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In celebration of National Library Week (April 13 - 19) the Library and the Art Museum are partnering together for a second year to present the work of local and nationally known artists. Their original art pieces were created from books, videos, CDs and DVDs 'weeded' out of the Library's collection.

This special public unveiling will be on Sunday April 13, 2008, from 2:00-4:00 p.m. at the Library, where a couple of the artists will share about their process and refreshments will be served. The first portion of the exhibit will be on display at the Library during National Library Week and then the remaining pieces will be on display at the Art Museum through mid-May.

At the end of the exhibit all pieces will be auctioned off with proceeds to benefit both the Library and the Art Museum. All those who come to the Library's exhibit will get a free pass to view the rest of the exhibit at the Art Museum.

In 2006 the Library and the Art Museum joined together to create this unique book/art program. Twelve artists were invited to participate in creating an original art piece from discarded Library materials. After the exhibit the pieces were added back into the Library’s collection and all have been checked out by the community many times over. As we contemplated the second annual event, word got out to the artist community and this year we were compelled to increase our number of participating artists to twenty-one.

The participating artists came to a ‘Book Grab’ in the Fall where they selected their books, videos, DVDs and CDs from a selection weeded out of the Library’s collection. Over the course of several months they created one-of-a-kind art works.

The first half of the exhibit will be unveiled at the Library to kick-off our celebration of National Library Week. The remaining works of art will be displayed at the Art Museum beginning Saturday, April 19th. All the pieces will then be auctioned off at a Silent Auction to be held at the Art Museum on May 10th, 2008 to equally benefit both the Library and the Art Museum.

The artists, in alphabetical order, are:

Robert Brasier is a working artist and art historian. He received his BA of Fine Arts, Painting from San Francisco Art Institute, as well as an MA in Art History from University of Cincinnati. He became the Director of Education for the Palm Springs Art Museum in 2002 and remains in that position today.

He has exhibited his work at the Aronoff Center for the Arts, the Gallery at Wellage & Buxton, ex situ all in Cinncinati, Ohio, and at the Hiestand Galleries, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio.

Gideon Cohn was born in Sweden and grew up on a Kibbutz in Israel. He lived in Israel and Holland before moving to California, USA in 1983. Much of his work revolves around the human figure with a hint of surrealism in the form of charcoal/pastels on paper and oils on canvas. Some of the art work incorporates other media such as wood, prints, and other material which provide the dimension of depth to the art.

Artist Statement:

“The figure has always been a source of inspiration for me. Its ever changing shapes, colors and lines have been a stimulus in my exploration process for 35 years. Figurative drawing and painting became my conduit to the beauty of sensuality, flow of spirit and the ties to earth.” – Gideon Cohn

I. M. A. G. E. S. by Gideon

Gallery Location: 2680 Cherokee Way, Palm Springs, CA 92264

Phone: 760.250.1521, FAX: 760.564.1808
Email: info@ImagesByGideon.com Website: ImagesByGideon.com

Patricia D'Alessandro. Patricia Alessandro’s artistic Muse nudged her into painting after age 70, having being known as an essayist/photographer/poet for 25 years. Collaging poetry and paintings for exhibitions in Sacramento, Berlin, and Paris, she still never considered herself an "artist" until the cultural art's community of Sacramento, named her an "artist", inviting her into major gallery exhibitions, as well as the KVIE Public Television's annual Art Auction.

Serving as a volunteer "ART"S ACTIVIST" in Sacramento for 15 years, she was awarded a Life Time Achievement Award for her services in March 2007, by the Sacramento Country Board of Supervisors, and the Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Commission, despite her move to the Coachella Valley. Her work has been exhibited at Desert Pride Center in 2007 in Palm Springs, and the American Association of University Women's Annual Art Auction in 2008 in LaQuinta. Currently, she hosts the VALLEY VOICES OF THE MUSE monthly poetry series for Barnes&Noble/Palm Desert/Westfield Center, on first Fridays of the month. She is working on an anti-war poetry collection to be published in Fall of 2008. She lives in Desert Hot Springs.

Robert Dunahay. Contemporary artist Robert Charles Dunahay is best known for his "Palm Series", a collection of paintings typically comprised of a single palm image isolated against a solid color background. His career as an artist has led him from New York to San Francisco and on to Palm Springs where he has his studio.

