3 New Exhibits At Silvermine Arts Center Starting April 22

From the Silvermine Arts Center: Silvermine will open three spring exhibitions on April 22—Perfect Partners: Art in Design, an exhibition exploring the role of art in interior design; Rob Loebell’s Mirrorless Reflections; and an exhibition of ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arrangment, presented by the Connecticut Sogetsu Study Group. The public is invited to an opening reception on Sun., April 22 from 2-4pm at the Silvermine Galleries. All three shows run through May 19.

Perfect Partners: Art in Design

• An exhibition exploring the role of art in interior design

Art is integral to the successful design of interior space. In a new Silvermine exhibition, Perfect Partners: Art in Design, five interior designers have been given the chance to create an innovative project to show the ways in which works of art can be a starting point for interior design. The exhibit will explore color, the mix of old and new, the curating of art and objects, and the eye of the collector.

Nancy McTague-Stock, a Silvermine Guild artist and former Board member who organized the exhibit, saw a unique opportunity for the designers to spread their wings.

Perfect Partners: Art in Design came out of my interest in creating an exhibition focused on the partnership of art and design,” said McTague-Stock. “Rare is the client who allows the designer to work like an artist, without boundaries or expectations. Art can initiate a dialogue, and designers can explore and complete that conversation in a space, whether residential or corporate. The designers have ventured to create installations that do exactly that.” Gallery Director Roger Mudre stressed that “collectors should purchase art because it speaks to them and is something they want to live with. It adds life and emotion to a setting.”

The five invited interior design firms are Susie Earls Design of Southport and Greenfield Hills, Krista Fox Interiors of New Canaan, Cherie Greene Interiors of Westport, Interiors by Anna Maria of Stamford and Danise Talbot of Westport. The designers selected art for their installations from the works of over 300 Guild Artist members of Silvermine – painters, sculptors, printmakers, photographers and mixed media artists as well as artists who work in glass, ceramics, fiber, wood and metal. The depth and breadth of the artistic disciplines at the nearly 100-year-old Silvermine Guild gave the designers a wealth and variety of art to choose from.

During the exhibition’s run, Silvermine will present three programs, led by experts, on critical elements of design. On the day of the public opening, April 22 at 3:00pm, Pamma Williams of PPG will discuss “The Voice of Color.” On Sunday, April 29th at 3pm, Matthew Sturtevant, an expert in 18th & 19th century furniture who has lectured extensively on the subject, will present “Trends in Design: Integrating the Old with the New;” and on Sat., May 12, at 3pm, Benjamin Ortiz, Art Advisor, Independent Curator & Collector, and owner of Bozarte, LLC, will discuss “The Art of Collecting and Curating Personal Collections.”

Mirrorless Reflections

• Rob Loebell

Rob Loebell’s relief carvings take photographs of home and travel as their source, but he transcends the original material by working in wood. His pieces are carved, burned, and painted until they are transformed into intricate, three-dimensional works that evoke memory but at the same time resemble ancient artifact.

Loebell describes his two-step process for the works in his new exhibition, Mirrorless Reflections: “I begin by taking hundreds of pictures and then curating them into a story in images. These images are then returned to three dimensions in carved collages… The photographs become more abstract, and hopefully, thereby, more universal. They are softer-edged, more like memories than decipherable events. The sculptures reimagine the fixity or flexibility of time.”

Born in Philadelphia in 1955, Loebell earned a BFA in Sculpture from the Tyler School of Art at Temple University and a Master’s degree in Art Education from Temple University. He has taught art for many years in the West Hartford public high schools and is a member of the New York Sculptors Guild as well as the Silvermine Guild of Artists. His work has been widely exhibited throughout New England, Philadelphia and New York.

Ikebana Exhibition

• The Connecticut Sogetsu Study Group

The Connecticut Sogetsu ikebana Study Group, headed by Silvemine Guild member Katharine Draper, and students from Shizue Pleasanton’s class at Silvermine School of Art will exhibit the art of Japanese flower arranging in the Farrell Gallery at Silvermine. Ikebana is a modern form of an ancient art of sculpture with living materials. It draws on traditional principles and aesthetic disciplines, combined with creative energies, to capture and express natural beauty.

All three exhibitions will run from April 22 to May 19.

Images courtesy of the Silvermine Arts Center