Oregon District Holiday Art Walk, Saturday, December 13, noon to 6 p.m.

Get in the holiday spirit as you stroll the galleries, sip cider and check off some of the names on your shopping list during the first Oregon Arts District Holiday Art Walk.

The event runs from noon to 6 p.m, Saturday, December 13. Enjoy lunch beforehand or dinner afterward at one of the district's many fine restaurants and taverns.

Gallery 510 Fine Art will host special events during the Holiday Art Walk:

1 to 3 p.m.: Cathy Jeffers will demonstrate felting. Guests also may make and take a felt ornament during this time for a $15. fee, which includes all the supplies to create one or two ornaments, a felting needle and block, and instruction from Cathy.

2 to 4 p.m.: Curt Dalton will sign his new book about the history of the Dayton Arcade, his 32nd book on Dayton history.  All proceeds from the $25. purchase price of the book, as well as any sales of $5 Dayton Arcade book bags, will be donated to the "Save the Arcade" effort.

4 to 6 p.m.: Gallery owner Loretta Puncer will demonstrate oil painting. Pears and apples are Loretta's favorite subjects for her small-scale oil paintings. She will create a painting from start to finish, and guests will have an opportunity to ask questions. Her new schedule of classes also will be available.

Panel Discussion on visual performance

Add some food for thought to your Thanksgiving weekend.  An artists' panel discussion on visual performance, "Physical Endurance and Extended Time," will be held at 7p.m. this Friday, Nov. 28, at Gallery 510 Fine Art, 510 E. Fifth St.

The discussion is being held in conjunction with the visual performance art exhibit "Approaching Metronome" at Goloka gallery, in which sculptor and painter Ryan McCullough is seeking to discover the space where sensory deprivation, identity and social expression intersect by becoming the very concept his art aims to explore. On Nov. 7, a sensory-deprived McCullough - outfitted with industrial earplugs and his eyes covered - began a residency in the gallery, creating art that was a visual representation of his experiences in his quiet darkness.

McCullough will participate in the panel discussion, along with Landon Crowell, the sculpture technician at Wright State University who has worked on extended time physical endurance art, and Jason Nein, who is in the Master of Fine Arts degree program in sculpture at Ohio University.  Thomas Macaulay of Wright State University will moderate.   

Gallery 510 Fine Art

Hi! I have not posted here for quite a while.  Lots of new things are going on with me and my art.  In October I expanded my gallery into the empty storefront next door.  I tripled the size of the gallery to 2400 sq. ft.  Part of the reason for doing this was to have more room to teach workshops.  I now have a space at the rear of the new gallery dedicated to teaching.  I also have room to showcase more of my artwork as well as the artwork of other wonderful artists.  

Currently on exhibit at Gallery 510 Fine Art are 20 of the watercolor paintings I did over the summer.  They are of the homes in the adjacent Oregon Historic District neighborhood. While I was painting a friend on mine, Doug Taylor, was taking photographs of the same locations and those photos are hanging with my paintings thru the month of November.

Gallery 510 Fine Art also has a wonderful group of paintings by Dayton artist and educator Curtis Barnes Sr.  The show is a preview exhibit for his upcoming retrospective at the University of Dayton December 9, 2008 thru January 30, 2009.  We have 23 of Mr. Barnes paintings, many of them recent 2008 canvases.

Gallery 510 Fine Art has many great holiday gifts...paintings, photographs, sculptures, fine pottery, handmade jewelry, art quilts, greeting cards, handcrafted natural soaps.  Please plan on stopping in sometime soon.  Gallery hours are Wed, Thu & Sat. 12-5, Fri 3-8 & by appointment.  Plan to lunch at Dublin Pub, Trolley Stop, Blind Bob's, Pacchia, Oregon Express or Thia 9 and stop by the gallery for a visit!

Miami for the Weekend!

I'm heading down to Miami, Florida for the weekend, if I can get there through the snow and ice.  I want to see what the art scene is like in the Wynwood Arts District. A fellow artist has recommended that I visit the Steve Martin Gallery.  They have an interesting website www.stevemartinfineart.com. I am "stuck" as some people say in a non-productive funk and I need some new inspiration.  I'm sure the sun and surf will help things along as well as looking at some new and different art. 

Car Painting Number 4

Done! Delivered to the framer a few days ago.  I've been working on this commission for the last year and I just finished the fourth of five large car paintings.  

As I'm working on them I feel frantic that I am never going to finish but you get to a certain point and you know you are just about there.  The hard part about realistic painting is that there is no set time schedule.  You can think that just because it took you 2 months to finish the last painting that it will take the same amount of time to finish the next one of similar size and detail, but art never works that way.  Each painting is its own entity with its own life and it takes its time being born.  It leads you along at its own pace and after you've sweated and struggled and sworn that you need to find an easier way to make a living, it enfolds you in its arms and says, "Yes, this is working and feeling very, very fine indeed!"

And so I begin a new painting!

Firmament, acrylic on canvas, 11"x14"x1-1/2", $95.

Photos from the Grand Opening

New Contemporary Painting

Intersection, acrylic on canvas, 36"x12"x1-1/2", $325.

Pick a color palette,  grab a canvas and paint.  The freedom that contemporary abstract painting allows is a great compliment to the realistic still life and landscapes that I create.

More Gallery 510 Photos!

Can you tell I'm just a little excited about Gallery 510!  The first photo is of my sister, Rosemary Baumann, on the left, who is my business partner and Gallery Director for Gallery 510, and me, Loretta Puncer, on the right.  

We are still working on establishing regular business hours... everything happened so quickly that I'm still trying to arrange my life to fit a gallery schedule.  Tentative hours are Wednesday, Thursday & Saturday 12-5, Friday 3-8. Regular hours will begin February 1 in conjunction with the Grand Opening.

The studio space within the gallery is working out very well.  I have devised a wall easel with a moveable shelf for painting.  I am also using a portable easel to paint on at the front of the gallery.  The light from the front windows comes from the north and is a very steady, bright light to paint in.  

Currently, I am still working on a commissioned car painting (the fourth of five),  a commissioned painting of an historical building,  and a series of contemporary pieces for the gallery opening.  I am also really feeling drawn back to the traditional still life, what this wonderful art journey all started with.  I found a shiny silver water pitcher at the Goodwill store the other day and my mind is swirling with ideas about what to include with this pitcher for a still life setup... I know I've said this before... especially to my students... the setup for a painting can take as long as it does to do the actual painting... I enjoy both.  It's like the time you spend preparing to have a Thanksgiving Dinner at your home.  You want everything to be perfect, you think about who you will invite, where people will sit, what you are going to serve. When the day comes, your guests arrive, the turkey has been in the oven all day, appetites are ravenous.  And then the feeding frenzy begins.  The best part though, is at the end of the day, the satisfaction you will have when every last plate is cleaned and bellies are full and that sleepy haze of satisfaction rules the rest of the evening.  A little dramatic, isn't it, but that's the best analogy I can come up with for what it feels like when I create a new still life painting.

Have a great Sunday!  I hope you have an original piece of art in your home that you can go to right now to enjoy.  If not you need to come see me!!

  

Photos of Gallery 510

I love my new space.  I've been painting away at Gallery 510.  Here are a few photos of the gallery space and my studio space.

Gallery 510 will be open for January "First Friday"

If you are planning to attend to this month's "First Friday", this Friday, January 4, 5-10pm, at the Cannery Art & Design Center stop by Gallery 510 and check it out. Get a sneak preview before the Grand Opening scheduled for February 1 & 2.  Gallery 510 is located at 510 East Fifth Street in the Oregon District. 937-672-6717