Dunahay’s work is collected worldwide by distinguished patrons including The Royal family of Qatar, Kelsey Grammer, Pierce Brosnan, and Baroness Monica Von Neumann of Switzerland, to name a few. Corporate collections include Pepperdine University, W Hotels, Disney, The Financial Times and the Packard Foundation. His work is in the collections of The Peninsula Museum of Art and The Frederick R. Weisman Museum of Art.

Dunahay has been featured in Metropolitan Home, Space Magazine, Palm Springs Life, Dune Magazine, Sunset Magazine Publications and Season in the Sun Magazine. More of Dunahay’s work may be seen on his website at robertdunahay.com. His work is currently represented by Melissa Morgan Fine Art (formerly Modern Masters Fine Art) in Palm Desert, (760) 341-1056.

Vernon Finney.

Vernon Finney’s career as an artist spans over 50 years. He has divided his time between the commercial art world where he earned his living, and his personal indulgence in the pure art. He should, therefore, be counted amongst the very few, privileged artists who are able to paint as they wish. The majority of Vernon's work is held in private collections, but he seems reluctant to part company with them, as they are so much a part of him. However it is only now, with the advent of technology and pressure from friends and art critics, that Vernon is offering his work to the general public in the form of limited edition Giclée prints of his work. There are also some originals of his artwork available.

As a person, Vernon has great affinity to nature, and is a great observant of both humans and nature and their relationship to each other. His art is classified as surreal, and although he depicts nature accurately, there is always more to it. He lets his imagination embellish it in a subtle way and lets the viewer share the artist's perception of the world around us. To quote Dr. Paul C. Denny, Jr., a retired art professor, "Finney's use of color manipulates our eyes to make us feel we are seeing two compositions in one". Being so extremely proficient and skilled in the art of painting, Vernon is able to depict on canvas, what most of us cannot express in words. He is able to bring forth feelings and ideas and convey them to the viewer. He is an artist who is able to put the vision of a dream on canvas. He depicts the human form in a generic way. It could be anybody, yet it represents everybody, conveying tranquility and mystique in their relationship and place in nature. When he approaches an empty canvas to begin a painting, the subject and composition of that painting is already completed to the last detail in his mind's eye. He does not draw on the canvas, so clear is the vision. What he does as an artist is make it visible to others by spending countless hours - and with impeccable skill, realize the image onto the canvas.

In 1950, Vernon Finney obtained a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Oklahoma University. He continued his art education studying Figure Drawing at UCLA, Lithography at Otis and further Figure Drawing at LA Trade Tech.

His work was exhibited in 1978 at Carter/Sarkin Gallery in Los Angeles; in 1986 at the El Camino College; in 1987 at D. Geraro Gallery in Santa Monica. In 1993-1994 his art was exhibited at the BonaVenture Hotel in Los Angeles in association with Sharing Friends of the Arts, and again in the same year under the auspice of the same organization in a group show with L.A.V.A. His work was the pioneer of the first "Art in the Park" in 1996 at Park LaBrea, and was seen in 1998 at L.G.O. Gallery in Palm Springs. CA.

He is among the listed artists in the 1989 California Art Review as well as the illustrated survey of leading American Artists in the American Artists publication of 1990.

His art has been acquired by the Oklahoma Ponca City Public Art Collection, by Mr. & Mrs. Bobby Daren, the Vincent Price estate, as well as by many other private collectors.

Finney has created murals for private and public places. They are in Pasadena, CA, North Hollywood, the Probe Night Club in Hollywood, at Berkeley, and Park LaBrea in Los Angeles.

His achievement in the art brought him two awards from the City of Los Angeles. In 1993 he received an Award of Excellence from Mayor Tom Bradley, and in 1996 he received Artistic Commendation from Mayor Richard Riordan.

Since 2001, Vernon has been involved in Reach For Art ( www.reachforart.com), a program donating signed lithographs of his masterpiece "Reach" to the families of 9/11 victims, soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, and children killed in accidents and violence.

Vernon Finney has lived in Palm Springs for over 10 years.

Dan Green practiced architecture for thirty years in St. Louis, Missouri as the owner of a small boutique firm, specializing in complicated high-tech projects throughout the United States. His undergraduate work was done at Washington University, followed by post graduate projects at the Danish Royal Academy of Fine Arts and the University of Copenhagen under a Fulbright Grant. He began painting in 2004 after retiring to Palm Desert, California with his wife Hila, a celebrated jewelry designer. He is an active member of the local Artists' Council, has won juried awards from the Palm Springs Art Museum, the City of Palm Springs and the National Orange Exhibition in San Bernardino. He is an annual participant at the Indian Ridge Country Club Art Exhibition in Palm Desert.

