Spring 2012 Gallery Shows

Center for the Digital Arts Student Show

January 23 – February 25, 2012

Reception: Wednesday, February 8, 5:30 pm – 7:00 pm

Special Screening of Student Multimedia Work: 6:00 pm

This exhibition of artwork by students from the Westchester Community College Center for the Digital Arts will include the traditional fine arts of painting and drawing as well as work from the digital arts, such as Digital Imaging, Computer Illustration, Desktop Publishing, Digital Video, Multimedia, 2-D and 3-D Animation. Animation and Video will be exhibited at a special gallery screening during the opening and will play during the exhibition.

 

Rebecca Mushtare

Data Experience

March 6 – April 14, 2012

Opening Reception: Tuesday, March 6, 6:00 – 7:00 pm

Artist’s Gallery Talk: 6:30 pm

 The body of work in Data Experience is an invitation to you – I invite you to become a participant and collaborator.  The core of my collaborative plea is our desperate need to reconsider the data at the root of our daily lives that we constantly consume and generate — iconography, conversations, our routines, etc.

I admit I should have invited you sooner – before the production of these systems for analysis, contemplation and creation.  Needless to say, these systems are not of much value unless they are put to use, tested and interrogated. Your efforts and contributions will give each system and body of data meaning and life.

The works in Data Experience include a number of entry points for collaboration and participation including (but not limited to): playing a game, scanning QR codes, telling stories, sensory input and initiating a dialogue.

Rebecca Mushtare is a visual artist based in Mount Kisco, NY. She is an Assistant Professor of Communication Arts (specializing in Digital Media) at Marymount Manhattan College in NYC. Rebecca earned her MFA in computer art from Syracuse University and a BFA from SUNY Oswego. She has exhibited her work throughout New York State and the East Coast and internationally.

http://www.cyberthread.net

 

Sarah Vogwill

Polaroids & Afternoon

April 26 – May 19, 2012

Opening Reception: Thursday April 26, 2011, 6:00 – 7:00 pm

Artist’s Gallery Talk: 6:30

For this exhibition the artist draws on her extensive collection of Polaroids produced over many years. Primarily focused on the small events unfolding in forests and gardens, the viewer is invited to enter into an intimate relationship with nature through observation. Emphasizing the singularity of the Polaroid as a discreet object, the work is presented in a variety of forms: framed as triptychs, reproduced as fine prints, and presented salon style in larger arrangements.

Additionally, the artist presents her 60-minute contemplative video piece, Afternoon, which invites the viewer to notice the subtle changes that occur as a beautiful spring afternoon unfolds in real time.

http://www.sarahvogwill.com/

Spring 2012 Lectures/Workshops

Matthew Slaats

Dead Hare Radio Hour Podcast

Tuesday, March 6, 7:00 – 8:00 pm

Matthew is an artist, activist and community organizer based in the Hudson Valley.  His work is based in a social practice that looks to create public forms of culture.  Seeing himself in hybrid roles, he works with communities to explore the wealth of social knowledge that is held in a place, then expressing it through forms of visual and interactive media.  His work includes the Hyde Park Visual History Project, Walking History, The Powers that Be, and Freespace. In 2010 he began PAUSE, a non profit organization that uses art as a catalyst for community engagement and development.

The Dead Hare Radio Hour is broadcast every Tuesday at 5pm (EDT) on 91.3 WVKR, Poughkeepsie, NY.

The show can be streamed on the WVKR website.

Download Episodes of The Dead Hare Radio Hour via iTunes.

http://matthewslaats.com

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Meet the Filmmaker:

The Housesitter,

by Humgoid Films

With Producer Pablo Bonelli and Writer/Director, Thomas Ascenzi

Question and Answer period follows the Screening

Thursday April 26,

2012, 7:00 pm

Q  & A period will follow the screening.

This local production company will be screening it most recent production, “The Housesitter”.

The Demons Cross Saga is the story of a struggle between two covert and ruthless powers.  The Housesitter is the first installment of the saga. “The Trust”, an elite secret society emanating from within a prestigious New England university and El Jefe, the shadowy figure behind Mexico’s most powerful drug cartel.  While power behind The Trust may be older and reach further, El Jefe has one important element on his side.  His enemies know less about him than he does about them. The central character Susan is from a family steeped in the traditions of The Trust, a tradition she rejects.  However, spite of her scorn however she and her friends are not safe from the crossfire of this clandestine war. What was meant to be a bucolic weekend in the country turns into a bloody nightmare for five friends as they are stalked and terrorized by a monstrous killer.

www.pablobonelli.com

www.humgoidfilms.com

This event is open to the public and all enrolled students, but registration is required. Please email us at peekskill@sunywcc.edu.

