This year, the Artist Spotlight Exhibition was particularly competitive. For reference, the Main Gallery of Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts can hold about 60 pieces of various sizes comfortable with gallery stacking and creativity. Typically, that means about 11 of our members can have about 5-8 piece hung. Normally, this is about all the entries we get; meaning that typically, only about 11 of our artists apply. That was not the case this year.
This year, we had 26 artists and over 230 pieces entered. We only were able to accept 22% of pieces entered, more than halfing our members chosen for this year too. We attribute this excitement to a lot of new members this year, some of which were chosen below.
We want to thank, again, everyone who entered this year. It was incredible to see everyone's cohesive collections of what they think represents them.
For the November Spotlight, here are the artists that made the exhibition:
Working primarily with watercolors, ink, paper, clay, and wood, illustrator and sculptor Maria Senkel brings to life the boundless spark of imagination. As she puts it, “Imagination is the sparkle that fuels my art and creativity.” Maria’s love for creating began in childhood. Though her professional path initially took precedence, she set a goal to fully embrace her creative side, and twelve years ago, that dream became a reality. Since then, Maria has dedicated herself to her art, drawing inspiration from myths, fantasy, storytelling, and fairy tales. Her work, known for its intricate detail, carries touches of humor, lightness, and timeless moral insights. Through her art, Maria celebrates beauty as she sees it— layered, nuanced, and always in the details. She has exhibited her work in venues throughout the East, receiving numerous awards along the way. Featured in multiple publications and represented by galleries in North Carolina, Maria has also been awarded several grants from the Arts & Science Council of North Carolina.
when i was about 10, my mother took me to the museum of modern art in new york. i remember standing, stunned in front of a giant painting of a map of the united states by jasper johns. i also remember looking around at all the grown-ups studying the art on the walls and it occurred to me that this art thing was something adults took very seriously. this was the beginning of my art life.
i painted all through grade school, boarding school, and college as well. in 1981, my work was selected for the first large-scale survey of abstract painting in the boston area at the boston institute of contemporary art. over the next few years i had a number of solo shows and participated in significant group shows including one at the boston museum of fine arts. shortly after that i sold a painting into the museum’s permanent collection.
in the mid 1980s, i had what can only be described as a lover’s quarrel with the art world. as well as i seemed to be doing, i had no car, no house, and no health plan. i owed the art store a lot of money and the lease on my studio was about to lapse. i also had a deep philosophical falling out with the director of my gallery. to make a long story short, i put my art life in mothballs and took up a career in advertising. in 1989, i was recruited to longhaymes&carr in winston-salem and enjoyed a varied and very creative career.
in 2013, i retired to take care of my first wife who was gravely ill. before she passed, she made me promise to take a run at making art again. she had been one of most steadfast fans back in boston. and so it was that, with a heavy heart and no clue as to whether or not i would actually be able to try making art again, i took it on. it became immediately apparent that my mojo never really left me and before long, i built a big studio off the back of my house and went to town.
since 2014, i’ve shown my work in group shows and solos at galleries and museums in winston-salem, new york city, richmond, wichita, and washingtom, dc. whatever issues i had with the art world seem to have resolved themselves. my studio practice kind of picked up right where i left off. these days, i paint primarily for an audience of one. it turns out that whether the work is any good or not, is really someone else’s problem.
My love of art, creativity and the natural world all came together when I discovered botanical printing with cyanotypes. Printmaking with cyanotype is a camera less photographic process using the sun as the UV light source. A light sensitive mixture of iron compounds is painted on watercolor paper and left to dry in the dark.
Botanicals are layered on top. For the “wet” process liquid is applied which creates different colors and effects. Pieces are then exposed to the sun for a varying length of time. I collect many plants from my walks and grow many of the flowers and herbs to be transferred onto paper or fabric.
I find beauty in the signs of the imperfect, the incomplete, the rustic and the organic disintegration of nature. As a gatherer of beautiful things and found objects, I use them in unfamiliar and unexpected ways. They always find their way into my art pieces.
All my past experiences have led to a love of the wet cyanotype process which is simple but unpredictable. Many variables affect the outcome, making each piece unique and one that cannot be duplicated. Wet cyanotypes are unpredictable and are always serendipitous!
Michelle was born and lives in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, with her husband and two rescue dogs. She has always loved being outdoors and spending time in nature. One person’s trash is reimagined into treasure. At the heart of Michelle’s pieces, you will discover found materials and breathtaking nature. Her artistic passions lie in finding ways to blend the two into new creations of beauty. Using paint, collage, printmaking, and lots of glue, Michelle unearths the unexpected magnificence that is all around us in our natural landscapes.
Michelle is a proud member of Associated Artists of Winston-Salem, Watercolor Society of North Carolina, Collage Artists of America, High Country Plein Air Painters, Special Agent Collage Collective, and Arts For Art's Sake.
I grew up in Pittsburgh, PA, in a family that liked to make things. I learned how to sew, I loved to draw and I loved clothing. My first year in college was as a Fashion Design Major at Pratt Institute and I then transferred to Carnegie Mellon University where I graduated with a BFA in Graphic Design.
When we moved to Winston-Salem I stayed at home with my kids and set up my first studio in our Ardmore home, but a few years later a “real” job as a graphic designer took all my time. Thirteen years later, I left the full-time job and became a part timer which gave me time to make art again.
1999-2019: Painting from life including painting en plein air, doing figurative and portrait work from life in the studio during this time was a great way to learn. Studying with lots of great artists in workshops using various mediums also gave me a good foundation.
2020-present: Collage and semi-abstraction has become my focus but I am still drawn to the same subjects I always loved: people and architecture.
