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Spring Art Exhibit
The Bethlehem Art Association was formed in 1966 to serve as a focal point for all kinds of visual art activities; and to provide contacts among artists, and between artists and the public.
Spring Art Exhibit
The Bethlehem Art Association was formed in 1966 to serve as a focal point for all kinds of visual art activities; and to provide contacts among artists, and between artists and the public.
View the full 2023-24 Program Calendar:
April Monthly Meeting
Fabric Art with Kathy Velis Turan
Kathy Velis Turan is a mixed media artist now living and working in the Hudson Valley region of New York. Her artwork has been exhibited nationally and internationally. Her focus may be realistic or abstract, but always intensely graphic. She employs surface design techniques which include silk screen printing, fabric painting, photo transfer and embellishing with free-motion quilting, hand stitching and beading on the whole-cloth surface of her work. She also silk screens on paper, then paints and uses other surface design techniques and media. She has curated fiber arts exhibitions and was the Visual Arts Director for the Greene County (NY) Council on the Arts. She was also the Advertising Director of Fiber Art Now Magazine. She is now a full-time artist. To learn more about the artist and see more of her art go to www.kvelisturan.com
March Meeting and April Workshop
Abstract Multi-media Painting with Kit Kelly Yedinak
Kit Kelly Yedinak gave a wonderful presentation at the March monthly meeting and will also conduct the Spring Workshop in April. Kit discussed the color, composition and endless possibilities for a range of materials that can be used to create non-representational or abstract style artwork. She discussed and demonstrated the unique process she uses to create interesting effects and textures using materials such as marble dust, dried flowers, paper, etc. The primary material, cold wax medium, can be adapted many ways and certainly looked like something that would be fun to work with. The presentation gave an excellent preview of the workshop which will be sure to be a fun learning experience .
Here is a photo-gallery of the meeting:
And, to the right, are the two paintings
that Kit created at the meeting.
Kit was born in Yakima, Washington and spent most of her life living along the West Coast with her family. She spent her childhood creating art and reading books, then she attended college in the Los Angeles area. After she got married and had two children, her family moved to Wilmington, North Carolina where she received a Fine Arts B.A. in 2006. She began to work in abstracts using various media and techniques, and pottery. In 2015 her family moved to New York and eventually she received a Masters in the Studio Arts in 2022. She is a visual artist who spends her time creating art in her studio.
Here is a photo of Kit with painting that was selected as a finalist in the 50th Annual, ‘On My Own Time’ juried exhibition by CNY Arts, which was held at Everson Museum in Syracuse last Oct 5th - Nov 12th, as well as two other images of her work. See more at kityedinak,com
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April Workshop
Kit ran an excellent workshop in which everybody learned a lot and had a wonderful time. Thank you Kit.
February Meeting - Annual Members Critique
with Eden Compton
Our Annual Critique was conducted by Eden Compton, who has made presentations, and judged shows for us many times. Each member is invited to bring one piece of art, either in progress or near completion. The critique is intended to help people get some insight into their work prior to our Annual May Show. Eden’s formal art education began with a BA in Art History from Colgate University and independent courses at the International Center for Photography in NYC. She has studied and taken workshops with nationally known artists. Her award winning work has been included in national juried shows as well as numerous regional and local shows.
Click here to learn more about Eden
January Meeting - Stylized Water Media Painting with Sterling Edwards
This meeting was a live Zoom demonstration of "stylized water media painting" by renowned water media artist Sterling Edwards. While showing us how to “stylize” shapes, Sterling incorporated watercolor techniques such as negative painting, saving white paper, and building rich, dark values. He shared his process for taking ordinary scenic elements and giving them movement to create vibrant compositions. He began with a sketch of a boatyard that included, boat hulls, drydock structures, ladders, and odd pieces of lumber. These still recognizable shapes were worked into this somewhat abstract "stylized" work of art.
Click here to learn more about the artist:
Lexi Hannah is a full-time professional artist specializing in commissioned artworks, murals, and live event painting. She is an ambassador for Holbein Artist Materials and brought variety of materials including quality paints, papers, and pencils for the meeting attendees to try. This was a very different type of meeting with attendees rather than the presenter doing the brushwork. It was a wonderful opportunity to learn about the wide variety of acrylic products that are available and to have some fun experimenting with them. To learn more about Lexi go to: www.instagram.com/lexihannah.art/
December Holiday Meeting with Lexi Hannah
BAA November Show at the Bethlehem Public Library
The Annual Fall Show was held at the Bethlehem Public Library during the month of November. Here are photos of the pictures that were in the show as well as a price list and a prize winner list.
The Fall Show Reception was held on Friday, November 17, at the Library
Comments on the Show were made by this year's Judge, Peg Foley
Peg Foley is a printmaker, fiber artist and art educator. She holds a Master of Science degree in Art Education from the College of St. Rose and a Bachelor of Science degree in Fine Arts from Nazareth College in Rochester. She is the recipient of a Surdna Foundation Fellowship and has studied art at Penland School of Art in North Carolina. She is a recent recipient of several New York State Council on the Arts grants and a Schenectady Foundation grant. She is an Oakroom artist and has shown her work in and around the Northeast. She designed and was the lead artist responsible for the “Schenectady and Me” community based sculptural bench project. She created sculptural benches throughout the city which incorporated community designed tiles depicting places and moments related to love of the city. In her personal work she uses photo etching and screen-printing processes to create mixed media works which incorporate collage and a variety of fibers into works which reflect on the idea of permanence in an uncertain world.