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Workshop

ePublishing with InDesign –
an Introduction

Michael Murphy, Adobe Certified Expert

Thursday April 12, 2012

6:30 – 9:30 pm

This 3-hour workshop is ideal for those qwho want to learn to create ePub documents from InDesign. The electronic book format that has become the industry standard, allowing eBooks that use this format to be read on a wide variety of eReaders, from dedicated hardware to desktop software to online based readers like the Kindle, the Nook and iPad.

This workshop covers these essential topics:

▪   What is ePUB

▪   Do’s and don’t for designing an ePUB

▪   Cleaning up your existing document

▪   Using the correct styles

▪   Applying Object Export options for images

▪   Creating a table of contents

▪   Managing a multi-document book

▪   Export Options

▪   HTML and CSS, what you need to know

▪   Adding metadata

▪   Testing your ePUB

For nearly 20 years, Michael Murphy has been a hands-on designer and art director, crossing the line between design, production and software training throughout his career. Michael is an Adobe Certified Expert in InDesign CS5, and the author of “ ” (Adobe Press, 2009).  He is also a contributing writer for InDesign magazine, and a featured speaker at the InDesign Conference and several InDesign User Groups.

Fall 2011 Lectures/Events

Bring us your broken objects for 

Patched: Sustaining the Life of Objects

a mending workshop on 

Thursday, November 10th, from 5:30 to 7:00 pm

With Sara McBeen, member of  Fixers Collective & Sarah Kate Beaumont, master sewer and founder of Verysweetlife Studio.

• Children welcome.
• Bring clothing or a non-electronic household item to mend.
• Tools and tips provided.

in conjunction with

What color is your trash, babycakes?

October 25 – November 26

Westchester Community College, Center for the Digital Arts

27 N. Division St., Peekskill, NY 10566

Artist, Jean Brennan, along with her husband and two children, conducted an investigation of their material—and highly disposable—world. As a mock anthropological study, each discarded artifact was photographed and tagged with its respective date, material, weight, user, function and color. Tagged with metadata, images were uploaded daily to an online  archive at Squanderless.com. The live feed ran for 10 months resulting in a unique family portrait narrative.

www.squanderless.com

www.squanderless.com/blog

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Eric Wilkerson, Making a Career in Illustration 

Tuesday, November 15, 2011, 7:00 pm

 

Eric has most recently started working as a visual development /concept designer for the movie industry, creating digital matte paintings and pre production art for projects in development. He is now working as a concept designer for the world famous Blue Man Group and WETA Workshop (the visual effects studio responsible for the Lord of the Rings films, District 9 and James Cameron’s Avatar.) His past clients include Activision, Walt Disney, Nickelodeon, MTV, and DC Comics. Eric is a graduate of The School of Visual Arts NYC.

http://www.ericwilkersonart.com/

This event is open to the public and all enrolled students, but registration is required. Please email us at peekskill@sunywcc.edu.

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Meet the Foley Artist/Sound Engineer

Leslie Bloome, Alchemy Post Sound

Wednesday, November 30, 2011, 7:00 pm

Alchemy Post Sound focuses on creating the best sounds for all types of productions including feature films, commercials, TV, animation, documentaries and video games. Alchemy records and delivers in digital formats. All of our sound effects are recorded to fit the exact requirements of each production.

Foley is the reproduction of everyday sounds for use in filmmaking. It’s the sound of the footsteps, movements or rustles. It’s anything that the actor might handle touch or grab, like writing a letter or clinking of a drink. Smaller sounds like jewelry jingle or a fly being zipped. Larger sounds like a body fall or a fistfight.

During filming, the location sound recordist tries to capture only the dialogue as best as possible. On the set, microphones are positioned to record an actors’ slightest whisper without background noises from camera and crew. In post, Foley adds back the detailed layer of sound to produce a rich and realistic track. Many times an actor will need to replace a line in a scene do to outside noises or a poor performance, or when a film is sold for foreign release and music and effects only mix is needed. In these situations, the Foley sound effects really come into play.

Leslie Bloome is both a Foley Artist and editor, with over 200 feature-film, television, gaming, animation and commercial credits. Recent credits include Showtime’s “Nurse Jackie”, HBO’s “Board to Death” and AMC’s series “Rubicon”.

http://www.alchemypostsound.com/

This event is open to the public and all enrolled students, but registration is required. Please email us at peekskill@sunywcc.edu.

