Meet Jim Davis, a local artist whose work has been shown at Mary Ola Miller's Gallery of Art and at the ArtCoop in Panama City. His solo exhibit at the Gallery of Art was titled “non-representational” and his solo exhibit at the ArtCoop, “1984 – Untitled Paintings”.
The majority of Jim's artwork involves the creation of non-objective acrylic paintings on canvas or primed Masonite. Other works include constructions made from found objects. Jim's work is abstract and non-representational.
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What is non-representational work? In non-representational work the artist supplies the visual elements, the color, the medium and the design but he does not supply terms of content. The viewer must supply the terms in order to appreciate the work as art rather than a visual sensation. Supplying the terms of content usually requires the viewer to understand the artist and his work because that artist's thoughts are the entire content of the work beyond the formal design elements. The artist's title can lend a hint to the viewer. The work is abstract, based on the artist's perspective of an idea. |
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Jim started painting when he was twelve years old. “My parents gave me a paint set for Christmas, and I painted portraits and landscapes throughout my teens,” Jim said. He also studied art in weekly classes at school in Pottsville, Pennsylvania. Once each month a traveling art instructor, Miss Gottwald, taught classes in various media. Art was offered as an elective in high school, and Jim studied design, drawing, painting, and sculpture for three years with Robert Kozlosky.
While Jim served in the United States Air Force, he always carried a sketchbook for drawing. While he was stationed in West Germany in 1971 photography became his primary medium. After military service, his photography studies took him to the Germain School of Photography in New York City, where he studied commercial and portrait photography. He realized that the images that fascinated him were those with broad, vibrant color in an acute geometrical framing. His focus on the abstract opened the door to self-expression without a camera and eliminated the need for him explore the outer landscape in search of a subject. |
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Jim relocated to Denver, Colorado. He received a Bachelors of Art from the Metropolitan State College of Denver in 1981. At Metro State, Jim met color-field painter Charles “Bill” Hayes, who taught two-dimensional design and painting. Color-field artists present the fundamental formal elements of abstract painting: pure, unmodulated areas of color; flat, two-dimensional space; monumental scale; and the varying shape of the canvas itself. Hayes' unwavering work ethic and success inspired Jim to pursue a career in fine art painting.
His first big success came as a senior in college. He was selected by the Metro State faculty to participate in a scholarship competition between artists from Colorado State University, University of Colorado, University of Denver, and Metro State. It was quite an honor for him because he was the only undergraduate in the competition. Artists were required to design and complete an installation piece for a newly constructed office complex in Aurora, Colorado.
Jim says the hardest part of his work is building stretchers, stretching canvas, and priming the canvas with gesso. His advice to new artists would be to study the lives and works of artists that impress you, visit galleries and museums to see up-close original artwork, and work hard to develop a style.
Look for Jim's work in future exhibits around Panama City. Experience the art through non-representational art. |
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Emilie Pritchard is an artist who works in two media: rug weaving and bead weaving. Emilie has been weaving for about 25 years, concentrating mostly on rugs for the last 12 years. She started bead weaving less than three years ago. Rug weaving requires both design and craftsmanship. As a designer, Emilie's first love is color. She uses color as the starting point for all her rugs. Some of her designs are enhanced by subtle shifts in color, while other designs have spontaneous color changes. She uses geometric designs to accent the relationships between colors. As a craftsman, Emilie strives to create a functional, long-wearing rug. To meet this goal, she chooses wool and linen as her primary materials. The weft, or visible part of the rug, is wool. Wool has been the fiber of choice for rug weavers for thousands of years. It dyes beautifully and wears well. The warp, the part stretched on the loom, is natural linen imported from Belgium. Although the warp is not usually visible, it lends firmness and stability for a long-lasting rug. Emilie hand-dyes her yarns for maximum color control and for subtle color variations unavailable in commercially-dyed yarns. |
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She also uses specialized techniques like weft ikat or gradation dying. She weaves with two colors of wool at a time, using a shaft switching technique that lets her place each color where she wants it in the row. Shaft switching gives Emilie a freedom of design similar to tapestry weaving while producing a heavier, sturdier product. Emile's designs are geometric. Some are modern and others draw on ancient or tribal sources executed with a contemporary feel. She strives to use the many traditions of weaving to produce fresh and original art. This goal keeps her at her loom, creating, experimenting, sometimes failing, but always learning, and finding great satisfaction along the way. Her rugs are intended for |
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the floor, and are very hard-wearing when used on the floor. However, many of her customers prefer to hang them on the wall as art. Emilie has rugs on-hand that can be purchased. She also has a design portfolio that allows customers to choose their colors and size. Or, she can create an entirely new, one-of-a-kind design. Custom rugs generally require 4 to 5 weeks to complete. Emilie learned most her weaving skills from books and experimentation. She has received little instruction in either rug weaving or beadwork. Her advice to people interested in weaving is not to follow the designs you find in magazines, but make a piece that's your own. If you need instructions to learn a procedure, change at least one element to develop your own design. Emilie's first big success in rug weaving was in 2002. She won Best of Show at the ArtsQuest festival at Eden Plantation. It was her first big validation and helped build her confidence. Both rug weaving and bead weaving involve the slow build-up of colors and patterns to achieve an overall design. But in bead weaving, Emilie is limited to the colors and types of beads she can purchase. She finds that limitation frustrating. On the other hand, beadwork has opened the world of three-dimensional work to Emilie, which she enjoys. In her beadwork, Emilie strives for a clean, uncluttered feel. Like the rugs, the pieces emphasize geometric shapes. She loves being able to expand the geometry into three dimensions. She draws as much inspiration from architects such as Santiago Calatrava or Ken Snelson as she does from jewelers. Emilie has short-term goals in both her rug weaving and bead weaving. In rug weaving, she's moving into more complicated dying effects. In bead weaving. She's building more complex sculptural pieces. Long-term, Emilie would like to add gallery representation to her art festival participation. Year-round, Emilie's work is marketed at www.eprugweaver.com. Check out her website to see her rugs and her jewelry. |
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