HOW THIS SERIES CAME ABOUT This series began with intuitive drawing in a 9”x 12” sketchbook using brush and ink. Trying to keep the freshness of these images was the tough part. I scanned them, enlarging them to fit my canvas, and then printed them out which gave me fat black lines. I cut the lines out to make stencils. The canvasses were recycled oil paintings over which I had painted with red-orange oil paint adding abstract marks with a brayer and scrapers. I then transferred the lines onto the canvas using the stencils and black oil paint. Adding more color and texture to the images brought them alive.
Making art and appreciating the art of others has been a lifetime endeavor for me. I studied fine art at the University of Missouri in Kansas City, where I am from, before attending and graduating from the Art Institute of Atlanta. My artist career began in traditional graphic art, which at that time, involved layout and illustration on a drafting table. As the commercial art industry morphed into the computer-aided, interactive design practice it is today, I developed digital design skills. However, since childhood, I have always loved to draw and paint.
Fortunately, my life took a turn that has allowed me to be able to truly focus on my fine art and artistic development. Creating fine art, whether painting or collage, is my passion. My art is varied, inspired by my creative thoughts, ideas or subjects that inspire me. This may be people, a scene, a still life or a moment I connect with emotionally.
A love I have is painting florals in an expressive and abstracted way. Creating and mixing colors and making organically shaped strokes is very fulfilling for me. In this practice, I am seeking to capture the experience of encountering flowers, their essence, and not in the realistic rendition of them. That is the experience I hope people have when viewing my floral abstract paintings.
Kelly Hodges is a contemporary artist known know for her use of cold wax medium and oil paint. Born in 1965 and a native of Winston-Salem, Kelly worked in graphic design for 25 years before attending Salem College where she received a Bachelor’s degree in Studio Art. She is influenced by abstract paintings and color theory.
Currently, Kelly is working on a series of cold wax medium and oil paintings that explore how texture, mark making, and color in abstract art evoke emotional response and tell stories.
“Art is a part of who I am. It’s a collection of experiences that shape my perception of the world and I share these perceptions visually,” Kelly says.
Sara Pollino is a Winston-Salem based photographer who explores evocative and abstract imagery. Sara earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography from the University of Florida. Her early work was film-based but currently, she uses digital format exclusively.
She has been included in several juried shows and been recognized in regional competitions for her photography.
Her process involves capturing thought-provoking images that are often missed, at first glance, in everyday environments. Finding beauty in the overlooked is one of her favorite pastimes.
Deborah Petermann lives in northwestern North Carolina and has been doing artwork all her life. Following her retirement from NC State University and the move to Western North Carolina, she has devoted her time to painting landscapes of Western North Carolina, Southern Virginia, Switzerland and France. “I have always been moved by the beauty of nature and feel the need to cherish and promote the preservation of natural areas.”
Primarily a landscape painter, her works also include printmaking, figurative painting, abstracts, and portraiture. She has hundreds of portraits in private collections and numerous other works hanging in corporate and private collections in the United States and Europe. Deborah is primarily a self-taught artist. She studied printmaking with established master printmakers Phil Garrett and Steve Chapp. She was awarded three merit scholarships to the Greenville County Museum School of Art. Her works were exhibited at the Greenville County Museum of Art in 1987 and 1988 and she was previously represented by the Mary Praytor Gallery.
Twenty-five percent of the proceeds from any sales of Deborah’s work will go to Western North Carolina Hurricane Relief.
Marietta Foster Smith is painter who has recently returned to the Piedmont Triad area where she was very active in the arts serving as Executive Director of Associated Artists of Winston-Salem and Coordinator of the Drawing & Painting Department at the Sawtooth School for Visual Art before moving to Salisbury. She completed her Bachelor of Arts degree in Arts Management at Salem College. Her studio arts education was completed at UNC-G. In Salisbury, she served as Executive Director of the Rowan Arts Council and was the founding member of Rail Walk Studios & Gallery. She still maintains a studio there and continues to work on her watercolor paintings. She teaches private watercolor lessons and several workshops each year.
She is a signature member of the Watercolor Society of North Carolina and has been accepted in their juried exhibitions receiving awards in two of their shows. She has also been accepted and awarded in juried shows at Waterworks Art Museum, Davie County Juried shows receiving First, and Second place and Honorable Mentions, Juried exhibit at Art and Soul, an Invitational Exhibit at Heart of Salisbury and accepted into the Dimensions Juried Exhibit in Winston-Salem. Her art has been published in numerous magazines and textbooks.
Although she has created art in a many media including oil portraiture, clay and direct applied cement sculpture, she is always drawn to the loveliness of watercolor and is inspired by the beauty that can be achieved with layering transparent washes allowing the paint to complete the strokes as it will.
“I am a painter who loves nature, color, and pattern. I climbed trees as a 10-year-old and imagined I could fly. Sometimes, I draped my body over the limbs of a big tree and pretended those tree arms were holding me. Nature has always been where I feel alive, alert, and at home. As for color and pattern, I look back to when I learned to sew. There’s nothing as enjoyable as wandering through the fabric aisles, imagining your project. These days, you can find me painting outdoors or in the studio, sometimes just mixing color and creating a “swatch” journal.”
Deliece Blanchard paints landscapes with lyrical and rhythmic marks that reveal her background in music. A cellist as well as an oil painter, she is a member of the Oil Painters of America, the American Impressionist Society, and American Women Artists. Highlights in 2024 include a solo show “A Love of Landscape,” in Lynchburg, Virginia, a first-place award at the Cashiers NC Plein Air Quick Paint and being juried into the OPA National Exhibition and the OPA Eastern Regional Exhibition, which is currently on view at the Centerpiece Gallery in Raleigh. She has been awarded fellowships from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, the Cook Foundation, and the Tyrone Guthrie Center in Ireland.
