blog.edmarion.com . Ithaca artist & painter, Ed Marion blogs

Interview/Slideshow re: CSMA Arts for All Marathon

This was a fun interview in the context of my participation in the CSMA Arts for All Marathon this year.

Interview/Slideshow

Article

Hey Ed, so what's up with the Ithaca Art Factory?

Funny you should ask!

I have the privilege of opening a new painting studio at 210 Elmira Road in Ithaca and I'm calling it the Ithaca Art Factory.  In addition to being my painting studio, there will be a new gallery, initially open Friday through Sunday, and a painting classroom with acrylic painting classes scheduled on Friday & Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons.

The whole idea of the class paintings is to share my passion for making art and for making paintings.  I think most people are fascinated by just the idea of an artist's studio, so to invite people into my studio, not only to view it and poke around, but actually to make paintings with me, this is what the Factory will be about.  Art will get made here, not only by me, but by you.

So to make the painting classroom inviting and accessible, I've created a new web site -- http://ithacaartfactory.com, which you can also like on facebook (http://facebook.com/IthacaArtFactory.com) and follow on (http://twitter.com/IthacArtFactory).   Just click on the "class calendar" link on the Ithaca Art Factory web site's navigation bar, and you will be taken to our calendar of acrylic painting classes.

My vision of the classes is almost that of a party or a date night.  You don't have to have any prior art experience and you don't have to buy any expensive art materials, just sign up online for a class prior to the class date, and then just bring yourself and a sense of fun and adventure.  When you come to the studio, you will be provided with canvas (16" x 20"), paints, brushes, easels, aprons, and art instruction.  I'll guide the class, step-by-step, how to make the particular painting we'll be working on.  Obviously, each person can add their own flourishes, and at the end of the class, each person will take home a work of art that they made with their own hands.

I'm absolutely thrilled about it!

To keep posted, follow what's happening in the Factory at http://www.ithacaartfactory.com/blog_index.html.

Yes, that's correct: $100 for an Ed Marion original painting that you call the content on . . .

• portrait
• theme
• idea
• dream
• photo
• you name it.
  
  Oh yeah, . . . . Rule #2:

• every day that someone does not take advantage of this project, I'll paint my vision and those paintings will be on sale for $1,500.00 USD-- half ($750) to me and half ($750) to CSMA.  So 26 paintings in all.  Every painting I don't get to paint your vision, I get to paint mine.
• details here: http://bit.ly/pP8qND.

Buy Art by the Square Foot, Sight Unseen . . . .

In support of the Community School of Music and Arts’ Annual fund-raising marathon (artsforallmarathon.org), I’m undertaking a project called Sight Unseen: Painting Your Vision from A to Z that I am inviting you to participate in.

Because the Marathon is 26 days long, from Oct. 3 to Oct. 29, 2011, for each of those days, I will be making a 12" x 12" acrylic painting based on your vision. I’m inviting you to buy a $100 painting, sight unseen, based on what you tell me to paint. You’ll make a $100 tax-deductible donation to CSMA and, at the end of the exhibition on Oct. 30, 2011, you’ll get an original Ed Marion work of art that your vision helped create.

So here’s how it works.

From now until Oct. 27^th, e-mail me (ed@edmarion.com; subject line: sight unseen) what you would like me to paint for you. Other than nudity, obscenity, or any image that would violate anyone’s copyright rights, it can be anything – your face, your house, your business, a favorite photo, a whimsical idea, a painting of words. Feel free to send e-mail attachments. Then donate $100 to CSMA via the Arts for All Marathon link at http://artsforallmarathon.org/pledge.php. On the "Review Your Donation" page, please include:

• your name
• e-mail address
• telephone number, and
• identification of what you asked me to paint via e-mail.

Once a request (to me) + payment (to CSMA) is received, each painting gets made and the show goes up. By collaborating with you, it is my goal to raise $2,600 for arts education scholarships at CSMA by painting the breadth of our community’s vision, sight unseen.

Thank you for your anticipated patronage and support of CSMA.

Now Teaching Acrylic Painting Classes at Michaels Arts & Crafts in Ithaca

This month, I'm starting to teach acrylic painting classes at the Michaels Arts & Crafts Store in Ithaca, NY (614 S. Meadow Street [Route 13], Ithaca, NY).  Each class covers different subjects -- florals, landscapes, seascapes, and still life -- and students create their own masterpiece in each class.