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Art and Smartphones, a New Artmaking Landscape Using Augmented Reality

Chris Manzione

Tuesday, October 25, 2011, 7:00 pm

What is Augmented Reality and what will an augmented future look like? Learn more about Augmented Reality, or AR, a technique that uses free smart phone apps to overlay 3-D images and information on top of real-time screen visuals as seen through the smart phone camera lens. Chris Manzione is a pioneer of this art form and will talk about theVirtual Public Art Project, his Augmented Reality platform for the public display of digital works of art. VPAP is the first mobile AR outdoor art experience ever, and maximizes public reception of AR art through compatibility with both iPhone 3GS and Android phones.

Unlike current AR smart phone utilities that enable users to view a location with an additional layer of information about that location – i.e. information about a restaurant, VPAP creates site-specific sculptures at a location that invite viewers in for close observation from all sides and from multiple perspectives.

http://virtualpublicartproject.com

This event is open to the public and all enrolled students, but registration is required. Please email us at peekskill@sunywcc.edu.

Fall 2011 Gallery Shows

Melinda Hunt

The Hart Island Project

December 6, 2011 – January 14, 2012

Opening Reception: Tuesday, December 6, 2011, 5:30 – 7:30 pm

Artist’s Gallery Talk: 6:30 pm

In 1991, Melinda Hunt and Joel Sternfeld set out to re-photograph Jacob Riis’s first photographs taken 100 years earlier at the public cemetery on Hart Island, New York. Mass burials in plain pine boxes remain an unchanged part of New York City. Soon after their book, Hart Island, was published in 1998, the island became closed to media and the public. The only witnesses to daily burials were prison guards and inmates from Riker’s Island.

After releasing the film Hart Island: An American Cemetery in 2007, Melinda Hunt submitted a Freedom of Information request for records of over 50,000 burials from 1980-2010. These generated an on-line database completed in 2011. People located in the database are the subject of a new series of landscape/portraits using ink applied to large (26″ x 40″) digital fine art prints from 35 mm black and white negatives. The negatives were never intended for use as finished photographs. They were collected as archival footage of a landscape where over 850,000 people have been invisibly buried since the American Civil War.

A gallery talk by the artist will cover the 20-year history of The Hart Island Project: An Artist and Community Collaboration.

Article from Lohud.com 11/14/11 

http://hartisland.net/

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Shopping

An Exhibition of work by Gina Randazzo 

September 6 – October 15, 2011

Opening Reception: Tuesday, September 13, 2011, 5:30 – 7:30 pm

Artist’s Gallery Talk: 6:30

This series of photographs is an expression of my feelings about living in a society where so much emphasis is placed on shopping.  Sometimes it seems to me that consumerism is the main component of American culture, now exported around the world.  (I photographed malls in India that look like Sherman Oaks, CA.) While I am extremely thankful that I am able to procure the goods I need to live comfortably, I aim to question the constant pressure I feel to engage in the commercial marketplace.  I photographed consumer environments with an eye towards examining the architecture and design that invite consumption.  I depict my psychophysical reactions to the surroundings by removing the mid-tones and framing the images to highlight the disorientation caused by visual overload.  The resulting images explore the emotions evoked by my experience of consumerism.

 

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Jean Brennan

‘What color is your trash, babycakes?’

October 25 through November 26

Opening Reception: Tuesday, October 25, 2011, 5:30 – 7:30 pm

Artist’s Gallery Talk: 6:30

Artist, Jean Brennan, along with her husband and two children, conduct an investigation of their material — and highly disposable — world. As a mock anthropological study, each discarded artifact was photographed and tagged with its respective date, material, weight, user, function and color and uploaded daily to an online archive. The live feed ran for 10 months resulting in a unique family portrait narrative.

‘What color is your trash, babycakes?’ interrogates the emotional resonance of the things that surround us. It attempts to weigh the unquantifiable color value of excess in our lives. The presentation of the work at Center for the Digital Arts includes a video projection, the digital archive and image walls sampling the 1,080 images created during the project.

http://www.jeanbrennan.com/

http://www.squanderless.com/

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Summer 2011

Of Line and Form

Works by Peekskill Arts Council Member Artists
Curated by The Peekskill Arts Council

Exhibition dates: June 2 through – July 29
Artist’s reception: Thursday, June 2, 5 pm – 7 pm

The Westchester Gallery is pleased to host a juried exhibition, “Of Line and Form”, by Peekskill Arts Council member artists. This group show will exhibit exciting works by 20-30 professional member artists with studios located in and around Peekskill. The focus of the show is on line as the fundamental element in all art. Line creates form, volume and texture in variety of media. Don’t miss this opportunity to become part of the Peekskill arts scene!

http://www.peekskillartists.org/

Faranda Show Spring 2011

Faranda Show Spring 2011, a set on Flickr.

March 9, 2011