- December 9, 2024
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Whether working with traditional paints on a canvas, clay, photography or plexiglass, a group of local artist are embracing the tie that brings them all together.
Producing unique and thought-provoking art.
A total of 26 artists with Beaux Arts of Central Florida will be showcasing work at the Museum of Arts and Sciences in Dautona Beach in an exhibit titled "Synchronicity." The exhibit, which will be on display until Oct. 20, celebrates the "inherent connectivity in our lives," a press release by the 57-year-old organization states.
“Synchronicity is about coincidence," Ormond Beach artist Robert Shirk said.
It's thinking of a song only to turn on the radio and hear that same tune, or looking at an old yearbook photograph of a friend and receiving a call later from that same person, he explained. Their art is not far off from that concept; most of the artists paint non-objective subject matter in studios, and they share the same aesthetic, Shirk added.
One of the artists participating in the exhibition is Carolyn Land, who resides in Port Orange. Her work, while it draws reference from nature, is abstract. The piece she is displaying is the epitome of synchronicity. It's called "Beneath Earth's Crust," and she completed it one month before the volcanoes erupted in Hawaii in 2018.
In the same show, Ponce Inlet resident Peg Williams's piece is titled "Beneath the Surface." Williams started out as a photographer before she delved into the abstract world. Now, she uses a macro lens to capture small details of machinery or decaying rock. It isn't until after she's taken a photograph that she begins to see the art in them, she said.
“I’m perhaps photographing some small anomaly or blemish or whatever, and then when it’s enlarged, it takes on a whole life of itself," Williams said.
Ormond Beach artist Nancy Newlove McElroy said for her piece "Ebb and Flow," she dealt with water as a concept. Her medium is clay, and her work has evolved over the years as she has abandoned production pottery. She's having fun with the "artistic sculptural person" she said she has become.
All the artists are connected in the same imaginative thread, she said.
“We reach a different level in our process in thinking through our creative expression," McElroy said.
Port Orange artist Sharon LaDue's work turned out to be different from what she expected in the beginning. At first, her piece was part of a larger work, which her husband eventually helped to scale down to three separate pieces. She worked on those individually from then on, and the art transformed.
She said she hopes people walk away with "a new way, or a different way of seeing something that is ordinary or familiar, but seeing it in a whole different way.”
Ormond Beach artist Toni Slick said she hopes people will be wowed by the show. She started out as an Ohio watercolor artist, something she did for 30 years before her art became what it is today.
“I see it as logical evolution,” she said, adding that she can’t imagine painting the same thing over and over.
Slick said she's thankful that MOAS is showcasing local artists now too, something that Land agreed was a wonderful opportunity for the art community.
It gives them a chance to showcase their ever-evolving art.
“I think if you’re really creative, you’re going to grow," Land said. "You just can’t stay stagnant. You see something, you have something and as a creative person you think, ‘What else can I do with this? How far can I push it? How many things can I make out of this one thing? And just let it blossom.”