Artist’s Statement:

"Attempting a transition from Architecture to Painting presents an interesting challenge. After many years of ‘keeping the colors inside the lines’, the absolute freedom that painting allows is somewhat daunting. Instruction is helpful, reading and observing are of great value, but ultimately trial and error is the process that holds the greatest potential for meaningful development. Some of the pieces presented here are realistic renditions while others much more abstract. These images are transitional efforts, and hopefully will lead to a more cohesive body of work as I realign my graphic foundations. If I am successful, my work of tomorrow will bear little resemblance to my work of today." - Dan Green

Jerry Hanson.

With a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Arizona, Jerry L. Hanson is a working artist concentrating primarily on commissions. His artwork is in private collections in North America and Europe.

Artist Statement:

“I am drawn to materials that become trash as soon as they are used. A newspaper is read; it becomes trash. I have been working with newspaper for 30 years. In my earlier works, I used the newspaper strictly as material, choosing it for the quality of the newsprint rather than the printed news. The Wall Street Journal was a favorite simply because of the weight and size of the paper. I didn’t select the paper based on content; the paper became the content of my art pieces. In my later works, I began to pay attention to the content of both, the newspaper and my art.

Newspapers have personalities. On many levels, the Los Angeles Times is not the Wall Street Journal. The look and feel of a newspaper is specific to each Newspaper. The layout of each has its own personality, its own style. Personalities in newspaper are what I look for in my art.

Newspaper is language. It is a dialogue between the writer and the reader. It is no accident the opinion section of a newspaper is serious, the obituaries somber, and the comics bright. The want ads are busy, the movie ads brash and colorful while the stock market report is controlled and tight.

I weave these languages and personalities in a dialogue with the viewer. It is my palette. Personalities and languages are deconstructed and reassembled. Ubiquitous newspaper is reorganized into a different way of seeing language and dialogue.” - Jerry L. Hanson

Michele Jamieson Michele Jamieson was born in Indianapolis, Indiana. She attended Indiana University where she received her AB degree, and taught school in Michigan and Georgia before moving to Santa Fe.

She returned to Indiana to work on her masters degree. Her ceramic studio in Bloomington, Indiana was opened in 1982. In 1986 she and her husband Wayne moved Jamison Studios to Palm Springs. Here her work began to reflect the influence of the contrasts found in the desert; the arid landscape, rugged canyons surrounding lush yards and golf courses, the juxtaposition of Indian, Spanish and Anglo cultures.

Soon after moving to California, a summer monoprintmaking class at Idyllwild School of the Arts led to a lasting interest in printmaking and artist's books. Michele has made numerous limited edition artist's books.

Jamison has been the recipient of two California Artist Council grants. She has taught in the Arts in Corrections and Arts in Mental Health Programs. Her work can be found throughout southern California.

Tom Johnson. Thomas Michael Johnson has been building and designing exhibits for the Palm Springs Art Museum for the last 24 years. The son of an artist, he has also been creating art throughout his life.

Over the past decade he has been working on a series of photographs which have been exhibited both locally and nationally. In his spare time he writes and continues to learn and experiment with a wide variety of artistic mediums. He currently lives in Palm Springs, is married, and has two lovely daughters.

Winifred Johnson Brewer.

Artist's Statement:

My work is a collection of memories and associations, a narrative with a personal vocabulary of objects, shapes, colors, and words. It doesn't really matter what I choose to paint because that first conscious notion will be painted over countless times.

Drawing, painting, glazing, cutting/pasting, sanding, scrubbing, washing, hammering, scratching, and carving, I end up with paintings coming and going -- one on top of the other, willing myself to risk painting the truly awful. I ruin and save, ruin and save, not always knowing when to stop -- destroying the beautiful as well as the ugly. The paintings end up totally worn away. These erased and beaten surfaces are an art process that reveals a life process. It's about identity -- disassocation and integration.

The biggest influence on my art is a childhood spent in my playpen tearing up my father's art books to the accompaniment of Caruso and the smell of turpentine. My first art history lessons were absorbing the world's greatest paintings and music in some unconscious, preverbal place. Crawling on a paint-spattered floor at my grandfather's in Greenwich Village was to define my life, a life I've spent searching for my own paint-spattered floor.