I love teaching these classes.  Last year I taught them for Grumbacher and Michaels in Vestal and Camillus and I'm so jazzed to be teaching them in my home town of Ithaca.  Michaels offers a Grumbacher starter painting kit for $50, which comes to $30 when applying the 40% off Michaels coupon at the register.  The kit includes 2 brushes, 4 tubes of paint (Academy Acrylics Titanium White, Ultramarine Blue, Cadmium Red Light, and Cadmium Yellow Light), two 9" x 12" canvas boards and a painting knife.  Classes cost just $25, and you can take as many, or as few, as you like.  There are no long-term class commitments.

Classes for October are:

• Sunday, October 23, 2011, 1 to 3pm . FLORALS
• Sunday, October 30, 2011, 1 to 3pm . LANDSCAPES

To register, stop in at the Michaels store on Meadow Street and sign up at any register for the class or classes of your choice.

from last night's Paint Off to benefit Ithaca Festival 2011

I'm painting at the Ithaca Festival Paint Off TONIGHT!

Tonight! - http://ithacafestival.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=39&Itemid=31

What's a Paint Off look like?  Check it out - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLW1NpoUy4s

New Hockey Paintings in the CAP ArtSpace Gallery

To see the hockey paintings which are part of the CAP ArtSpace Gallery show, currently hanging at the gallery at 171 Center Ithaca on the Ithaca Commons, click through.

Please join me at the Gallery on Monday, March 21st from 6:30 to 7:30pm when I'll be speaking about my passion for creating figurative art, especially works centered around local scenes and commissioned portraits.

Good Evening, Hockey Fans! opens this Friday, March 4, 2011, 5 to 8pm

Please join me at the opening of my new art exhibit -- Good Evening, Hockey Fans! -- a show of paintings inspired by many years of watching Cornell's Big Red Men's Ice Hockey team at Lynah Rink in Ithaca, New York.

Feel free to click (and print) the poster, at left, to share with your friends and coleagues at work.  You can also help me spread the word of the show on facebook -- http://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=130509040338444 -- by inviting your hockey-loving facebook friends to the show.

I hope to see you at the opening this coming Friday, March 4th, from 5 to 8pm and also at my artists's talk on Monday, March 21st, from 6:30 to 7:30pm.  All events to be held at the CAP ArtSpace, 171 Ithaca Commons (right in Center Ithaca on the downtown Ithaca Commons).

Cups & Cones at TBurg gimme!

My paintings of coffee cups and ice cream cones are on exhibit at the gimme! Espresso Shop in Trumansburg, NY through July 29th.

Ed Marion at the Grassroots Festival Art Barn

For those of you attending this year's 20th Annual Grassroots Festival in Trumansburg, NY, check out the Art Barn to find my paintings of Festival favorites, including Sim Redmond, Chad Crumm, Kevin Kinsella and the Evil City String Band. 

Art Collecting

All you wonderful art collectors looking for pineapple paintings,
 

ice cream cone paintings,
 

and guitar paintings,
 

come check out what's available.

July checklist

. hang paintings at gimme! espresso shop in Trumansburg for the month of July

. hang paintings at Good Works Gallery for Friday, July 2nd, 5 to 8pm

. finish paintings for the Art Barn at the Grassroots Festival, July 22 - 25

. turn on the studio camera while I'm painting so you can watch me make art

studio cam

I've been playing with the studio cam today.

late May . early June

This is the last weekend for my show of new paintings at the Moosewood Restaurant.



On Friday, June 4th, from 5 to 8pm, Good Works Gallery will be open for Ithaca Festival Friday.  Come visit us, consume some great art, and know that a percentage of all purchases (8%) are donated to the charity of your choice.

early May 2010

Thanks to all who came out to celebrate the opening night of Good Works Gallery, a monthly collaborative gallery that I started with friends and artists, Paul McMillan, Carlton Manzano and Ryan Curtis.  The gallery is located in the Ahimsa Yoga Studio, just opposite the kitchen door of Moosewood Restaurant on the ground floor of the DeWitt Mall in Ithaca, New York.  On every first friday of the month -- as part of Gallery Night Ithaca -- we'll be displaying and selling new works of art with a philanthropic bent.

For every work of art we sell, we'll donate 8% of the sale price to our patrons' charity of choice.  So not only can you buy good (and great) works of art, your art patronage will support your charity as well.

 

During the month of May, I'll have a display of new paintings at the Moosewood Restaurant in Ithaca, New York.  My new paintings feature large ice cream cones and coffee cups, so if you're into large (or small) Andy Warhol-like multiples, come check out the new work.

My first Vincent van Gogh cover painting

I had a real good time making this painting tonight which is a copy of a detail of Vincent van Gogh's Wheatfield with Crows.  The occasion was the Ithaca Festival Paint Off which is now in it's fourth year.  The idea of the Paint Off is to get a group of artists together in one room before an art-loving crowd and have them make their painting in one hour.

