Washington Glass Studio Returns to Art Basel / Art Miami Fairs!

CONTEXT Art Miami 2022

Miami’s Longest Running International Art Fair Art Miami and sister fair CONTEXT Art Miami featured artwork by many artists from the Washington Glass Studio.

View into part of the Alida Anderson Art Projects space in Miami

On Tuesday, November 29, 2022, almost 20,000 guests came to the opening of the 10th edition of the sister fair to Art Miami. CONTEXT Art Miami is dedicated to the development and reinforcement of emerging and mid-career artists, and the vibrant contemporary and modern art fair was the natural setting for the works carried by Alida Anderson Art Projects (AAAP).

Tim Tate’s endless mirror series are a favorite of visitors to the fair.

This year’s AAAP booth at CONTEXT Art Miami showed works by glass mixed media artwork by Christina Helowicz, Michael Janis, Tony Porto, Tim Tate and Erwin Timmers. It also featured mixed media works by J Jordan Bruns, Lenny Campello, and Steve Wanna.

Tony Porto chats up collector group describing the collaborative sculptures made with Michael Janis.

Some Art Miami Highlights:

Christina Helowicz installs her blown glass /mixed media sculpture at the Art Miami fair.
Erwin Timmers with a San Francisco collector that acquired his cast recycled artwork for her collection.
Nora Atkinson, Curator-in-Charge for the Smithsonian’s Renwick Gallery flanked by Michael Janis & Tony Porto.
Lenny Campello (center) describes Michael Janis’ new glass panel artwork.
Christina Helowicz, Director of Alida Anderson Art Projects talks about Steve Wanna’s paintings.
alida anderson, michael Janis and Tony porto, christina helowicz, f lennox campello, lenny, erwin timmers at dinner.

The artists at CONTEXT Art Miami raise their glass in toast! Salud! Amor! Dinero! Clockwise from left bottom: Steve Wanna, Erwin Timmers, Michael Janis, J Jordan Bruns, Christina Helowicz, Tony Porto, Lenny Campello, Joe Ivacic, Danny Marder.

2022 Art Basel/Art Miami Features Washington Glass School Artists

Washington Glass School artists are prepping spectacular glass/mixed media artwork to be presented at Context Art Miami – at Alida Anderson Art Projects . New art works by WGS artists Michael Janis, Christina Helowicz, Tim Tate, Erwin Timmers, along with artworks by Lenny Campello, Tony Porto, J Jordan Bruns and Steve Wanna, Marinela de la Hoz and others will be on exhibit at CONTEXT Art Miami Art Fair, space A29.

CONTEXT Art Miami, presented by Art Miami, continues to create and push boundaries on the conversation about contemporary art, The 2022 edition will showcase works from 75 innovative galleries from more than 20 countries, including Japan, Turkey, Australia, France, South Korea and Chile, among others. CONTEXT Art Miami will kick-off during Miami Art Week with an invitation-only VIP preview on Tuesday, November 29 and run through Sunday, December 4, 2022.

Final Week of CLICK-IT! Online Exhibition

Works by Jennifer Caldwell & Jason Chakravarty, Jeff Zimmer, F Lennox (Lenny) Campello, Teri Bailey and Steve Wanna.

Works by Jennifer Caldwell & Jason Chakravarty, Jeff Zimmer, F Lennox (Lenny) Campello, Teri Bailey and Steve Wanna.

We’re down to the final week the “CLICK-IT!” online exhibit!. Showing works by these talented artists (Teri Bailey, F. Lennox Campello, Jennifer Caldwell, Jason Chakravarty, Cheryl P. Derricotte, Sean Donlon, Sean Hennessey, Joseph Ivacic, Michael Janis, Carmen Lozar, Tim Tate, Erwin Timmers, Steve Wanna, & Jeff Zimmer) to the public and hearing the wonderful feedback has been so rewarding. It means a lot to us that we can share their world with the world and an appreciation for the works/sentiments/technical brilliance can be appreciated.

