portrait commision

laura sanders has completed another gorgeous portrait commision.  laura is one of our incredible artists who also takes on a few select portrait commisions during the year.  we have blogged about her beautiful paintings before and look forward to having her in a show at the gallery soon.  laura will come to you and take tons of photos of the subject, select a few which she thinks will make an amazing painting and around a year or less later voila.  not a quick process but one that yeilds fabulous results!!

WALKER  2012

oil on canvas

40 x 30 inches

 

exhibition is up and open!!

selena beaudry's solo exhibition is up and open!  the show is amazing and is a must see for the summer.  her paintings, collages and piles are exhibited together.  they all play off one another and show the artist's depth of talent.  the back room of hidell brooks holds an installation of word 60.  Sixty individual piles as the artists calls them hung together to form a grid of color and form.  your eyes will be memorized for hours.  it is our favorite installation at hidell brooks hands down.

  

 

 

rebecca brooks, selena beaudry, katharine thomas

the exhibition runs through august 31st.  plenty of time to escape the heat while enjoying the cool gallery and an amazing show! 

sneak peek...arless day

just received arless day's images for his invitation!  they are stunning as always.  thought we would share one with you to get everyone excited for his upcoming solo exhibition.  the show runs september 14 - october 27, 2012.  arless day will be at the opening on friday, september 14th from 6-8 pm.

LIVING MEMORIES  2012

collage and gouache on board

15 1/8 x 26 1/2 inches

studio tour + artist talk - selena beaudry

the mccoll center is having a studio tour and artist talk june 12th at 6 pm at the studio of our fabulous artist selena beaudry.  hidell brooks gallery is having a solo exhibition for selena july 13-august 31.  the show is still in her studio so it is a wonderful opportunity to get an early viewing of her new paintings, piles and collages before they head to the gallery to get installed!

it is rare to get the chance to see inside an artist studio and hear them speak especially after they have just finished an amazing body of new work!  go to the link above to sign up for the studio visit, only 20 lucky people can attend!

studio visit - page laughlin

we love visiting our artist's studios.  it definitely gives you a glimpse into their world.  the world where they create the unimaginable.  first for themselves then for the pleasure of the viewer.  we are always amazed with the artists fundamental need to create something.

entering page laughlin's studio in winston salem you are immediately overwhelmed with the amount of objects everywhere.  from sculpture by her husband to piles of paintbrushes in all shapes and sizes to gloves, tape and of course tubes of paint scattered about.

page is a bit obsessive about her paint colors.  charting every color she has used with their name and details to remember for future use.  she is a professor of art at wake forest university and the current chair of the art department.

page laughlin's paintings over the last decade have been based on interiors derived from photographs of homes in high end magazines.  from there she reinterprets them into a painting to delve into what is behind the image.

"these commercial images are compelling subjects for my painting because they reveal much about our consumptive desires. i am interested in what these fantasies reveal upon closer inspection and in what is veiled in seduction.  my work has shifted emphasis from more formal concerns of the interior space towards an increased focus on the contents of the interiors themselves."

we have come to view a new body of paintings she has been working on all spring.  actually we are the first outsiders to lay eyes on the new work!  she is now incorporating figures in her interiors.  the paintings are amazing.  the beautiful interiors are still there but are now occupied by people.  their is a tension in the new work.  the figures are interacting as in something has just happen or is about to happen.  their presence brings the viewer into the interior and makes you want to be a part of their conversation.  the new paintings are very compelling.  we have permission to share a glimpse.

the work is still in progress but we are looking forward to showing the new paintings at hidell brooks gallery.  we are very excited to announce page laughlin will be having a show at the north carolina museum of art in february 2013.  we left her studio filled with the anticipation of seeing the finished work in the coming months and with a handful of beautiful beets grown in her amazing backyard surrounding her studio.  

the art of hanging ART

there is an art to hanging ART.  everyone always wants to know the secret to installing art. we have a simple mathematical calculation that works every time.

we use a 60 inch medium.  meaning the middle of each painting no matter the size is at 60 inches. most museums and galleries use this technique as well.

measure height of painting 

= 13 inches

divide by 2

= 6 1/2 inches

add 60

= 66 1/2 inches

subtract distance from top of painting or frame to wire tightly pulled

- 3 inches

= 63 1/2 inches

hammer nail and hang!

disclaimer: this only works when there is nothing under the painting!  there are many other rules that apply to hanging over furniture, mantles, up stairwells and on and on.  we do highly recommend using OOK classic professional hangers.  we will continue our series on the art of hanging so check back for future blogs for more tips.

eric aho at the currier museum of art

hidell brooks gallery has had the pleasure of representing the paintings of eric aho for quite some time now.  we have both enjoyed watching his work change with every fluid brushstroke and the amount of paint on the canvas!  we are proud to announce his first solo museum exhibition opening next weekend at the currier museum of art in manchester, new hampshire.

