Fall exhibits by our members

Portsmouth Contrasts in Black & White

 

 

Photo artist Thomas A. Wright offers two contrasting series of Portsmouth images as you

have never seen this historic city before. Showing October 5 - October 29. Join us for the

opening reception Friday Oct 7, 2016 5-8pm at the New Hampshire Art Association’s Robert

Lincoln Levy Gallery, 136 State Street, Portsmouth, NH. Visit us at

 

www.digitalvistasimaging.com for more details.

 

 

These paintings are on display through the end of December. The bank is located in the same plaza as the Whole Foods market in Bedford. You can go in and view the paintings any time the bank is open.

 

Joe Smiga will be exhibiting his photographs at various craft shows this fall. Linda Feinberg and Joe Smiga will be sharing a table at the Holiday Market downtown Manchester (1000 Elm Street) on Saturday, December 10th.

 

Artist of the Month award for September by the Manchester Artists Association was given to Linda Feinberg for her mixed media  painting "Follow Me" which is about the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument.

 

This area memorializes the U.S. Army’s 7^th Cavalry and the Sioux and Cheyenne in one of the Indian’s last armed efforts to preserve their way of life. Here on June 25 and 26 of 1876, 263 soldiers, including Lt. Col. George A. Custer and attached personnel of the U.S. Army, died fighting several thousand Lakota and Cheyenne warriors.

Various tribes banded together to win this battle, but lost the war. The memorial is very spiritual and explains more than can be said in this short writing. 

This mixed media painting is 9” X 12”, matted and framed under glass, 13” X 16”. $125

Next FOA meeting is the last Wednesday of October, Oct 26th, 7:00 p.m. Contact treasurer, Linda Feinberg if you would like more information.  lhfeinberg@gmail.com

 

 



Monday, June 20th - free concert

This is a free concert at Victory Park (across from the City Library).  The organization is trying to buy or lease the building on Amherst Street to bring more art and music downtown.

The mission of Old Sol Music Hall is to establish, maintain, and operate a performance venue and community center aimed at leveraging the arts to create positive social and environmental impact. Old Sol Music Hall will provide a mid-size performance space and implement civic programming, including weekly pre-­show service projects, in-kind donation drives, and a More Than Music Fund, which takes a portion of every ticket sold to support the work of local non-profit organizations. Through these efforts, Old Sol Music Hall will reinvest a projected $35,000+ worth of social impact into the Greater Manchester community every year.

Old Sol Music Hall will be both a cultural and civic venue in the heart of Downtown Manchester. Led by its team of Concert Corps national service members, Old Sol Music Hall will provide opportunities for patrons to give back to the local community which, in turn, will build social capital and help New Hampshire attract and retain its Millennial workforce.

Summer Project

Just a little preview of some of the proposals for the tunnel on the Piscataquog River trail. Photo above shows sketches for the tunnel by Anthony Williams.  Photos and sketches below are from Stephanie Byrd. The proposals have to be approved by the mayor and alderman before we can proceed with this project.

Inside Mural - Finished

With thanks to Shirley Perry for the photos. Our artists finished the mural in the O'Malley headquarters. Left to right: Anthony Williams, Deb Funk, Shirley Perry, Stephanie Byrd.

Annual Meeting Notice

Time and date:  Tuesday, January 19, 7:00 p.m.

Location: 90 Crestview Road, Manchester, NH 03104, contact for directions, Deb Funk: Motherfunk8@gmail.com

Roll call and Welcome new members, Collection of annual dues ($5.00)

Reading of Minutes of preceding meeting 

Treasurer’s Report

Reports of Officers (no elections of officers unless one of our officers resigns, terms are 2 years)

Election of Directors per Bylaws

“Beginning with the third year of the organization, the directors to be chosen shall be chosen at the annual meeting of this organization in the same manner and style as the officers of this organization and they shall serve for a term of two (2) years.

The Board of Directors shall have the control and management of the affairs and business of this organization. Such Board of Directors shall only act in the name of the organization when it shall be regularly convened by its chairman after due notice to all the directors of such meeting.

Fifty-one (51%) percent of the members of the Board of Directors shall constitute a quorum and the meetings of the Board of Directors shall be held regularly on the third Thursday of the month or on such other date as the Board of Directors authorizes.

Each director shall have one vote and such voting may not be done by proxy.

The Board of Directors may make such rules and regulations covering its meetings as it may in its discretion determine necessary.

Vacancies in the Board of Directors shall be filled by a vote of the majority of the remaining members of the Board of Directors for the balance of the year.

The President of the organization by virtue of the office shall be Chairman of the Board of Directors.