I had some anxiety before tonight about what I should paint.  I mean what madman came up with this event.  Oh, it was me some 3 years ago.  But this was the first time I really participated in the event as a painter.  I was toying with several different images and really didn't know until about 10 minutes before the clock started what I was going to paint.

What really sealed the deal was that I googled this painting some time last week and later that night, my wife and I tuned into a Jake Johannsen concert on television which had this painting as the stage backdrop.  The die was cast.

A couple of things.  Sitting there tonight and painting gave me the greatest opportunity to just eavesdrop on the conversations of the people behind me.  Some of the more interesting comments?  I really like his brushwork.  Well, I hope so, Vincent was one of the world's masters.  I got a kick out of that one.  Better still, a young child with his mother: Frogs, right?  That made me laugh.

I did the painting on a kitchen cabinet door that I got from a building supply business and then gessoed the interior panel.  I copied from a black & white photocopy of the image and took about 50 minutes to paint it and used the rest of the time to take the blue painter's tape off from around the edges.

At some point in the evening, I had the feeling of privilege of walking in the shoes of the man who originally painted this scene and that made me happy.

March

 

This March, I have a show of paintings on display at Collegetown Bagels in East Hill Plaza. Collegetown Bagels is one of my very favorite places in all of Ithaca to eat, get a coffee, meet friends, relax, the whole shebang. I also have a double self-portrait (above) hanging in CSMA's Post-Decade show and I'm working on a new series of works that will be on display during the month of May at the Moosewood Restaurant in Ithaca.

I am so proud of the work that Luke Fenchel and company is doing over at theithacapost.com. I have always thought that Ithaca and Tompkins County represented possibly the best cultural destination in all of New York State outside of New York City and now many of our creatives are coming together to write about the cultural treasure trove that we make, experience, and live every day. For news on the musicians, painters, dancers, playwrights and actors who make, display and perform their art on a daily basis, check out The Ithaca Post.

As April approaches, I’m gearing up to do a one-hour live painting with 24 of my fellow artists at the Fourth Annual Ithaca Festival Paint Off which is being held on Friday, April 2, 2010 at 7:00pm at Center Ithaca on the Ithaca Commons. The Paint Off is a fabulous event in which 25 artists paint their respective masterpieces in 60 minutes before a live crowd. It’s Gallery Night, so they’ll be music, food, a chance to win all of the Paint Off paintings via raffle or auction, and me! So come down to Center Ithaca, support the Ithaca Festival with your $15 admission fee, and watch great art being made in real time.

And just in case you forgot how fun the Paint Off is, here's a video snippet of last year's event to remind you.

January . February

Thanks to all who visited and rated the self-portrait portfolio I submitted for the Artists Wanted The Power of Self competition.  While the jury is still out for the grand prize (6 months of free rent at The Edge in NYC or $7,007 cash), I was jazzed just to enter the competition.  Hopefully the judges will be just as jazzed by my self-portrait painting discipline over the years!

On Friday, February 5, 2010, from 5:00pm to 8:00pm, Collegetown Bagels at 203 N. Aurora Street, Ithaca, NY will graciously host an opening reception for paintings I will be hanging there for the month of February.  All of the paintings on display, both old and new, will feature some person or place from our great town.  If you're out and about for Gallery Night Ithaca, please stop in to say hello and consume some great art and food.



And I've finally turned my pineapple paintings into some nifty greeting cards over at http://www.zazzle.com/edmarion99*.  (I know, odd URL address, but unless you include that little asterisk at the end, I don't get my full commission.)  These pineapple cards are great for any occasion, particularly as thank you cards, housewarming cards, and greeting cards.  The pineapple is a universal symbol of welcome and hospitality, so if you'd like to purchase and give my art on a small scale, here's a great way to do it.  Mahalo!

November

I'm honored to have a painting in CSMA's Mainly Blue group show which runs through the end of November.  The show -- curated with great care by local artist, Rebecca Godin -- is an exploration of the color blue by several well-known artists from our area.  It's well worth a visit.

I'm also very excited to have donated a painting to the Cornell School of Hotel Administration's Charity Auction on the night of Saturday, November 21, 2009, starting at 6:30pm.  This is a fun annual event.  For information on how to donate or attend the auction, click here.

I need your help

So, Ithacans and those who just want to be Ithacans, I need your help.

Ithaca’s Community School of Music & Arts is hosting the CSMA Post-It® Art Show as part of the Arts for All Marathon from September 28^th to October 24th.

Here’s the idea. All of Ithaca is invited to make art on sticky notes (or more familiarly, Post-Its®). Folks bring (or mail) in the Post-It® art, CSMA displays the art on their gallery walls. Big opening/closing/purchasing night at CSMA on 10/23 when we sell these great miniature works of art for $5 per Post-It. Undercurrent: everyone (ages 1 to 92) is an artist and everyone can collect art, especially at $5 a throw.

