FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
“Visions”
a group exhibition, featuring four contemporary abstract expressionism
and collage artists:
David Garcia, Ivo Perelman, Janice M. Pittsley, Launa D. Romoff
Dates: May 1st – 22nd, 2004
Opening Reception: Saturday, May 1st, 6 – 9 pm
Absolute Art
Gallery
2326 Huntington Drive, San Marino, CA 91108
Tel: 626.285.8585
E-mail: <mailto:info@absoluteartgallery.net>
Web site: <http://www.absoluteartgallery.net>
Gallery Hours: Tuesday to Saturday, 11am-6pm, and by appointment
Contact: Gallery Director
San Marino, CA -- Absolute Art Gallery, a new contemporary art gallery, is very pleased to announce a group exhibition, “Visions” featuring four contemporary abstract expressionism and collage artists David Garcia, Ivo Perelman, Janice M. Pittsley, Launa D. Romoff. The exhibition opens May 1st and runs through May 22nd, 2004.
David
Garcia “Zee Zee” Acrylic on Paper, 30”x22” |
Ivo
Perelman |
Janice
M. Pittsley |
Launa
D. Romoff “Untitled #203” Mixed Media on Paper, 6 1/4” x 4 1/2” |
“The dream
begins
The painting unfolds
I feel my way along.
All manner of obstacles are encountered
I reach for balance and rhythm and truth
I seek for understanding
I test my strengths
I see the weaknesses.
I am influenced by everything
I become eternal for a moment.”
David Garcia was born in California of Portuguese/American parents.
As a young man he moved to Paris, attended the Academic Julian, and
traveled throughout Europe. During his travels, he made a sojourn to
his grandparents' birthplace in the Portuguese Azores. After living
there for a period of time he returned to the United States in pursuit
of the Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees in the fine arts.
He was then offered a teaching job in Aspen, Colorado, where he lived
for two years. Another two years’ teaching in Los Angeles followed
this teaching assignment. He has traveled through Europe, Japan, India,
Mexico, Tahiti, Thailand and the United States with a passion for art.
The natural affinity of music and visual art has rarely ever been expressed as vividly as in the visual imagery created by noted jazz saxophonist, Ivo Perelman. Born in Sao Paulo, Brazil, he came to the United States in 1981 to pursue a musical career. He has performed to great acclaim in jazz festivals and concerts around the world and has recorded 25 CDs. His music, a unique form of free jazz, translates itself into the striking Abstract Expressionism of his painted imagery. Just as his music evolves out of his liberation from musical convention, his imagery dispenses with traditional artistic conventions and expresses the raw energy that creates each painting. The intense flows and abrupt breaks of sound that emerge from his saxophone are reborn as zigzagging lines of color splashed on canvas. Each painting is like a performance, a set of actions in time, which can happen in that particular way only once, embodying the sound of his music through the stroke of the paintbrush. The notes become vibrant colors and the rhythm transcends into shape. He passionately unravels the most vivid emotions, whether playing the saxophone or approaching the canvas.
Janice M. Pittsley’s
primary interest is to explore the place where representation and abstraction
meet, where the particularities of the material world are joined with
the abstract qualities of the world of ideas and emotions. Pittsley
develops this place through an interweaving of opposites: the naturalistic
and the idealized, the airy and the grounded, the imagined and the observed,
the particular and the generalized. She wants her painting to carry
threads from the perceptually felt world to the intellectual world:
“I hope to create drawings in which the mind, the hand, and the
heart work together in concert.”
Pittsley’s drawings are developed from a variety of sources and
interests. “My interest in pictorial representations of both real
and imagined images is influenced by my love of reading both nonfiction
and fiction.”
Pittsley’s work combines a variety of traditional drawing materials:
graphite, charcoal, pastels, colored pencil, and erasers. Her intention
is to use their diverse physical qualities to create a harmonious and
engaging material presence. Much as the ideas in her drawings involve
a synthesis of opposites, she wants their materials and process to reflect
visual contrasts: the hard edge achieved with sharpened pencil combined
with the blurred edge of pastel, the opacity of many layers with the
transparency of one, the somber palette of charcoal with the pure pigment
of pastel.
Born in Los Angeles,
Launa Romoff has been working with collage/mixed media since
1997. She has been inspired by the work of Kurt Schwitters, regarded
by most as the twentieth Century master of collage. Ms. Romoff finds
her material everywhere, for she believes that by working in this medium,
you learn to “see” the beauty of the discarded and turn it
into “art.”
“How I use the material at hand is often more important than the
material itself” – Kurt Schwitters
The exhibition runs
through May 22nd, and the opening reception will be held from 6-9 pm
on Saturday, May 1st, 2004, and will be open to the public.
Absolute Art Gallery is located at 2326 Huntington Drive, between San
Marino Avenue and Del Mar Avenue, 100 feet east of San Marino City Hall,
south of Huntington Library in San Marino. Map
& Directions:
Monthly exhibition opening receptions will be held from 6-9 pm on the first Saturday of each month.
For more information about Absolute Art Gallery and exhibitions, including images, please contact: Gallery Director at 626.285.8585 or info@absoluteartgallery.net
