Off the Clock Exhibition

The Off The Clock exhibition was an employee art show at my job, The Rhino Art Company in Encinitas. The store has a small gallery in the building called the Back Door Gallery. There are only 4 for us working there at the moment so the show included Eric Terry (the hard ass from NY), Mario Minneci (a.k.a Happy, the industrial designer from Illinois), Brian Weisz (Boy Wonder, prankster extraordinaire) and me. Yes, I work with a bunch of guys. I actually prefer it. 

I think the basic purpose of the show was to give the employees a chance to show what we are capable of doing with the materials we talk about all day. I really liked everyone’s work. We each had a wall to ourselves and I think we all were well represented by our pieces.

Brian’s wall had a series of both paintings and drawings he had done over 4 years of his friend Pat. He really enjoys portraiture and is pretty amazing at capturing expressions in both drawing and painting.

Brian

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My favorite of Brian

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Eric had three large paintings of his babies with headphones series. He mixes pastels, with gesso, spray paint, and turp creating these layered chalky jesters and stains often in the form of infants or figures. His marks give a certain subtle vibration to the figures.

Eric

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Eric

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another one of Eric

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy, ahem…sorry, Mario made a rather large painting he first designed then carefully and very cautiously executed…and it turned out kick ass. He used, latex paint, acrylic and water soluble oils on his piece. His piece is rather pop-py and his design influences are definitely evident in the palette as well as the execution of the painting. He’s one meticulous mofo.

 

Bad-ass popiness

 

Mario

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I decided to show the series of play studies I’ve been doing and a larger drawing on masonite. The play studies were an experimental exercise in which I used the materials I had while remaining as abstract as possible. I didn’t include all of them because I didn’t feel they were all strong enough to show and because I made my own frames (I’m on a budget). Although I had a few set backs in making the frames, I’m very pleased with the way they turned out.

 

My play studies

 

The second larger piece was rather spontaneous. I had initially intended to do a painting of one of my environmental light studies but after having a very in depth conversation with my mom I changed my mind and instead did an oil pastel drawing of my grandmother, aunt and mother from an old picture taken in Cuba. I had forgotten how much I love working with oil pastels and how comfortable I am using them.

My Wall

The turn out was decent but more than anything I enjoyed the process of putting the whole show together. Consulting each other on our progress, planning for the event, installing, and then enjoying the evening even though we were all cracked out and exhausted – it was really satisfying and I can’t wait till I get the opportunity to go through the motions of showing again. 

 

 

Mujeres Maza

 

 

~ by estaaquarela on June 29, 2008.