A director may be removed when sufficient cause exists for such removal. The Board of Directors may entertain charges against any director. A director may be represented by counsel upon any removal hearing. The Board of Directors shall adopt such rules for this hearing as it may in its discretion consider necessary for the best interests of the organization.“

                    

Old and Unfinished Business

New Business

Set next meeting date and location

If you would like more detailed information, please contact our treasurer, Linda Feinberg, lhfeinberg@gmail.com

If you are not a member but would like to join us at the meeting, you will be welcome to our group. We will also be discussing our spring and summer projects. You can pay the dues at this meeting, or use the Paypal button on top of the blog page.

More art competitions

Just click on the images to enlarge them. Also, the tab on the right at the top has more information about shows, fairs and classes.

Member updates and invites

Joe Smiga along with at least fourteen other photographers will be exhibiting their photos in the lower level at the Hooksett Library from September 1st to December 31st.  

Joe will also be doing a lone photo exhibit in the main level of the Hooksett library that will run the first quarter of 2016.  He plans to have 12 to 14 photos in that exhibit of pictures he took in the Canadian Rockies.

Joe took these two photos of stained glass in a friend’s home in Manchester. 

Several of our members will be exhibiting at the Manchester Artist Association annual Art in the Park show.  This year the show will be held in Merrimack on September 26th, 9:30 – 4:30. The event will be held at the Abbie Griffin Park, 6 Baboosic Lake Road, Merrimack. There is ample parking behind the town hall.

Rollande Rousselle is now part of a new artist’s group in Amherst (28-1 State Route 101A). The artists are painting on site, giving classes and have a lovely gallery called Creative Ventures.  The grand opening will be on Friday, September 11th from 3-6 PM. 

Some information from their website:

"In July of 2015, Creative Ventures Gallery was born. Creative Ventures exists to provide working space and to create visibility for talented local artists who gathered together with the common goal of getting more stable exposure to the public. The studio/gallery is open to the public and provides a relaxing environment, allowing the public to interact with artists. The artists work independently but come together for our united cause. On any given day several artists can be found working in their studio spaces.

Our location combines studio, gallery and classroom space all under one roof. At any one time the art represented may include oils, acrylic, watercolor, pastels or other works on paper. We also offer sculptural ceramics to the public. Our gallery space is part of each artist’s studio space. Some are paintings come right off the easel. Some artists offer art classes and workshops. There also are outside artists who teach in the classroom."

Good luck to the artists and their new venture.

Our next Friends of Art Manchester meeting is on Thursday, September 17th at 7:00 p.m. at Linda and Joe’s house, 511 Pickering Street.  We hope to have a guest who will talk to us about how we can help with the Riverwalk in Manchester and some of the downtown graffiti problems.

June Challenge - Doors

Shirley Perry was the only one to submit a photo for our June challenge of "Doors". Thank you, Shirley.

These two are my own photos and they are in Manchester.

There are many interesting doors downtown. You are welcome to submit more photos or sketches and I will post them for you.

Send compressed file to: lhfeinberg@gmail.com
Thank you.

Public Art - Urban Art

Congrats to our VP, Anthony Williams, on his first place prize! Thank you to member Shirley Perry for these photos. Anthony teaches art classes locally.

You can find his contact information on our “Contact Us” page (tab at top).

















No one submitted any art for the June challenge in our last post (it’s still on so you can still submit a sketch) so I’m posting some urban art from my recent trip west. These photos were taken in Boise, Idaho.

I hope that these inspire you to submit some of your own work. You do not have to be a member of Friends of Art Manchester to do our June challenge. Please send your ideas, guest posts and art/photo submissions to our treasurer Linda Feinberg, lhfeinberg@gmail.com

If you include any attachments, I would appreciate it if they are in a condensed file format, not a large file. If you prefer, you can send me a link to where the file is posted (especially if it is a large file) and I can include that. Thank you.

June Challenge - Doors

What inspires you? We are testing out a challenge for the month of June.  Our first challenge topic is "Doors".  Please submit a sketch, painting, drawing, sculpture, photo, poem, music on this subject. To submit, post in the comments section below. If you can't copy your item, then post a link to a URL on the web where we can find it. There are no prizes, but we will be happy to give you credit on our blog.

We are pretty flexible with the topic, doors could also include gates, car doors, barn doors etc. Your "art" does not have to be from Manchester, it could be from anywhere, just try to stick to the topic. In July we'll have a different topic.

Places to look downtown -- the various churches have interesting doors, also NH Institute of Art, the city library, gates to the Valley Street Cemetery.

You do not have to be a member to submit your inspiration to this challenge, but of course, we would appreciate it if you would join us. The membership fee is only $5.00 annually and you can pay with the Paypal button on this site.

We look forward to seeing your work. You can include a couple of sentences too about what inspired you to create it. Please note that comments are moderated and will take a day or two to post.

Linda Feinberg, Treasurer
Friends of Art Manchester

To start off the challenge, here is an old Photoshopped picture of the front doors at NH Institute of Art:

Project Ideas for Spring and Summer

Our winter project is gradually getting done. Paintings by Linda Feinberg and Deb Funk have been delivered to Webster House. Linda’s painting is up on the wall of the conference room.