October Meeting and November 18 Fall Workshop
Mixed Media Landscape Collage
Cathy Laccetti
Cathy enjoys experimenting with different mediums and techniques, truly enjoying the process and not necessarily the finished product. She (self-described) is a “Jill of All Trades; Master of None.” Although she was honored to recently receive an Award of Excellence for her gouache painting, “Au Sable Afternoon”, at the Arkell Museum’s Annual Art of New York Show juried by Eden Comptom
At the October meeting Cathy demonstrated her process for creating mixed media landscape collages. She uses her own handpainted paper; sometimes adding in purchased papers or recycled elements, i.e., old book pages, chopstick wrappers, menus, maps, etc. She began by discussing how to deconstruct an image into simple shapes, decide on a color palette, and determine values. She then discussed the best types of paper to use for collage and demonstrated a few of her favorite painted paper techniques for creating textured papers. After a discussion on substrates and glue, Cathy created a simple landscape collage.
The BAA Online Salon is Now Open
The BAA Website now includes an Online Salon in which members can submit images of artwork that they would like to share with others. (See banner above)The artwork can be any style, new or old, finished or in process. Along with an image, artists can supply narrative and a contact link. There is an opportunity to talk about the process that was used, the inspiration behind the piece, the materials used, advice that could be used to help complete it, etc. The email link will make it easy for viewers to send comments. The goal is to provide much more flexibility and variety in the works that are on exhibit on the website and to foster more communication among our artists and the public.
September Meeting - Peter Keitel on the Uses of Photography in Painting
BAA member Peter Keitel did a presentation on how photography is used in the creation of paintings as well as other technical or optical devices that artists have used since well before the invention of modern photography. Peter gave a little history of these means used in painting. He showed slides that illustrated many of the ways in which modern photographic methods can be used in various styles of painting, in addition to photorealism. The presentation review how to capture photographic images in preparation for a painting and how those images can be transferred to a painting surface. Instruction on how to paint was not included, but ideas on how photography can be used in the development of a painting were emphasized.
BAA June Picnic
The weather was wonderful for the June 15 Bethlehem Art Association picnic at Five Rivers Environmental Center. Thank you to Susan Nye and Ellie Prakken for organizing the event and Pete Nye and John Smolinsky for helping set up. Thanks also to the members who brought what was needed to make a pot luck event a success. This year we are providing links for recipe requests:
Spring 2023 Member Show
Although the Spring Show is over, thanks to Mike Joyce, you can still see photo galleries of the show and the reception.
The judge for the Show, Anne Manzella has been the District Supervisor of Visual & Media Arts for the North Colonie Central School District for 20 years, where she oversees an award winning department from which many advanced high school students graduate on to college art & design degrees and careers in the creative economy. She is co-chair of region 6 for the New York State Art Teachers Association, and has served on the Visual Arts standards writing team at the NYS Education Department. Anne has adjudicated members' exhibits of the Colonie Art League, and recently has partnered with the faculty of the Visual and Performing Arts department at Russell Sage College and the Upstate Alliance for the Creative Economy to facilitate a Creative Career Expo for area high school students and parents. As she can carve the time, she enjoys visual journaling and working in mixed media, collage and exploring encaustics.
BAA Member Show and Sale,
Delmar Reformed Church, May 20
The BAA held another successful Show and Sale event at the Delmar Reformed Church on Saturday, May 20. Participating members can set up an area to display and sell their artwork. Members of the community are invited and this is an excellent way to make connections between the residents of the area and local artists. The popular event also includes music and demonstrations by artists. Thank you to Peggy Becker for this photo gallery of the event.
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BAA April Meeting, Printmaking with Billy Fillmore
Billy Fillmore, who teaches in the Art and Design Department at Russell Sage College, began his presentation with a slide show of his extensive collection of work done in his career.
He participated in numerous Artist in Residence programs. Billy teaches drawing, painting, printmaking and sculpture, which he enjoys and he likes to challenge his students to do what they want to do, not what is expected of them. With his artwork he likes to make people stop and wonder, he shows pain and beauty and likes grotesque surrealism. His latest series is of clowns, some of which evoke his childhood memories. Click here to see the wide range of his work: FILLMORE WEBSITE
Billy also gave a demonstration of printmaking, making stamps by carving rubber stamp blocks. This is a form of relief printmaking in that he takes away what he doesn’t want to print. He also showed us that if printing words or numbers, you have to carve those backwards.
BAA March Meeting and Spring Workshop with
Ritvik Sharma
BAA member Ritvik Sharma did a watercolor demonstration at the March 16 Monthly meeting and conducted the Spring Workshop in April. Here are Ritvik's words about his art: "I am a self taught artist based in Schenectady NY. I was drawn to sketching and painting very early on as a kid and loved creating watercolor paintings and pencil sketches. As a kid I took refuge in painting. I had an off and on relationship with art during college. I did art whenever time permitted. For the last several years I have devoted my time learning watercolor techniques and painting subjects that interest me. I enjoy painting city scenes, floral and seascapes the most. I continue to learn by taking workshops with artists I admire. I have recently started working with oils and have been enjoying the process of learning a new medium. I regularly participate in art shows around the capital region and show my works through local galleries."
Spring Workshop Photos
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