Art News

Chet Zar will be curating and participating in “The Talking Board Show”, opening on October 20th at CoproNason Gallery in Santa Monica, CA.
Over 30 artists have created their own custom, functioning talking boards (ie: ouija boards) for this event. There will also be a live musical performance by The Ghastly Ones.

Chet Zar will be debuting new giclee prints of two of his most popular paintings, “Black Magick” and “I Want You” - 30×40” wrapped canvas on wooden stretcher bars, signed and limited to 20 each - price is only $450 each.  Available only at CoproNason gallery.

“The Talking Board Show”
Group exhibition and Halloween party at CoproNason Gallery
2525 Michigan Ave. T5, Santa Monica, CA. 90404, 310.829.2156

Opening reception:
Oct. 20th, 2007 (show runs through Oct. 31st)
8pm- Midnight (come in costume!)
Free admission

Artists: Brandi Milne, Bruce Mitchell, Carrie Ann Baade , C. Blake Williams, Chantal Menard, Chet Zar , Christopher Owen, Chris Peters, Colin Burns, David Hochbaum, David Stoupakis , Ed Benedetto, Eric Pigors, Germs, Joe Vaux, John Haley III, Jose Lopes, Junkhauler, Kathie Olivas, Kevin Willis, Lola, Matthew Bone, Meats Meier , Michelle Waterman, Nathan Spoor , Orion, Travis Lindquist, Travis Louie , Ver Mar, Wilson Hsu, Zombienose

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Viktor Safonkin’s exhibition entitled “The Inside Pressure” will be held in the H.R.Giger Museum, Gruyeres, Switzerland.

The exhibition opening takes place on the 3^rd of November at 17:00 in the H.R.Giger Museum. The exhibition will proceed 6 months from the opening day.

All the paintings are borrowed from the collection of the Museum of Fantastic Art in Zeist, Holland.

Gallerie Museum H.R.Giger,
Chateau St. Germain,
CH – 1663 Gruyeres,
Tel. +41 (0)26 921 22 00

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Updated web site of James Zar -  www.jameszar.com

James Zar has run the gamut in all areas of the fine art and commercial art fields.  Someone once said he’s one of the most diverse artists I’ve ever seen.  He’s been a celebrated sports illustrator, a major movie artist, a classical still life master for galleries across the United States, and a mystic interpreter of unseen realities as demonstrated in his powerful surrealistic fantasy or dream art creations.

Education: Mr. Zar studied at the San Francisco Art Institutes, and privately with the late Keith Finch.  Mr. Finch was the biggest influence in his current free wheeling fantasy work.

Shows and awards:  Zar won first place in the Los Angeles Bicentennial show, a gold medal in the San Dimas Art Festival, and his work is part of the Raymond James Museum.  He has had numerous one-man shows and he has been written up in Desert Magazine, New Mexico Magazine, Rendezvous Magazine, Southwest Profile and Southwest Art magazine.

At present Mr. Zar is focused on his mystical fantasy art, and with the help of his son, whom Zar refers to as, “The Great Chet” (a great artist in his own right)  has set up a new web site and blog to try , as he says, “To share my life’s work and deepest heartfelt convictions with as many people as possible.”

James Zar also has a blog discussing the symbolism and his process in creating his paintings:

"My artwork, especially the fantasy work, is developed out of spontaneous feeling tones. A figure or a scene flashes across the palace of mind and insatiable curiosity draws me into a new adventure. This quality of being in the creative mode attracts great energy to it. Every new painting is in the womb of this new energy. I believe every self or person is an energy idea. This idea yearns to be expressed. God also yearns to know more about God through this life or expressed idea.Rarely does the meaning or teaching of a new painting make itself known to me until after it is finished. Then, often it will startle me with, 'Oh, that’s what that means!'" - (excerpt from James Zar's blog)

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Mysterium Fidei - A Retrospective Catalog Highlighting Daniel Martin Diaz ’s Career
Paintings, Drawings, and Prints, 128-Page Cloth Hardback, 10×10 Full Color

Foreword by Gloria Fraser Giffords with Michael M. Brescia, Ph.D. and John David Long-Garcia, M.A.
 
