Moraga Art Gallery

The Moraga Art Gallery announces a new show, “Transitions”, featuring the one-of-a-kind, Asia-accented jewelry of Lafayette’s own master jeweler K. de Groot as well as a collection of Raku and pit-fired pottery by guest artist Mary Leigh Miller of Moraga.

The show opens March 25th and will run until May 30th. K. de Groot strings her cross-cultural necklaces with varieties of antique beads and pendants brought back from China, Nepal, India, Thailand and other exotic destinations.

Semi-precious stones, delicately etched, molded, and granulated gold and silver beads as well as other trinkets endow her work with both a touch of class as well as a touch of Asia.

Custom-made jewelry using customers’ own unique pieces is one of her specialties. To create her pit-fired ceramics, Mary Leigh Miller arranges clay pieces in a sand cavity surrounded by burnable materials - sawdust, dry seaweed, wood and cow dung. During an hours-long bonfire, she adds various amounts of copper oxides and salt, thereby producing unpredictable but ever intriguing results.

Equally stunning are her Raku pieces that are adapted from an ancient Japanese firing technique during which work is removed directly from the hot kiln and smoked with burnable materials, giving each clay surface a copper sheen.

The public is invited to attend an opening reception on Saturday, March 28th from 5:00 until 7:00 pm to see the exhibit, have some wine, meet the artists, and enjoy the 3420 Mt. Diablo Blvd. - Suite A (Mt. Diablo Blvd. at Brown Avenue) Lafayette, California 94549 925-284-2788 www.LafayetteArtGallery.com company of other Lamorinda art lovers.

Fifteen member artists of the gallery will also have paintings, photographs, ceramics, jewelry and finely-crafted wood ware on display. The gallery, located at 522 Center Street, Rheem Shopping Center, in Moraga, is open Wednesday through Sunday from noon to 5 pm.

For more information, go to www.MoragaArtGallery.com, or call 925-376-5407.