In-‘FLUX’ of Paintings at Mineola Library

As adults and children walked down the stairs to the gallery, bright colors and shapes of all sorts and sizes filled the hallway. The neon colors and geometric shapes gave life to the white walls as children pointed above their heads to the paintings. Each one stood out and each one had a story of its own.

On Tuesday evening the held an art reception for artist Nikki Sclair’s solo exhibition entitled “FLUX.” The gallery is open to the public from July 2 to 31.

“I love the work that I do and I like to show it as much as I can,” Sclair stated about that evening’s showcase. She loves that the library “really encourages creativity” by allowing her the opportunity to share her artwork with the community.

Sclair wants to reach as wide an audience as possible with her art, but reaching out to children is at the top of her list.

“It’s incredibly satisfying when a 10-year-old comes up to me and starts asking me questions about my work and what this means or what that means,” she said. 

Sclair lists her inspiration for the series as Mary Prankster buses from the 1970’s. 

“Those crazy funky hippy buses,” she said, referring to the brightly painted school buses which share a lot of similarities with her work, though she views them more as a system that flows, trying to connect things visually in each of her pieces. 

Sclair also incorporates random body parts in her paintings such as a nose, eye, or hand as the human body also reminds her of parts that connect into a system. She said that wants viewers to break out of the box with her paintings, even if that means the reaction her artworks gets is laughter. 

“I don’t want my artwork to be too serious,” she said. “If I see someone cracking up at the sight of my painting, that’s great.”

Although Sclair often switches back and forth between different forms of art, such as photography, she plans to continue working on this particular painting series. 

“This [series] has been so rewarding and so satisfying, I really want to see where it goes,” she said.