"….broodingly personal…with a compelling, esoteric edge.”  -The Los Angeles Times
 
A catalog highlighting Diaz’s career and newest body of work. In this collection of oil paintings, drawings, and prints, Diaz contemplates human suffering and one's undying faith in the afterlife. His mystical imagery reflects the influences of Byzantine iconography, Retabalos, Ex Votos, the Illuminati, ephemera, alchemy, and 16th-century anatomical engravings.

Gloria Fraser Giffords, author of Mexican Folk Retablos, is a  art historian and conservationist of 17th Century  Mexican religious art.

Michael M. Brescia, Ph.D. (Latin Am. Hist.), is Assistant Curator of Ethnohistory at Arizona State Museum andAssistant Professor of History at the University of Arizona.

John David Long-Garcia, M.A. (Phil., Theol.), is the Managing Editor of the Catholic Sun and an  Adjunct Professor at the Kino Institute.

Special Edition Slipcase & Clamshell w/ Signed Etching will be available in Sept.

You can Pre-order and read more about the book by visiting Daniel Martin Diaz's personal site .

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Please join Martina Hoffmann for a solo exhibition of her work.

The artist will be showing a selection of 40 paintings and limited edition canvas prints.

Hoffmann’s ‘Transcendent Realism’ offers the viewer a detailed glimpse into her inner landscapes that have been informed by the dream state, meditation and shamanic journeys. These realms reflect a deep reverence for the universal interconnectedness and interdependency of all life.

THE FENARIO GALLERY

Nov. 2, 2007 – Jan.1, 2008

Opening Reception: Nov. 2, 2007, 6 PM

881 Willamette St.

Eugene, Oregon 97401

(541) 687 –933

Hoffmann personal website

To view the complete show online after Nov 2, 2007, visit The Fenario Gallery

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THE largest collection of Australian surrealism ever assembled has been given to the National Gallery despite its owner, Ray Wilson, being a trustee of the Art Gallery of NSW Foundation.

At the time he was yet to inform the NSW Gallery or its director, Edmund Capon, of his decision. The works, worth $6.6 million, fill a major gap in the National Gallery's collection. Boyds and Nolans are represented alongside the first Australian surrealist painting, James Gleeson's The Attitude of Lightning Towards a Lady-Mountain.

The $6.6 million acquisition is in two parts: the NGA has paid $2.5 million of the total value, the rest is the gift of Agapitos and Mr Wilson, who lives in Sydney.

Mr Wilson, who spent 17 years building the collection with his late partner, James Agapitos, said too much love and intellectual rigour had been invested in the collection to see it split up. He had been in discussion with the gallery for more than two years.

The NGA director Ron Radford yesterday described the gift-purchase as "a very generous act". The collection covers the period 1925-55 and features works by many of Australia's great artists, including Sidney Nolan, Arthur Boyd, Albert Tucker, Robert Klippel, Joy Hester, Jeffrey Smart, Russell Drysdale and Danila Vassilieff.

It also includes works by Australia's greatest living surrealist, James Gleeson - who has only limited representation at the Canberra gallery. In the 1970s, Gleeson was on the NGA's curatorial team, then later joined the board. He had strong views regarding perceptions of conflict of interest and discouraged the gallery from buying his works.

Although Agapitos and Mr Wilson were long-time supporters of other Australian galleries, the NGA's strong international and local surrealist representation seemed the most obvious home for their collection.

Photo: National Gallery of Australia

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The Panorama Museum in Bad Frankenhausen, Germany, is a treasure for Fantastic painting. The building houses the the monumental painting "Early Bourgeois Revolution in Germany" (1983-1987) by the artist Werner Tübke (1929 - 2004). The painting is a massive 14 x 123m panorama painted in the Old Masters techniques. The visual effect of this work is stunning to behold and towers above you when you enter the circular chamber that houses it. Only the painting itself is lit, heightening it's effect. In every direction one turns there are new details to behold. It is unlike other gallery experiences where one may invest a few minutes observing a painting before moving onto the next. It is totally immersive in that no matter where you turn you are surrounded.

Tübke was commissioned by the East German Government to create an artwork to celebrate a peasant's uprising in the 1500's. The scale of the painting was chosen for him, as government officials wanted to out do a similar project in Moscow. Originally Tübke declined, but later agreed under certain conditions. The project took him several years to research and prepare for, and then another two years to produce a 1:10 scaled version of the planned painting. He then laboured over the painting with a team of artists between 1983 to 1987 to complete it. In the end it impacted on his health, and spent the final nine months working with out a day off.

