early on by the assemblagists, Davis soon took wing and began to experiment with a variety of mediums, techniques and themes. At the suggestion of artist and former professor, Charles White, Davis began to produce prints and paintings in series.
While he was inspired by travel to Africa, the Caribbean and American Southwest—the colors and patterns of the Pacific Rim cultures also seeped into Davis’ artwork.  During the ‘70’s and early ‘80’s, Davis’ involvement in the California mural movement culminated with the 1984 Olympic Murals project.  His Eye on ’84 is one of ten murals on the walls of the downtown Los Angeles Harbor Freeway.

Chee Keong Kung

Geometry and gestural mark-making are integral to Kung’s practice that is rooted in his training in art and architecture. Kung grew up in Singapore, where the rich diversity of cultures has indelibly shaped his approach to artmaking. He works with an evolving vocabulary informed by the cultural milieu and observations from natural and man-made environments. Kung is interested in the emotive resonance that grows out of the act of intent seeing and remembering. His process relies on discovery and invention while navigating the spaces between light and shadow, depth and flatness, and motion and stillness.
Kung’s works are in private, corporate, and institutional collections, including The National Museum Art Gallery of Singapore and The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities.  Born in Singapore, Kung studied art & architecture at the University of Houston and real estate at Cornell University.  He lives and works in McLean, VA.

Open Latitudes: Alonzo Davis and Chee Keong Kung at Workhouse Arts Center

2023-07-06T20:13:22+00:00June 7, 2023|

Artist Talk: Saturday, July 15, 2023, 2-4PM

“Through travel, I seek influences, cultural centers, energies, new terrain and the power of both the spoken and unspoken.”  – Alonzo Davis

“The allure of creating is finding places that I do not already know.”     – Chee Keong Kung

Vulcan Gallery, Workhouse Center for the Arts, 9518 Workhouse Way, Lorton, VA, 22079

Open Latitudes: Mixed Media Works by Alonzo Davis and Chee Keong Kung  presents the work of two contemporary artists who share a commonality rooted in exploration, discovery and improvisation. The use of geometric forms, gestural mark-making, the exploration of the tension between 2 and 3D, natural and man-made materials as well as working in series are integral to both artists’ studio practices.

An enticing aspect of travel is leaving the familiar behind and experiencing a new place. Upon returning home, what was once familiar is somehow transformed through new eyes. Through their travels—literal and metaphorical–Davis and Kung have absorbed deep multi-cultural influences that have informed and enriched their work and processes. In the details and precision of their work, there is an expansiveness that extends beyond geographical and cultural boundaries to encompass the broader world.

– Curated by Mary Welch Higgins

Score: Mixed Media by Joan Dreyer

2023-04-10T23:14:51+00:00April 6, 2023|

Reception: April 8th, 2023,  4-6PM

  • Score: Mixed Media by Joan Dreyer, Workhouse Center for the Arts, 2023
  • Score: Mixed Media by Joan Dreyer, Workhouse Center for the Arts, 2023
  • Score: Mixed Media by Joan Dreyer, Workhouse Center for the Arts, 2023
  • Score: Mixed Media by Joan Dreyer, Workhouse Center for the Arts, 2023

Location: Workhouse Center for the Arts, Vulcan Gallery, W-16, 9518 Workhouse Way, Lorton, VA, 22079, United States (Campus Map)

Score explores 20 years of the work of Virginia based mixed media artist, Joan Dreyer. While developing her MFA thesis at Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia, PA, Joan began taking tools, techniques and imagery that have been historically considered “women’s work” and transforming them into innovative, contemporary art that is responsive to the tone and tensions of our times. Created by combining fiber techniques with unexpected materials like X-rays, her work is a subtle art that asks questions about life, loss, symbolism and the impact of war instead of providing one size fits all answers . The artist’s work provides a space for the contemplation  of life stages that we all encounter. The result is a body of work that allows for meaningful but also multiple interpretations by the viewer.

For more information about exhibits at the Workhouse Arts Center or artwork purchase inquiries, contact Audrey Miller audreymiller@workhousearts.org. Follow Workhouse Arts Center on Instagram at @workhousearts, on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WorkhouseArts and Twitter at @Workhouse_Arts. The Workhouse Arts Center is open to the public Wednesdays – Saturdays from 11 am to 6 pm, and Sundays from noon to 5 pm. Free public parking is available. A map of campus can be found online here.

Irreplaceable by Sally Kauffman

2023-05-10T19:16:58+00:00April 4, 2023|

  • Irreplaceable: Paintings by Sally Kauffman
  • Irreplaceable: Paintings by Sally Kauffman
  • Irreplaceable: Paintings by Sally Kauffman - Installation photo credit: Greg Staley
  • Irreplaceable: Paintings by Sally Kauffman
Workhouse Arts Center Announces New Art Exhibition Opening
Irreplaceable: Paintings by Sally Kauffman
Curated by Mary Welch Higgins
March 25 – June 11, 2023
Second Saturday Exhibition Reception, April 8, 2023, 4 – 6 PM

Lorton, VA – ( March 2023) The Workhouse Arts Center announces the opening of the new exhibition, Irreplaceable: Paintings by Sally Kauffman. The exhibition is on view from March 25 through June 11, 2023, in the Workhouse’s McGuireWoods Gallery (W-16). There is a public exhibition reception Saturday, April 8, 2023, 4 – 6 PM.

Irreplaceable is an exhibit of abstract yet allusory paintings by DC area artist, Sally Kauffman. Kauffman works in series and is known for paintings depicting groups of people engaged in communal activities. In her most recent series, she turns her eye to the plight of endangered and extinct species. Her high contrast color palettes and adventurous brushwork are reminiscent of the abstract expressionistic movement of the 20th Century. Yet her goal to increase awareness of the species represented in her work calls to mind Romanticism, a late 18th century artistic and intellectual movement that promoted the power of the creativity and the arts to raise awareness and thus transform circumstance.

