The Mosaic Project is a multicultural exhibition and educational program for students and families in Lancaster County.
The Project is made possible through a generous grant from the Lancaster County Community Foundation.
***Less than 1 month until the 2010 Mosaic Project gallery exhibit opening night!***
We are proud to announce the 2010 Mosaic Project artists:
Diane Edison and Jerry Pinkney
Diane Edison
The direction of my work while firmly rooted in personal iconography, has become much more diverse in visual choices, with a much more inclusive selection of portrait images. Through these portraits I give acknowledgment to the psychological and distinguishing issues of identity. It is the duality of literal representation and narrative content that defines my pursuit.
One may extrapolate a point of view through reading the individual painting and drawings, as primarily a dialogue between the subject, the viewer and myself. The central subtext of this interpretation is, decisively, what I have come to recognize about others and myself through the making of art. These images can be understood as conversations.
Join us at PCA&D on October 1, 2010, and meet Diane Edison in person! Public activities that day include an artist talk at 10 a.m., a book signing from 5:30 - 6:30 p.m., and a reception to meet the artists from 5 - 8 p.m. Click here for more details.
Congratulations Jerry Pinkney for winning the 2010 Caldecott Medal for "The Lion and the Mouse."
I am a story teller at heart, so each project begins with this question, “Is this story worth telling?”
I grew up in the Germantown section of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Most of the members of my small African American community had migrated from the South. What impressed me as a young boy was the way my family members and neighbors expressed themselves thorough stories. Whether in the oral tradition or in music that one embraced, Gospel, Blues or Jazz, it was all about the delivery of a well told story. I chose to express myself through picture making, visual storytelling. Drawing and painting helped me to tap into that part of my being that needed to create. My work today imitates the energy and the animated way in which stories where told during those impressionable years.
African American history and culture takes up the most space in my body of work, this too springs from my childhood. Over the years I have been fortunate to create works for a variety of projects. All when at their best enhance and enlarge how I see the world around me. Yet it is those projects that speak to the African American narrative that give me a sense of purpose and the most satisfaction. I love the act of making marks on paper, and seeing those marks develop into a picture. My intent and hope is to lead viewers into a world that only exists because of that image. In many ways I believe the work that I do is a form of citizenship, a way of being and contributing to our country.
Join us at PCA&D on October 1, 2010, and meet Jerry Pinkney. Public activities that day include his artist talk at 1 p.m., a book signing from 5:30 - 6:30 p.m., and a reception to meet the artists from 5 - 8 p.m. Click here for more details.
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Meet the 2009 Mosaic Project Artists: Mary Borgman and Rudy Gutierrez
Formerly a professional sign language interpreter, I now translate the personalities and dignity of individuals into drawings.
My subjects are often drawn from a diversity of cultures. Through my art, I want to introduce them to others, to capture their beauty and reveal the essence of their spirit and humanity.
I work with charcoal on frosted Mylar because this translucent support allows me to build up and then erase marks to expose the luminous quality of light.
The sitters assume frontal, uncompromising poses and look directly at the viewer, turning the observer into the observed. The larger-than-life size format magnifies the intensity of the sitter’s gaze and infuses the portrait with a presence that transcends the passing moment.
~Mary Borgman
Since 2004, Borgman has been an instructor at Washington University in St. Louis, the same school from which she received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Graphic Communications. She has also earned her Associate of Arts in Deaf Communications (St. Louis Community College) as well as her Master of Arts and Master of Fine Arts from Fontbonne College (also in St. Louis).
RECENT SELECTED EXHIBITIONS
2009:
Mosaic Project, Pennsylvania College of Art & Design, Lancaster, PA
Art Chicago, Merchandise Mart, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago
SOFA NY
Portraits, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago
2008:
Photo/Realism, Clay Center, Charleston, WV
Looking Ahead: Portraits of the Mott-Warsh Collection, Muskegon Museum of Art, Muskegon, MI
Palm Beach³, Ann Nathan Gallery, Palm Beach, FL
Art Chicago, Merchandise Mart, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago
SOFA Sculpture, Objects, Functional Art, Ann Nathan Gallery, New York, NY
2007:
SOFA: Sculpture, Objects, Functional Art, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL
In Black and White II, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL
SOFA: Sculpture, Objects, Functional Art, Ann Nathan Gallery, New York, NY
Art Chicago, Merchandise Mart, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago
Palm Beach³, Ann Nathan Gallery, Palm Beach, FL |
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Rudy Gutierrez was born in the Bronx, New York, and grew up in Teaneck, New Jersey. He received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Pratt Institute, where he began working professionally. His art has been commissioned for various periodicals, book covers, magazines, records, CDs, and children’s books worldwide, and his paintings have appeared nationally and abroad.
Among other honors, Gutierrez has received the Dean Cornwell Recognition Award, the Distinguished Educator in the Arts Award and a Gold Medal from the New York Society of Illustrators. His art has been featured by Communication Arts, Step by Step, Society of Illustrators, and Art Direction Magazine, as well as the book, Art Revolution.
His work has been described as “Wall Medicine,” ancient yet contemporary, urban in a sense and musical in feel. Gutierrez believes that the highest honor and fulfillment is to inspire and uplift. To this end, he has performed as a guest artist with Def Dance Jam Workshop, doing live “painting performances,” backdrops, stage props, and workshops with the dance troupe, which features hearing impaired and physically challenged youth. He has also “performed” with Dance, Music, and Kids on stage with performers of “The Lion King” and “Bring in the Noise, Bring in the Funk,” among others, at the Henry Street Settlement for a benefit concert by the organization. Dance, Music, and Kids is a grassroots, community-based project to bring the arts to children who might not otherwise gain that exposure.
Gutierrez has also contributed art to the First Annual Anti-Apartheid show at the United Nations, participated in a touring show of Germany exploring social issues, and donated art to the International Cultures Foundation. He recently exhibited a painting at the World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa, and contributed to and cocurated “The Prevailing Human Spirit” Exhibition in New York, a benefit for the victims of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.
Gutierrez has taught at Pratt Institute since 1990 and has taught or lectured at many other institutions. His art work was featured in the film “The Task,” and he was commissioned to do the CD cover art for Santana’s “Shaman,” which was featured during the 2002 Super Bowl halftime show and on guitars, clothing, candy, eyeglasses, shoes and other products to fight AIDS in South Africa. Gutierrez’s art hangs in the private collections of Carlos Santana, Clive Davis and Wayne Shorter, among others.
“If art is therapy
if art is to inspire
if art is a weapon
if it is medicine used to heal soul wounds
or if it makes one not feel alone in his or her visions
or if it serves as transportation to a higher self
Then that is where I aspire to live everyday.”- Rudy Gutierrez
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