--Wini Johnson Brewer, 2007

Barbara Maccarillo is New York City born & raised, a product of the NYC Board of Education from kindergarten through college graduation. She was surrounded by, & took almost for granted, the art world of the 50's & 60's, she is a bit of a snob about her good fortune - born in the right place, at the right time.

As with most great artists, psychological trauma often forces creativity to emerge from the wounds, real or imaginary. Barbara, unable to cope with the upheaval of a move from a three room apartment in Long Island City, to a real house, with a garden & garage in Elmhurst (think Archie Bunker & Ugly Betty) refused to go to school. A quiet, cooperative child, she taught herself how to throw tantrums & cry uncontrollably. Miss Carmen, besides herself with what to do with this wailing child, sat Barbara at a small table in the corner of the classroom, providing her with materials she would need to occupy her for the morning, fabric scraps, pictures, paint, cardboard, glue, scissors. Every morning Barbara made puppets. Afternoons went smoothly. She was promoted to the third grade, a student to be proud of.

Her grandfather bought her a “Jon Nagy, So You Want to be an Artist” kit. Saturday mornings Barbara watched TV & drew along with Jon.

Acceptance into the School of Industrial Art was by portfolio & drawing test. Barbara majored in Advertising Art & Fashion Design, plus carried a full academic load. Rock & Roll was hot, the NY Impressionists were making themselves known, the school was within walking distanced of the MMA, MOMA, the Whitney. Plus, she worked. Even then art supplies were expensive.

Four years at the City College of New York gave her the art & academic background to knock down walls. Instead, she taught in the Art Departments of Flushing & Newtown High Schools, with occasional substitutions at Brooklyn Tech, teaching drafting. One year of that was enough. She married, moved to Cheyenne, Wyoming & never looked back.

Art? No time. Kids to raise. Pets to tend to. Pies to bake & yes, clothes to design & sew, puppets & dolls to make. Ten years later, Barbara returned to school. She became an RN. Determined to save lives & stomp out disease, art was put on the back burner for another twenty-five years. Meanwhile, she picked up a Masters in Public Administration from Rutgers & waged political battle for causes she believed in - like confidentiality of medical records.

Artistic achievements, during this dry spell, were few & far between. A poster contest at the hospital, some advertising sketches, an occasional watercolor. Currently there is a 120 square foot mosaic-in-progress in her backyard inspired by the Watts Towers. The Altered Book Project has kept her busy. Sculpture, mosaic work, printmaking & collage are her favorite mediums to work in. Hates to paint. Works to the task, not for fun. Takes art seriously, or not at all.

Ron Meyers received a MFA in painting from the Hartford Art School at the University of Hartford in Connecticut. Under the wings of his mentor, the late master painter Richard Neas, he became a successful Trompe L’oeil artist, with projects including the re-creation of the Globe theatre for a national Folger Library Shakespeare exhibition, and the transformation of a stately Kentucky mansion’s dining room into an early American pine shack for the entertainment of Queen Elizabeth ll.

After years of living, working & painting in New York, London, Amsterdam and San Francisco, Meyers moved to Los Angeles, where he gained notoriety as an Interior Designer. His works have been featured in Progressive Architecture, Metropolitan Home, and the LA Times among others. For many years he was a features writer for the Style section of the LA Weekly. In 2003 Meyers took up permanent residence in Palm Springs . Currently he serves on the Board of Governors of the Palm Springs Museum’s Artist’s Council. His work continues to win awards at both the Museum and Palm Springs City Hall exhibitions, including last year’s infamous “Dyke with a Pearl Earring.” He facilitates monthly life-drawing classes at the Palm Springs Museum.

Jas Minkel has been creating large organic sculptures from laminated Oriented Strand Board rescued as scrap from construction sites in Palm Springs since 2003.

The OSB medium lends itself best to broad curved surfaces, which appeals to his sense of design for contemporary sculpture. From his favorite artist, Salvador Dali, he encourages a playful sense of the surrealistic “trickster” to work in transforming this thin, flat panel, square edged medium into gently curving sculptures.

Jas releases the hidden inner beauty of this coarse construction material into sculptures that are organic in original design favoring bilateral symmetry, not unlike the human body. Some of the pieces have several orientations, changing apparent form as they are repositioned. There may also be images within images, flowing like an optical illusion; sculptures designed to evoke your creativity.