Works by Sean Donlon, Michael Janis, Jennifer Caldwell & Jason Chakravarty, Joseph Ivacic and Tim Tate.

Works by Sean Donlon, Michael Janis, Jennifer Caldwell & Jason Chakravarty, Joseph Ivacic and Tim Tate.

Those who have yet to visit the exhibition should grab the chance to see these truly wonderful works online – click HERE to jump to online exhibit!

Works by Cheryl Derricotte, Sean Hennessey, Erwin Timmers, Jennifer Caldwell & Jason Chakravarty and Carmen Lozar.

Works by Cheryl Derricotte, Sean Hennessey, Erwin Timmers, Jennifer Caldwell & Jason Chakravarty and Carmen Lozar.

Artists For Racial Justice” exhibit and fundraising for non-profits that can help with equality with art as a tool for healing and peace to help at this time.

Artists for racial.equality.justiceClick HERE to jump to the fundraiser arts page.  

Want more than just visual …stimulation? click on link below and get the official “Click It” themesong – music by Donovan Lessard.

WGS Featured Artist : F Lennox Campello

CLICK IT! Featured Artist: F. Lennox Campello

F. Lennox (Lenny) Campello

F. Lennox (Lenny) Campello

Florencio Lennox (Lenny) Campello was born in Guantanamo, Cuba and studied art at the University of Washington School of Art in Seattle, Washington from which he graduated in 1981. While there Lenny helped to create the Arts NW Student Gallery in Seattle, the area’s first art gallery focused on student artwork. He also organized several exhibitions at the School of Art.

In that same year that he graduated from Washington, he won the William Whipple National Art Competition First Prize for Printmaking, the silver medal at the Ligoa Duncan Art Competition in Paris and the French “Prix de Peinture de Raymond Duncan,” also in Paris. In addition to numerous galleries, his work has been exhibited at the McManus Museum in Scotland, the Brusque Museum in Brazil, the San Bernardino County Art Museum in California, the Musee des Duncan in France, the Frick Museum in Ohio, the Meadows Museum of Art in Shreveport, Louisiana, the Hunter Museum in Tennessee, the Sacramento Fine Arts Center in California, The Art League in Alexandria, The Museum of Contemporary Art in DC, the Rock Springs Art Center in Wyoming and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Boulder, Colorado, the Popov Museum in Russia and the Museum of Small Art in Malaysia. In 2009, world famous American art collector Mera Rubell selected one of his pieces for her 2010 “Cream” auction at the Katzen Museum in Washington, DC. In 2016 The Washington City Paper called him “one of the most interesting people of Washington, DC.

Washington Glass School blog catches up with Lenny as his work is part of the WGS Contemporary online exhibit “CLICK-IT!”.

Washington Glass School (WGS): Describe your artwork method/process.

Lenny Campello: I usually draw with either charcoal or graphite, generally on paper and for the last few years on reclaimed, broken, unfired Bisque. The drawings are most likely part of an ongoing narrative series, some of which I’ve been doing for decades, where I tell and retell stories, or express ideas through the means of contemporary realism. Over a decade ago, inspired by the marriage of embedded video in the glass sculptures of Tim Tate, I started to embed video in my narrative pieces, where I employ the video to further the narration process.  This has further progressed over the years to embedding miniature spy cameras, motion detectors, video recorders, etc. into the artwork.

f.lennox.campello.art.ceramic.charcoal.wgs.contemporary.clickit

F. Lennox Campello “Suddenly, She Wasn’t Afraid Any Longer ” charcoal & conte on unfired bisque. Lenny’s artwork is part of WGS Contemporary online exhibit CLICK-IT!

WGS: Describe your work in the show and highlight aspects that the viewers should understand about the work.

