New Members Exhibit - 2021
We are excited to announce our new juried artist members for this year! While we would have loved to see all of their beautiful work in person, due to current restrictions, we have decided to enjoy their work and stories through this online gallery. Please enjoy them below. And to view more of their works, please click on their names below. Thanks!
“The world always seems brighter when you’ve just made something that wasn’t there before.” -Neil Gailman
The above quote is what inspires me to keep creating. I grew up in a family of artists, but never showed much interest myself until several years ago. My mother was in her 80’s and was rekindling her love for watercolors. She coaxed me to sit with her and paint a flower. I was hooked. I am a self-taught artist. I started with watercolors, painting animals and flowers. I now dabble in many different mediums. I am not intimidated by new challenges. I watch YouTube videos, take online courses and ask questions from fellow artists and I practice.
I enjoy playing with vibrant colors and letting my creativity flow out into each piece. One piece of art may be constructed with many layers that could include inks, acrylics, watercolors, and markers. Others may just be a single medium. I may add textures with glitter or glazes. Some pieces may be finished with resin instead of a varnish.
Most of my pieces are abstracts and seem to take on a life of their own. When I am in the mood, I will do a modern realistic piece. I have often had people commission a subject piece. My hope is that my audience will connect to the colors and fluidity of my paintings.
I am not a new artist to HCAA, as I was originally juried in as a 2D artist, and continue to produce 2D works in a variety of mediums. But I also have a passion and love for photography. In 2019, I was honored to win first prize in the black and white category as well as BEST OF SHOW in the Annual Open Lens photography contest. I have enjoyed pushing the boundaries with portraits, and my favorite subjects are my six, beautiful children. I used to have a primary focus in newborn photography, but have gradually grown to enjoy more conceptual art - photography that has a message behind it. I want viewers to be provoked within their hearts and minds. What do these pieces make you feel? What messages are these pieces trying to convey? I am thankful to officially be juried in as both a 2D artist AND photographer, and I look forward to sharing more of my photography at exhibits throughout the years.
Working with clay is an attempt to bring order and purpose to my life; however, sometimes the clay is not in my control and pursues its own path-not unlike pieces of my life. I came to ceramics as a second career and developed my craft over several years of art center classes, private lessons, numerous workshops and a lot of trial and error. Clay is my medium of choice as I love that is its organic and that the clay and I work together to form useful and decorative pieces that carry of bit of me in them. My love of travel gives me so many areas of expression, my recollection of favorite experiences and places provide countless ideas for my pottery.
From an early age, I have always loved and appreciated art and wanted to create my own paintings. Born and raised in Iran, I pursued a degree in Chemistry, but I was always painting in my free time. Painting has been my passion as well as my form of therapy— enabling me to express my feelings and transfer them onto canvas and paper. I love to create different types of textures in my paintings, and I’m typically drawn to using bright colors. I work mainly with acrylics, watercolor, and also enjoy creating abstract paintings used in mixed media.
I live in Fishers, Indiana with my husband and our three daughters. We love to travel whenever we get a chance. From the Middle East to Europe to Africa, our travels have given me the opportunity to see different sceneries and to use this inspiration in my own work. In addition to traveling, nature itself inspires many of my paintings. Natural landscapes help me visualize new shapes and colors, and I love to capture light in different angles. My goal is to always portray real, life objects but with a twist—using my own imagination to give the viewer a new way to appreciate nature through my art. I’m part of the Carmel Art on Main Gallery, where you can find my canvasses of imagination and abstraction.