Encountering no one else working in this new medium has required Jas to become his own mentor. He enjoys challenging the medium; designing sculptures that require him to develop new techniques to build and finish the pieces with free flowing, shape shifting images to challenge the imagination of the observer.

Diane Morgan is an award-winning artist specializing in watercolor. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Michigan with a major in design.

After working for 20 years in advertising and most recently as Public Art Administrator for the City of Palm Springs, Diane currently paints full-time. Having painted with oils for many years she now works primarily in watercolor. Her watercolors have won numerous awards and her paintings appear in collections from New York to California.

Morgan’s work has been published in International Artist magazine. And, she was honored with the prestigious “Best of Show” award from the Coachella Valley Watercolor Society in 2007. Diane is a member of the Artists Council of the Palm Springs Art Museum, The American Watercolor Society, The Transparent Watercolor Society of America, The Coachella Valley Watercolor Society and a juried member of the National Watercolor Society. Her work may be viewed at DianeMorganFineArt.com.

Kimberly Nichols is an artist and writer living in Palm Springs, California. Her work crosses genres including literature, photography, painting, conceptual and performance all with subtexts dealing with the psychological aspects of being female. Her work has been exhibited in galleries in Palm Springs, Palm Desert, San Francisco, and Santa Monica and in the Palm Springs Art Museum.

Gary Patterson has had his home and studio in Palm Springs since 2003. His paintings' geometric surface patterns are based on the geometric shapes of needlepoint stitches and quilting patterns. His "Paintings About Painters" comprise the main body of his work. Each is a reinterpretation of an artist who has inspired him.

Gary has shown his work in Palm Springs, San Francisco, Alameda (CA), and Minneapolis, and his work is in collections across the U.S. and abroad. His web site is garypaterson.com. "Palm Springs Book Club" is his first foray into the third dimension.

Richard Proctor

Details coming soon

Mark Stephenson earned a BA in English with an emphasis on poetry and modern American literature at Colorado College, a terrific small liberal arts college nestled at the foot of Pikes Peak in the Rocky Mountains. While working on an MA in film at the University of Texas, in Austin, he developed a passion for still photography, shifted gears and enrolled at Brooks Institute of Photographic Arts and Sciences, the rigorous technical school in Santa Barbara, California, where he earned a second BA (Commercial Photography) in 1984.

He made his way as a professional photographer ever since and now focuses on creating photographic artwork that he shows and sells on the fine art festival circuit, in select galleries nation wide and by teaching photography and digital printmaking workshops at the Palm Springs Art Museum. In 1994 he moved from downtown Los Angeles' artist district to the small rural community of Sky Valley, California (not far from Palm Springs). His home and studio sit on six acres of pristine desert with lots of wildlife (quail, dove, coyote, fox, hawk, owl, snake, squirrel) and stunning views of San Gorgonio and San Jacinto, the first and second tallest peaks in southern California.

Crystal Thorne is a local area teen artist.

Artist Statement:

“I have been interested in making art for as long as I can remember. I was introduced to the art of altered books last summer. When I took an altered book class at the Palm Springs Art Museum. I have been a member of the Teen Art Group at the museum for the last 2 years. This is the third year in a row that I have had a piece accepted into the fine arts creativity awards held by the museum. This is my first time working with the Palm Springs Library.”

Peggy Vermeer.

Artist Statement:

“My creative process as a mixed media artist involves incorporating my handmade paper laid with images onto my canvases. From creating monotypes, I have returned to the canvas, large wrapped ones, and in doing so I can use all the papers, object and paint to fulfill my desire to create a painting that has color shinning through, images that seem to vibrate along with the many exotic papers and dyes I use to impart my feelings in my work.

Themes are very much a part, usually cast around the female figure, myths, quotes from writing or poetry and as I create someone takes over and I am just the provider, is it my inner self? The spirit in me continues until the moment of revelation, it is finished!

As an artist I am still trying to find my inner self through the creative process. I want to share my feelings, let people know there is beauty in all things and this enables me to delve into the essence of the painting. Layering papers, objects and paint creates a depth of color and the use of the handmade paper, which began in water, my sign, enhances and also endorses the spiritual side of my creation. When my work is finished, the many arts used are missing only one, the dance, and if my paintings could dance I would feel complete.”