Lenny Campello:Suddenly, She Wasn’t Afraid Any Longer” is part of several of my processes. This charcoal and conte on Bisque is part of my “Obsessive” series. I have probably repeated this image, in various variations and incarnations, over 200 times since the 1980s. The subjects which draw my obsession are diverse and varies. Some of them are iconic people and often comic book superheroes – Frida Kahlo was the first around 1975 when I first saw her works in Mexico City, Elvis, the racist murderer Che Guevara, Monroe, The Batman, Catwoman, Spidey, Superman, etc.  Others, such as “Suddenly, She Wasn’t Afraid Any Longer” is just an image that keeps returning to the blank paper. This one exemplifies lack of fear, taking a chance, a leap forward and away from indecision… freedom.

WGS: How have you handled the Covid lockdown?

Lenny Campello:  Not well… I have not adapted… It sucks! All my time is occupied around the ripple effects of the draconian lockdown and I have not created many new pieces… the ones which have emerged are dark and foreboding.  I am concerned that more people will die eventually because of the Covidian lockdown effects than from COVID-19 itself.

WGS: What artwork/event has moved you and got you thinking about your own work?

Lenny Campello: John Singleton Copley’s dramatic rendering of a shark attacking 14-year-old Brook Watson in Havana Bay – depicted in his painting “Watson and the Shark” has always struck me as one of the greatest narrative paintings of all time! And it made Watson into a celebrity!  Tim Tate’s worldwide impact on art history, in being the first human on the planet to take video away from video players and embedding it into artwork, so that the video became a component of the artwork, not an “artsy movie” to be played on a screen, had the most profound effect on my artwork. I stole his idea – which he developed into glass sculptures – and deployed the same concepts into my drawings and paintings.

F. Lennox Campello "North Atlantic Mermaid (Syreni Caldonii)" artwork in the CLICK-IT! online exhibition.

F. Lennox Campello “North Atlantic Mermaid (Syreni Caldonii)” artwork in the CLICK-IT! online exhibition.

WGS: if you were not an artist – what would you be?

Lenny Campello: Running a food truck outside some Midwestern University or running a small Cuban restaurant in Brechin, Scotland.

WGS: Do you do a lot of planning in your work – or is there an element of chance while working?

Lenny Campello: Very little planning – other than compositional… and there’s always an element of chance – especially in the blurring of the charcoal, which often reveals unexpected new forms and figures.  Sometimes that leads me to include a double-encrypted form of writing that I’ve developed over the years, where I’ve married ancient Ogham writing with the Navy’s verbal Falcon Codes. I use this to “leave” messages hidden as cracks on the backgrounds of some drawings – these almost always start by “accident”, when I see a shadow or crack developing into a phrase.

WGS: What is your rule of thumb in determining when a work is finished?

Lenny Campello: No rule of thumb – I just know…

Click here to jump to F. Lennox Campello’s work in CLICK-IT!

Pulse Art Fair Showcases WGS Artists Tim Tate and Michael Janis

This years Art Basel / Miami Art Week is December 2 – 8, 2019. It’s the best time of the year for viewing contemporary art in Florida, if not the entire world. Miami and Miami Beach will be the center of the art world for a week. More than a thousand art galleries from around the world participate in some eighteen art fairs. You’ll see amazing artwork from around the world. pulse.art.fair.glass

Potomac, MD’s Alida Anderson Art Projects will be presenting new works by WGS Co-Directors Tim Tate and Michael Janis at their gallery in the 15th edition of the PULSE Art Fair.

Tim Tate and Michael Janis' collaborative glass/mixed media artwork titled: "The Longing for Transcendence" will be on display at Alida Anderson space #501 during Pulse Art Fair.

Tim Tate and Michael Janis’ collaborative glass/mixed media artwork titled: “The Longing for Transcendence” will be on display at Alida Anderson space #501 during Pulse Art Fair.

 

 

A new feature for the fair, PULSE Perspectivos, a dual-language series of talks and tours held in English and Spanish. A presentation, “On Identity in the Arts: What Does It Mean to be Latino/a? Latino, Latina, Latin(x), Hispanic…”, held in Spanish at 2 p.m. on Saturday. The conversation will be led by art critic, writer and blogger Florencio Lennox (aka Lenny) Campello who has been spearheading interactive events discussing these issues for the past few years. 