Carolina Davison is working on getting the building that the city owns (former Latin America Center at 521 Maple Street) turned into an art center. We hope she succeeds! She has already had a fundraiser and an open house. Lots of people are interested in this project.

Several ideas were suggested for spring and summer projects, including a sketch crawl (bring your camera or sketchpad, meet somewhere, then head out, do your thing, and come back to show everybody what you accomplished afterwards). This would be both a social and art event.

Several of our artists are interested in painting more utility boxes and will be taking photos to discuss which ones with the city. 

Tables will be available at Veterans Park during their concerts.  We might take a table one evening and sell some items as a fundraiser for our group.  Linda suggested we could buy notecards (Strathmore has some) and paint them to sell. Items to sell need to be fairly low prices as these are free concerts and people who attend are not bringing much money with them.

Another project from Webster House – finish up the 4’ x 8’ mural in their basement. We have some volunteers already and I’m looking forward to seeing the finished mural. Our next meeting is May 20, 2015.

Color Charts for Painters

It’s easy to make your own color charts with your own paints. The photo above shows one method of making a color chart.  These are Winsor & Newton Artisan water mixable oil paints.  The company puts out a chart too with teeny tiny photos of the colors.  I drew straight lines with a ruler and permanent marker on 9” X 12” gessoed canvas paper (these come in a pad and are not too expensive).

Since I was just interested in seeing what the colors looked like in a larger view, I did one chart for each group of colors. I also did one for the neutrals, but it is not shown here.  Across the top row I wrote the color name and noted if the color was opaque (“O”) or transparent (“T”).  I painted the actual colors in that color family on the second row.  On the third row down, I added transparent white to each color.  On the fourth row down, I chose yellow ochre to mix with it on some of the charts.  The other rows vary depending on what I wanted to see. (You can enlarge the photo above by clicking on it).

I took a color mixing class in acrylic paints a few years back. The charts we made there were more about color mixing. These were done on acrylic paper. (photo below)

Top left chart shows primary colors, red on left in box 1, yellow in middle box 3, blue on right in box 5.  Other charts are variations on color mixing.  Most of them show the first row had one color on the left (box #1) and the one we wanted to mix it with in box #5 on the right. Then we mixed the two colors together 50/50 and put that mix in box #3. Again mixed box #3 with #1 into #2; then #5 (original color) and mix #3 into #4.  The second row down were the top row mixes mixed with titanium white. The third row down contained the first row’s mixes mixed with neutral gray; and the fourth row down contained the top row’s mixes mixed with black.  These can be done with any medium, not just acrylic paints. I added some other mixes in box #6 to see what they looked like.

Basically, most of us know that when we mix blue and yellow, we get green. But with pigments there are many yellows and many blues, so we will get many shades of green.  Making color charts will help with decision making when you are painting.

On my own, I decided to try to figure out what my paint tubes looked like, which ones were transparent and which ones were opaque.  I made another series of charts (below).

In these my first column contained my artist grade paints. The second column contained my student grade paints and the last column contained some craft paints I also had from other projects.  It was interesting to see the differences in the different grades of paint. The black line down was to help me determine which paints were opaque (full coverage) and which ones were transparent.

These are tedious exercises, but worthwhile and you will have your own color charts with your paints to refer to for every painting.  If you are really serious, you can note down your mix ratios too (as can be seen in books about color theory).

Happy painting!

Next Friends of Art Manchester regular meeting is on Thursday, March 19^th at 7:00 p.m. We will be meeting at a different venue this week. For more information contact blogger and treasurer LindaFeinberg.

Webster House Winter Project

Artwork by Christina Burke-Gagnon (Tina Gagnon)

The proposals/sketches/photos are coming in for our winter project. We will be discussing these at our annual meeting on Jan. 21st (see the Jan. 2nd posting on this blog for more information).  We will be choosing four designs for the 4' x 5' panels at Webster House and possibly some alternatives in case our top four picks are not acceptable for some reason or other.  Please take a few minutes to look at all the photos and come to the meeting with your suggestions and comments.

Four beautiful designs by Deb Funk (above)

Two sketches (above) by Eileen Belanger. I can imagine them in color easily having seen Eileen's paintings in the past.

Sketch by Anthony Williams (our top muralist!). Looks like he's really thinking.....

Urban scenes from Manchester, NH, bridge and river studies by our blogger, Linda Feinberg. That's the Merrimack River flowing through our interesting city.

And finally, some suggestions by Lou Catano, director of Webster House. We could make a variation of any of these. I don't know who the original artist is so we wouldn't be able to copy without permission (copyright issues), but we can certainly do something similar.

These are the submissions that came in by the deadline. If there are a few more ideas, they will be added to this post if possible, or shown at the meeting.  Hope everyone has a creative and artistic weekend.

To view the pictures in full, just click on them.