Transcending Nature: Paintings by Eric Aho 

organized by the currier museum of art 
June 2, 2012 – September 9, 2012 

 

the currier museum of art will be the first american museum to present a survey exhibition of eric aho's work. the exhibition features more than 30 paintings by the vermont-based artist.  his earlier works on view include dramatic, plein air paintings of landscapes influenced by such artists as claude monet, paul cezanne, john constable and frederic church. aho's most recent paintings are abstract monumental compositions – some as large as eight feet by nine feet.

aho's latest abstract paintings capture the lived, remembered, and imagined experience of being outdoors. through the unexpected use of color, vigorous paint handling and surprising compositions, his paintings make palpable the immediacy of nature and the intangibles of light and movement.

an illustrated catalogue featuring essays by the curators and an interview with the artist will be available.

if you are up in new england this summer...this would be the perfect field trip!

painting of the week!!!

hidell brooks gallery is thrilled to be having our first solo exhibition for scott duce at the gallery in late fall.  his beautiful paintings are slowly arriving at the gallery.  scott duce is an artist working in new york.  his paintings are in museums, corporations and private collections. duce received his mfa from boston university and his bfa from the university of utah.  we will be showing his marker series and in public series.  his unique style is a contemporary twist on the classic landscape that make for stunning paintings.  the in public series is a study of the human figure in motion.  his paintings are not complex in structure, they are simplified and thought provoking.

the artist states, "though the tree is the obvious focal point of the paintings, the land and sky assist in its dialogue, weaving a pattern of meaning and suggestion. it is my intention to find diversity in combinations of these elements, which then help to establish a connection between the whole painting and the viewer. it is important to recognize the image of the tree not necessarily as the tree outside of my window, but as the vehicle which i use to establish the time-honored process of painting."

new paintings...julia katz

love the new series of paintings by julia katz!  hidell brooks gallery had their first solo exhibition for the chicago based painter last year.  her paintings are full of luminous color and bursting with energy.  her main focus is the figure in movement but is emphasized by the abstract quality of her backgrounds.  the combination is fluid and perfectly matched.  the colors are strong but gorgeous.

In 2006, I started working with a theme of the figure in motion.  My interest in that theme has evolved over time, shifting toward the interaction of a moving figure with its environment and continuing to grow to include other concepts of motion and energy.    Those may be subtle biological or psychological energies, or enormous impersonal energies of our natural world.  

I use no visual references for the gestural abstraction in these paintings, although I have in mind that the forms I am inventing are organic and suggestive of nature.  I work spontaneously and impulsively.  Looking for compositions that strike me intuitively, I often rotate the paintings in all 4 directions as I paint, searching for visual forms and relationships that occur unintentionally.

new paintings by julia katz will arrive this summer at hidell brooks gallery.  we will be anxiously anticipating their arrival!!!

the gettysburg review + arless day

arless day has the distinguished honor of gracing the cover of the current issue of the gettysburg review.  his collage paintings are also featured inside the review as well.  the gettysburg review published by gettysburg college is the country's premier literary journal.  

the editors of The Gettysburg Review express their deep commitment to the arts and humanities by seeking out and publishing the very best contemporary poetry, fiction, essays, essay-reviews, and art in issues as physically beautiful as they are intellectually and emotionally stimulating.  our most important criterion is high literary quality; we look for writers who can shape language in thoughtful, surprising, and beautiful ways and who have something unique to say, whatever the subject matter or aesthetic approach. we have very eclectic tastes, but are highly selective, publishing only two percent of manuscripts submitted to us annually.

hidell brooks gallery is looking forward to the next solo exhibition featuring arless day's painting collages in september just in time for the democratic national convention!