By memorializing the energy, diversity and beauty of birds and butterflies in flight, cats, turtles and fish, she honors their place in our ecosystem while drawing attention to their plight. She recognizes that some viewers may simply enjoy the beauty of the paintings and animals represented. There may be others that do not notice the plastic bags and ropes entangling the turtles that are painted to represent just one of the ways that humankind’s actions have impacted the endangered animals. Finally, others may enjoy the paintings and decide to dive deeper to discover that these extraordinary creatures are threatened or already extinct. Kauffman’s paintings remind us that art has the power to raise awareness and create change.

For more information about exhibits at the Workhouse Arts Center or artwork purchase inquiries, contact Audrey Miller audreymiller@workhousearts.org. Follow Workhouse Arts Center on Instagram at @workhousearts, on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/WorkhouseArts and Twitter at @Workhouse_Arts. The Workhouse Arts Center is open to the public Wednesdays – Saturdays from 11 am to 6 pm, and Sundays from noon to 5 pm. Free public parking is available. A map of campus can be found online here.

Photo Credit: Greg Staley 

Long Front of Culture

2022-09-27T18:20:07+00:00September 27, 2022|

My mother, Helen Schrider Higgins earned an MFA from Catholic University in Washington DC in 1955 at the age of 25. She was the first woman to be admitted to the MFA sculpture program at CU. ( She become a student at CU in the late 40’s not long after they admitted women to the school. )

As a child you don’t contextualize your parent.  My memories as a child  of the late 60’s and 70’s was one of being around art, artists and books. In lieu of dolls, I received pastels and sketchbooks as gifts. This was my norm. My context.

In her later years, she and I would – at least once a year – find ourselves having lunch in the  courtyard cafe  of the West Wing at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC. While we always talked about art, at these courtyard lunches we starting to go deep into her story and her experience  around the emergent Washington DC art community of the 1950’s.

Our National Gallery conversations gave me a strong foundation when I had the opportunity last year to delve into the time period  of the 1950’s while collaborating with Catholic University on an exhibit of her art work.

In my research, I did a deep dive into Black Mountain College, the Bauhaus artists, Bernand Leach, Shoji Hamada and other influences.

One of the most interesting insights for me came from a book that I found at the Phillips Collections museum shop in a moment of serendipity.

It was “The Free World,  Art and Thought in the Cold War” by Louis Menand, an English Professor at Harvard.

He did extensive research and wrote about culture in the time period that she came of age as an artist.

The insight from Menand was regarding the art critic/art world power broker Clement Greenberg.  Yeah – that guy. 

I was not aware that Greenberg received plenty of what we call today “pushback” during his heyday.

Greenberg constructed a top/down art world structure.  In his peak years, Greenberg championed the abstract expressionists as the pinnacle of art. Later in the 60’s, he was overwhelmed by the popularity of pop art and his power within the art world of his time declined – although his writing maintained a strong hold on academia for decades.

The key point that I learned  from “The Free World” was that the term “The Long Front of Culture” that was coined by the British art critic, Lawrence Alloway.

Alloway argued for the arts to be viewed as part of a continuum. There are multiple genealogies of art – not one.

I am simplifying the argument about what constitutes high art but my point is that there are and have always been many different ways to create.

There are so many more artists now than there were in the 1950’s. The art world is much more diverse.

What moves you? What excites you? What do you want to see everyday?

Bibliography

The Free World: Art and Thought in the Cold War, Louis Menand, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York,  97803741584158453,

It’s a Wrap – Before, During, After: Art Shaping Resilience

2022-04-04T16:11:13+00:00April 4, 2022|

I’ve learned that some times the best opportunities come when you least expect them. The opportunity to collaborate with Angie Newman Johnson Gallery on an exhibition as Distinct Studios LLC came after a year of unexpected personal twists and turns that made the experience of starting up an arts consultancy challenging. We could not have asked for a better experience right out of the gate. It was a rewarding experience to curate this exhibition for the community of EHS and also for the arts community at large. Thank you to Elizabeth Vorlicek and the team at the Ainslie Arts Center of Episcopal High School and all of the exhibiting artists. Thank you as well to everyone that came out on a rainy evening in February for the in-person opening. We appreciate you! Below is a link to the exhibition page and a gallery of photos from the opening reception and the exhibition. Stay tuned!

Visit exhibition page for Before, During, After: Art Shaping Resilience – February 14th – March 22nd, 2022 

Upcoming Exhibition

2022-02-14T19:41:01+00:00February 1, 2022|

Before, During, After: Art Shaping Resilience

Before, During, After: Art Shaping Resilience showcases the work of nine contemporary visual artists who communicate through art their personal experience of a world that has been altered by concurrent global challenges.

A key objective of this exhibit is to explore how the art object can shape and strengthen resilience. These nine artists create work that communicate universally shared feelings of loss, fear, and illness but also of cultural identity, renewal, and hope. We contend that the creative act itself strengthens an artist’s ability to comeback from difficulties but also that their work can shape resilience in the viewer.

The artists exhibiting in Before, During, After are Adjoa J Burrowes, Gail Shaw-Clemons, Alonzo Davis, Joan Dreyer, Mary Welch Higgins, Sarah J Hull, Akemi Maegawa, Alexandra N Sherman, Elizabeth Vorlicek.

Curated by Mary Welch Higgins

Dates: February 14th – March 22, 2021

Angie Newman Johnson Gallery
Episcopal High School
3900 West Braddock Road
Alexandria, VA 22302

For an appointment time and on campus directions: Contact gallery assistant, Michael Windsor at maw@episcopalhighschool. org

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