El Sentinel / the Sun-Sentinel have already been posting about the upcoming arrival of our glass artist's works!

El Sentinel / the Sun-Sentinel have already been posting about the upcoming arrival of our glass artist’s works!

PULSE Art Fair is located as Indian Beach Park, 4601 Collins Avenue, Miami Beach, and 46th Street with direct access from the beach and the boardwalk.

PULSE Art Fair is open to the public from Thursday, December 5 through Sunday, December 8, 2019. A Private Preview Brunch will be held Thursday, December 5, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Lenny Campello’s “How To Survive As An Artist Seminar”

Throughout the year, the Brentwood Arts Exchange offers classes and workshops of interest to artists. On September 30, from 2-4:30 pm, as part of the center’s Professional Development Series, the Brentwood Arts Exchange will be once again hosting the “Bootcamp for Artists” seminar at no cost to the artists.

paintball.mona_lisaBOOTCAMP FOR ARTISTS

Date and Time: Saturday, September 30, 2017, 2 – 4:30 pm

Hosted by noted artist/author/art critic extraordinaire, F. Lennox Campello, this free seminar is suitable for all visual artists interested in taking their career to the next level.   

Ever wonder how to maximize the attention your work gets from the press, galleries, and museum curators? How to present your work in a professional manner and save money in the process? How to tap into grants, awards, and residences? How to approach a gallery? Then this seminar is for you! Space is limited. 

Cost: Free

Location: Brentwood Arts Exchange, 3901 Rhode Island Avenue, Brentwood, MD 20722

Contact: 301-277-2863

Lenny Campello Solo at Artists & Makers Studios

"The Devil... after he came back from Georgia" Charcoal, conte on unfired Bisque 5x6x3 inches, c. 2017

“The Devil… after he came back from Georgia”
Charcoal, conte on unfired Bisque
5x6x3 inches, c. 2017

F. Lennox Campello (aka Lenny) is a well known voice of the Mid-Atlantic Art scene, where as an independent curator, art dealer, art critic and consultant he has organized many important shows in the Washington D.C. capital city area.

Lenny came to the United States from Cuba with his parents when he was 10. The family settled in Brooklyn, but he was restless, so he forged his father’s signature and joined the Navy at 17. The military paid for him to major in art and math at the University of Washington in Seattle, and then he was off, stationed all over the globe but keeping up with his art all the while. He held an art show in Beirut and created illustrations for Stars and Stripes newspaper. His figurative artwork is the basis of his solo exhibition along with works in a variety of media and subjects, including the artist’s favorite subject: A 30-year-old affair with Mexican icon Frida Kahlo. In his “Obsessive Drawings” series, Lenny’s works provide insight into his own life, and others.

 

Lenny Campello, "Frida in a Cross of Clouds"

Lenny Campello, “Frida in a Cross of Clouds”

Artists & Makers in Rockville opening of The Obsessions of F. Lennox Campello is Lenny’s first regional solo show in 8 years.

Artists & Makers Studios 2
12276 Wilkins Avenue, Rockville, MD
The Obsessions of F. Lennox Campello

Opening reception is Friday, June 2nd from 6-9PM.

This exhibit runs June 2-29th, 2017.  Viewing hours are 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM, Tuesday-Friday, 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM Saturdays, and Sundays/Mondays by chance or appointment. For more information on Artists & Makers Studio visit www.artistsandmakersstudios.com.

Artomatic Picks F. Lennox Campello!

Artomatic presents: F. Lennox Campello Selects – A curated show of artists selected by artist, writer and art critic, Lenny Campello. Many of of the selected artists participated in the Artomatic Inaugural Ball last month.

