The Place Where Art Happens
enewsletter | December 2022
WELCOME OUR NEW ARTISTS IN RESIDENCE
Mendocino Art Center’s 2022/23 Artists in Residence (clockwise from left): Nick Kakavas, Collyn Ahrens, SULO BEE, Nicolaus Chaffin, Winchi De Jesus and Katie Applebaum.
Please welcome our new fabulous crew of Artists in Residence. We’re incredibly excited to introduce them to you! Mark your calendars to see their incredible works of art during the Artists in Residence Exhibition, March 31 through May 1, 2023.
In Fine Art
Nicolaus Chaffin (he/him) received a BA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He creates sculpture and installations which braid processes, materials and participatory activations, and consist of common construction materials. His work is a meditation on the invisible labor of his queer forefolks, those who envisioned the utopic through centering experimentation, and those who sought the future through the radical act of survival.
In Jewelry/Metals Arts and Mixed Media
Winchi De Jesus (she/they) is an interdisciplinary Queer, Filipino-American artist who makes work inspired by interpersonal relationships. They received a BA from Cal Poly Humboldt, and explore making art through metalsmithing, photography, glass, and clay to navigate their attachment with the human experience. Their work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, and they recently participated in Cooperation Humboldt’s “Just Imagine” – Artists Dismantling Capitalism online exhibition, as well as “Anonymous Brooklyn” in the Gallery at Brooklyn Metal Works.
SULO BEE (they/them) received their MFA from SUNY New Paltz. Their work explores their response to lived experiences and how they materialize as the fragmented narratives that define their identity as a Trans Non-Binary individual. They layer, respond, and transform elements through experimental processes. Using planar and three-dimensional construction, automatic drawing, and alternative surface treatments, they create harmonious tensions that address the gray area between themself and contemporary society. Iterative processes and chance operations serve as a method to highlight the opposing entities that embody the queerness of the work.
“Print and metal converge in my practice to create harmonious tensions and a state of equilibrium, a space for balance and belonging.”
In Ceramics
Katie Applebaum (she/they) received their BA (ceramics), California State University – Chico.
“I like to find romance in the simplicity of utilitarian objects. When your life is made better by something so simple, so intrinsic and benign, how can you not glorify it? It is my directive to emulate these objects as a tribute to their reliability and usefulness. In order to understand these objects more intimately, I set out to learn their intricacies. I deconstruct them with my mind so I can build them with my hands”
Collyn Aubrey (she/they) received their MFA Graduate Parsons School of Design, NY.
“My forms flux between figurative and quotidian objects, to investigate animacy and the desire to see oneself in material. I make a reparative effort toward reshaping anthropocentrism by dissolving the separations of human from non-human and by celebrating the vibrancy of matter.”
Nick Kakavas (he/him) received their MFA in ceramics from Georgia State University.
“My latest body of work, ‘Sin With Me,’ focuses on homosexual desire and how society associates certain lifestyles as right or wrong. The clay sculptures become proof of my existence. I want to continue using the male body as a source for content and further explore how the body can be used to inform content without the need for a narrative to be placed upon it [while at the Mendocino Art Center].”
MEET NEW CERAMICS & AIRs COORDINATOR, SETH CHARLES
Also please welcome Seth Charles (he/him) as our new Ceramics Coordinator and Artist in Residence Coordinator at the MAC! He holds a BFA from The University of North Florida and a MFA degree from Central Washington University. He has been a professor of visual art at State College of Florida and Central Washington University and has lectured and led workshops around the country.
Seth has been a long term artist in residence at The Clay Studio of Missoula and Morean Center for Clay. His work has been shown in numerous national and international exhibitions and is held in public and private collections. Seth is co-owner of A&S Kiln Building and Consultation Services and has built wood fired kilns at multiple schools and clay centers across the country including Washington, Vermont, Montana, North Carolina and Florida.
Please reach out to Seth (707-937-5818 x11) if you have interest in our ceramics program, or have any general questions about ceramics or the Artists in Residents program at the MAC.
MEET JULIE KARLONAS, INDEPENDENT YOUTH ARTS FACILITATOR
Julie Karlonas (center) hosted a “Free Family Art Night” in November, welcoming dozens of children to paint gourds as a preview of her “Art with Julie” youth art classes beginning in January 2023.
We also welcome Julie Karlonas (she/her), of “Art with Julie,” an independent facilitator of a Youth Art Program held at the Mendocino Art Center. She recently instructed a fun and successful introductory “Free Family Art Night” at the MAC. Thirty plus participants had fun painting gourds and enjoyed snacks and refreshments that were sponsored by our local Harvest Market.
The next “Free Family Art Night” is Saturday, December 10, 3pm-4:30pm. Children of all ages are encouraged to drop in and create holiday ornaments. All materials are provided.
Julie is a multi-disciplined artist and holds an MA in Montessori Education and Elementary Teaching credentials from Saint Mary’s College in Moraga, CA, and a BFA in Printmaking from Sonoma State University. She is the founder of Art Work, a company committed to developing art curriculum for children. Julie has written four books and accompanying materials on sharing art with children. Her books and materials are used internationally.
Please reach out to Julie for her “Art with Julie,” six-week art sessions packed with exciting art projects specifically designed for four different youth age groups, starting in January 2023.
KILN CEREMONY, ART TALKS DELIGHT ATTENDEES
Unloading of the kiln with works featured in Chapter Two of “Earth, Fire and Ash.”
A large crowd gathered for our November Second Saturday Gallery Reception as we introduced artist/ceramist Seth Charles, MAC’s Ceramics and Artists in Residence Coordinator, who gave a talk on his artistry and showed a slide presentation of his ceramic work. All were welcomed to partake in plenty of appetizers, hot spiced cider or glass of wine.
Ian Hazard-Bill also introduced our latest exhibition, “The Wall of Cups,” in our Nichols Gallery, and talked about the creative work, flow and spirit of the wood fired kiln, and discussed all varying and magical aspects of creating a wood fired “drinking apparatus,” also known as a cup or mug. Everyone was then invited out to the MAC’s active kiln yard on campus for a viewing of the process in action, as well as blessing the kiln’s final fiery embers. All the ceramic pieces were then removed the following Tuesday and many of those pieces are now being shown in our Main Gallery in Chapter Two of “Earth, Fire and Ash,” continuing through December 30.
We welcome you to come by the MAC Gallery Store and view all our new inventory of special art and gifts for your holiday shopping! And please come by for a very festive Second Saturday Gallery Reception, December 10, 5pm-7pm, with live holiday music by Lynn Kiesewetter, playing our grand piano during Mendocino’s Candlelit Shopping Night.
A warm and happy holiday time is wished from all of us at the MAC to you and yours!
CASTING TECHNIQUES TAUGHT AT MAC
Barry Schrager (he/him), our Jewelry/Metal Arts Coordinator, hosted and instructed an enjoyable and well-received, in-person jewelry/metal arts workshop recently. The focus was introducing casting techniques: wax casting, cuttlefish bone casting and sand casting.
Please reach out to Barry (707-937-5818 x15) if you are interested in one-on-one instruction, personal group classes, or personal studio time.