On 10/23, crowds of people will jockey before thousands of works of art to be the first buyer of the next big (ok, small) thing. Basically, organized mayhem. Prior viewing hours & days will get people into the CSMA gallery to stake their claims, and, at the appointed hour, we need tight organization on sales.

So, locally, who wants to help me organize this baby? There are so many ways to say "yes."

We’re envisioning thousands of submissions and hopefully hundreds of sales on the night of 10/23. Immediately, we need help in:
– getting the word out starting August 18^th (blogs, e-mail distribution lists, twitter, facebook, Flickr; and
– commitments to staff the purchasing party on the night of 10/23.

Additionally, I (and more importantly, CSMA) needs all your ideas and help as this great Marathon raises scholarship dollars for students who could not otherwise afford the great arts programming that CSMA offers. Please e-mail me with your thoughts, ideas, and offers to proselytize/staff the event at ed@edmarion.com.

Thanks.

The CSMA Post-It® Art Show for the 2009 Arts for All Marathon (Sep. 28 - Oct. 24)

I'm very excited to be participating again in this year's Arts for All Marathon (2009 web update coming soon) to benefit the Community School of Music and Arts in Ithaca, New York.  In 2009, the Marathon will run from Monday, September 28th through Saturday, October 24th.

As part of the Marathon, CSMA will be hosting a Post-It® Art Show inviting all Ithacans to make, view, and buy art on Post-It® notes for a gallery show and opening which will take place on Friday, October 23, 2009.  So here's an easy and great chance to have your art displayed at CSMA for all your neighbors to see.  Take Post-It®, make art on it, get it to CSMA.  Up on the CSMA gallery walls it goes to the first buyer at our opening/closing celebration on Friday, October 23rd.

It will be a great chance, too, for you to see the art of all of your neighbors (hopefully, thousands of them).  Further details to follow.

I'm also assisting in curating the first floor front gallery for CSMA during the Arts for All Marathon.  During the Marathon, a score or more of artists will display their craft and hold mini-marathons of their own in CSMA's first floor gallery.  Interested artists wishing to participate are urged to visit the Arts for All Marathon web site for more details.

Art at Ithaca's Moosewood Restaurant

So my art show at the world-famous Moosewood Restaurant is finally up and running through the month of August.

I called the show Multiple Personality because I tried out a few new different series of multiple paintings, including original oil and acrylic paintings of pineapples, skateboarders and a guitarist.  The exhibit of 32 paintings basically encompasses much of my work from 2009.

Now that the show is up, I'm gearing up for CSMA's Arts for All Marathon which will again run from September through October of this year.  As part of the marathon, I'll be the head cheerleader and motivator for a community-wide "Post-It" sticky note art show that will be a featured fundraiser for CSMA.

Our goal in raising money for CSMA scholarships is to bring out both the artist and arts consumer in each of us.  The Post-It show will culminate in a great one-night gallery show at CSMA where all of the art submitted on Post-Its will be up for sale to raise funds for CSMA's art scholarships.  If you visit Moosewood during the month of August, I'll try to keep the restaurant stocked with some Post-It art of my own to give away during August -- if only to whet your collective collector's whistle.

CSMA Portrait Drawing & Painting class cancelled

Oh well.  Bad news from CSMA.  The Portrait Drawing & Painting class I was scheduled to teach this summer has been cancelled due to low enrollment.

Art in Ithaca this weekend: Americana Vineyards & gimme! T-Burg

Starting Friday, July 3rd, my painted barrel will be on display at American Vineyards in Interlaken (see, post below) and starting Sunday, July 5th, I'll be hanging a new show of portraits and people at the gimme! Espresso shop in Trumansburg.

So if you're in the mood for a nice drive, some driving capuccino, and a great bottle of wine, it may be the ideal weekend to take in some of my art along with some of the best food and beverage our region has to offer.

The Switchboard ~ an Ithaca art blog

Recently, I commented on a post at a new Ithaca blog on art and art criticism called The Switchboard.  The Switchboard describes itself as "written by a group of Ithaca artists, art critics, and art historians.  It is a place to have conversations about art in Ithaca and elsewhere.  Posts are intended as the starting points for these conversations, so please, if you’re reading, join in with comments!"

While my post comments sought to raise the issue of the identity of the authors, the site itself remains an excellent addition to the Ithaca art scene and a necessary and viable part of any art community that is seeking to be treated seriously.  It is not only good writing and good reading, but is a place to actively participate in the conversations that occur there.

I highly recommend it.