Original woodblock prints from around the era of the uprising were used as reference material, and ultimately the style. The challenge was compose a picture with out beginning or end, where all scenes overlapped into a circular whole. The final effect is like that of Hieronymus Bosch or Pieter Bruegel, and both seemingly have some influence on Tübke's work. It is an apocalyptic vision reflecting what inspired the medieval mind of Thomas Müntzer, who led the peasants revolt to its fateful and bloody end.

The painting is a comment on the social upheavals of the time, the philosophical inspirations, and the moral decay. Like Bosh, fantastic creatures populate the landscape, and symbolism abounds. The painting is a classic of modern Fantastic painting, worthy of it's Old Masters predecessors.

The museum also has works in its collection from other modern painters who work figuratively in the Old Masters traditions. It is through the link to the Old Masters, that the museum has also exhibited a number of well known Fantastic painters, such as Rudolf Hausner, Heinz Zander, and Beksinski. There has also been an exhibition dedicated to classic surrealists.

A visit to this hidden treasure of Germany will leave you inspired. More information about about the museum can be found it's web site panorama-museum.de.

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News From Visionary Revue:

Just released, the 4th issue of the Visionary Revue explores the complex relationship between entheogens and artistic creation. Ten Visionary artists recount their experiences - the sudden lucidity, the hyper-perception and enlightening visions - each artist exploring a different entheogenic path. Holden, Heskin, Venosa and more… 266 pages, loaded with images and in-depth articles, edited by L. Caruana. The Visionary Revue is an on-line journal documenting emerging trends within the international movement known as Visionary Art.

www.visionaryrevue.com

EXCERPTS:

At last I had pierced the veil. Sitting with my eyes closed, I entered a land of accelerated time. Centuries elapsed in moments. I watched fantastic temples of sandstone accumulate and erode. Countless sunsets merged into a flickering twilight. Behind my eyelids, pink and gold-veined carvings swirled over the pillars, cornices, stairways and domes of ancient, but alien castles or mosques. Fascinated, I gazed at the tiny gargoyles. Charming new elements attached themselves to these: extra eyes, beautifully patterned scales, finely wrought exoskeletons. The temptation to take up a brush and begin recording these details was strong.

Maura Holden

The Cosmic Mountain

Then, the painting transformed. Everything that appeared 'rendered' became absolutely real. The paint dissolved, the frame disappeared, and all deficiencies gave way to perfection. I marvelled at the jewels in the shadow of the wings. These were not 'artfully rendered' to resemble transparent orbs of glass - they became them… deep crystals glowing from within. I was now 'seeing' in the presence of the Sacred. Only when I pulled myself out of it, slightly, did I realize how different 'the vision' was from the support, the painting. It is so difficult to describe, this state of 'pure vision' because, when I'm in it, I'm entirely in the image. It isn't an image at all, really. It's a timeless experience of immersion into sacred wonder.

L. Caruana

A Mirror Delirious

Art and Ayahuasca are both teachers that can reveal that whilst we live on the surface of things, there are yet deep layerings and extensions to our everyday selves. Each being is like a ten-thousand armed, multi-faced deity, such as those depicted in Indian temples. We extend outward across the fields of nature, manipulating and weaving energies in a myriad of realms. The art of the greatest visionary painters emphasises this hyperdimensional aspect to the human being

Daniel Mirante

Realms

Hopefully the domains of what we conceive of as entheogens can be blown wide open through realizing that it is truly the essence of our nature to strive toward the light & spiritual understanding. All of us. So, what can one artist do but mimic the creator in all its glory? Expressing gratitude and reverence for the unfathomably vast and unknowable through our own acts of creativity, thereby fusing Artist & Divinity simply by being in the act of creation, by becoming an embodied god droplet manifesting beauty upon the earth. Beyond judgment of technique or application. The act of creating art induces god.

David Heskin

Art (v.) = Entheogens

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This massive piece by Italian street artist 'Blu' looks absolutely incredible! I am particularly drawn to this image for obvious reasons (if you have seen my drawings). Though Blu's artwork covers the side of a 5 story building and mine are rarely larger than A4. I am very impressed!

Found on ectoplasmosis. 

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