first firday

June First Friday - Maddie Amelia Lewis: Dreamscaping

Skulls and Bottles

Artist Reception: Friday, June 5 - 6-8 p.m.

Bio: Maddie Amelia Lewis is a 2D artist with a fondness for acrylic paint and ink. She is a recent graduate from UC Santa Cruz. She is fascinated by fantasy, the arts, and textures.

Paintings will be on sale from $20-$85, and lithographic prints will be selling from $5-$15. See artist website for preliminary prices: www.noxkitarts.com

Artist Statement:

I like making huge gestural brush strokes, circular voids reminiscent of black holes, drips, and fine lines. I paint abstracted landscapes and attempt to embody concepts like death, anxiety, love, daydreams, and imaginary places. I will go through great lengths to actualize an idea. I try to draw from the beauty and emotion in my life for my art so I can’t forget it. Each of my pieces is a space I create to reflect, and after I take my time with each one, I let it go.As an acrylic painter, I am a texture junkie. I love acrylic mediums—glass beads, resin sand, modeling paste, black lava—I’ve tried them all and I make full use of them. My paintings ensure dynamic and varied surfaces. I tend to work very quickly and use a lot of aggressive mark-making techniques. The larger the canvas, the more energetic I become while I paint it. For small works, I can be more delicate, but the restlessness remains.  They say that drawing from live models gives the drawing itself more life, so I try to instill the energy, emotion, and intensity into my paintings by embodying those feelings as I paint.In the end, it all comes down to an obsession. I paint because I can never get paintings out of my head. A painting will tell me what it needs to be real, and I oblige it the best I can. It’s a piece of the world inside of me—it has always been, and will never cease to be.

First Friday March

First Friday, March 7 Dream Scapes:Fleeting Lines From the Human Consciousness Paintings by Whitney Romberg Available to view for the month of March anytime the studio is open.

Artist Statement: From a young age, I have always been fascinated by the concept of dreams within the human brain. Within these paintings, I strive to explore the tangibility of dream scapes using color, texture, and symbolism to illustrate the vagueness that our conscience is capable of making, expressing our deepest thoughts that our rational mind isolates during waking.

Friday, July 2 - Fast and Loose - A Selection of Local Rock 'n' Roll Photography

[slideshow] Friday, July 2 Artist Reception 6-9 PM 118 Coral Street

Santa Cruz Rehearsal Studios (118 Coral Street) will host a reception from 6-9 PM for our latest show entitled “Fast and Loose – A Selection of Local Rock N’ Roll Photography.”

The show features the work of local photographers Tim Cattera, Brian Crabtree, Cat Johnson, Vanessa Lucas and Peter Saporito. Each photographer will display some of their favorite band shots from Santa Cruz and Bay Area venues throughout the years.

These diverse collections of images, captured in the moment, document the raw energy and controlled chaos which is always part of the shows. The lens is sometimes directed towards the stage, individual band members or on the audience and their interaction with the experience. If this show does not inspire you to go out and experience live music, I’m not sure anything will.

About the artists:

Tim Cattera Starting out with success in surf photography, including his work published in Surfer Magazine, Tim evolved into stills, family portraits, fashion and live music. You can find him locally, anywhere from on top of a bar at the Crepe Place trying to get the perfect angle on the drummer, to roaming the wharf shooting hot rods in the sun. http://www.timcattera.com/

  Brain Crabtree Brian was just another college kid with a camera until he began an internship with Santa Cruz based Your Music Magazine. Since then, Brian has become the magazine’s main photographer capturing shows and experiencing the Santa Cruz underground music scene on a near daily basis.  http://yourmusicmagazine.com/photos.html

Cat Johnson A renaissance woman, Cat is a blogger, freelance writer, web and graphic design buff, long-time record store nerd/employee and musician, as well as a photography enthusiast. Behind the counter at Streetlight Records Cat is uniquely positioned to capture candid moments from the mundane to the insane.   http://houseofcat.net/

Vanessa Lucas With a fascination for the absurd and a ravenous hunger to see the truth behind "The Scenes" Vanessa Lucas entertains and provokes the visual world of the underground. Her work strives to capture the souls of all those who dare to go outside the norm. http://www.facebook.com/pages/Just-For-Thee-Taste-Photography/199324136279   

Peter Saporito The past 15 years Peter has been looking through a lens to capture light. Light that comes in countless forms – live music, a secluded ferris wheel, a random bathroom or a portrait of a friend. Peter has been voted Best Photographer and Best Visual Artist in both Santa Cruz Weekly and Good Times. http://www.peterangelosaporito.com