Featured Artists Include: 

Bijan Machen

Carrie Hughes

Christ Lyngas

Cory Oberndorfer

David Camero

David D’Orio

Deborah Lash

Devin Symons

Erwin Timmers

John Grunwell

Joseph Merchlinsky

Kathryn Trillas

Larry Jones

Lindsey Routt

M. Helene Baribeau

Magda Johanna Gomez

Michael Janis

Monica de Gastyne

Nancy Donnelly

Natalia

Natalie Camou

Nicolas Zimbro

Paul Farley

Philip Yabut

Rania Hassan

Ric Garcia

Roger James

Russ McIntosh

Sardar

Sasha Sinclair

Sean Hennessey

Shanthi Chandrasekar

Stephanie Booth

  Tim Tate

  Zofie Lang


Exhibit from February 8th to February 22nd, 2013.

Opening reception February 13th – 6 to 8 pm (think Valentine’s!)

Pepco Edison Place Gallery address and hours:

702 8th Street, NW between G and H Streets

Open Tue Wed Thu Fri Noon – 4pm

Click HERE to jump to FB event page.

Miami Art Fairs – Real Deal or Hype? Panel Discussion @ The Hive 2.0

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Hip? or Hop?

Miami Art Fairs Panel

First-Hand Perspectives From Experts And Newcomers

Date: Monday, January 14th, 2013, 6:30 – 7:30 pm

Catalyst Projects will moderate this discussion, generously hosted by Arch Development and The Hive 2.0. 

Aqua Show in Miami 2012

The panel is going to feature Lenny Campello, distinguished art dealer, art writer and artist at Aqua; Adah Rose Bitterbaum, owner of the Adah Rose Gallery and exhibitor at Pulse; Tim Tate, mixed media sculptor at Art Miami; Sean Hennessey, glass artist and newcomer to Aqua; and Shaunte Gates, exhibiting artist at Select.

This panel discussion will offer the DC arts community a look at the increasingly important world of art fairs from diverse perspectives.

This event is free of charge and open to the public.

Location:

The Hive 2.0

1231‐B Good Hope Rd SE

Washington, DC 20020

WGS Gets Wood Artist Drew Storm Graham

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The DC-area knows that StrathmoreHall houses the incredible Baltimore Symphony, but Strathmore is not just for the performing arts anymore – Strathmore features fine visual arts. The organization is in its second season of its Fine AIR program, where the center cultivates local visual arts talent by pairing emerging artists with established professionals in the community in its Fine Artist in Residence (Fine AIR) program and exhibition. Fine AIR residencies last six months, during which time participants expand their craft, build their audience, create a curatorial proposal, solidify their artistic voice and, ultimately, premiere a new body of work commissioned by Strathmore.

“Twisted” Drew Storm Graham

2012-2013 Strathmore class of fine artist-in-residence Drew Storm Graham expands his knowledge of artwork media by working in glass at the Washington Glass School.
Multidisciplinary artist Drew Graham’s artwork references imagery steeped in the counter cultures of tattoo and graffiti art. Normally working with airbrushed laminated wood veneers,  under the mentorship of writer and artist F. Lennox Campello, Drew has been exploring new artistic possibilities. 

Drew Graham begins sifting crushed glass powder onto panels of glass for color samples.
Color, texture, patterns, sequence and how depth can be achieved are the goals of the glass workshop.

The culminating Fine Artists in Residence Exhibition  will be on view in the Mansion at Strathmore beginning August 31, 2013.

About Strathmore

Strathmore presents and produces exemplary visual and performing arts programs for diverse audiences; creates dynamic arts education experiences; and nurtures creative ideas and conversations that advance the future of the arts. The hallmark of the arts center is the Music Center at Strathmore, a 1,976-seat concert hall and education complex. The Music Center at Strathmore, located at 5301 Tuckerman Lane in North Bethesda, MD, is immediately adjacent to the Grosvenor-Strathmore station on Metro’s Red Line. For more information, call (301) 581-5100 or visit www.strathmore.org.