Blue Moon Gallery launches fall season with new exhibits
The Blue Moon Gallery in Grayslake is launching its fall season from 6-9 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 24.
New guest artists, live music, and a pop-up show will be featured. The opening reception will present two new exhibitions: "Creatures Great and Small," featuring mixed media paintings by Kittie Yohe of Northbrook, plus pastel paintings and monoprints by Mark Price of Cedarburg, Wisconsin. Both are award-winning artists.
Mixed media artist Colleen Steenhagen of Kenosha, Wisconsin, continues her exhibition of cyanotype photography, and new works from the gallery's collective artists - Tony Armendariz, Mike Bellefeuille, Leisa Corbett, Juli Janovicz and John Kirkpatrick Jr. - will be on view.
A one-night-only pop-up show will be presented by Frank Fitzgerald of Lindenhurst. Guitarist Tom Clippert of the Oakton College Guitar Ensemble will be the gallery's musical guest. The gallery will also be open from 1-4 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 25.
Kittie Yohe's mixed media paintings are a response to her environment, her life experiences, the beauty of the natural world and the ideas and emotions within her. The need to express and communicate her thoughts drives her passion to paint.
She paints a variety of subject matter, but is consistently inspired by the elements of the universe; creatures of the earth, sea and sky; the endless variety of landscapes and bodies of water; and natural formed objects.
In recent years, she has employed more experimental techniques and approaches in her artwork. Using Yupo, a synthetic Japanese paper, Yohe applies airbrush paints, inks, watercolors and other materials using a variety of playful techniques and applications to achieve unique effects.
Yohe has been painting for 50 years. She has exhibited in local art fairs, as well as solo and group shows. Her work is represented in many private collections.
Mark Price transforms his pastels from imagination to reality by using primitive tools introduced centuries ago, coupled with new techniques learned through his experiences.
He has traveled extensively in the Rocky Mountains, the Caribbean and Europe, where he immersed himself in the local landscape creating a large portfolio of work. He also enjoys plein air painting, capturing the mood, light and character of a location.
From a distance his pastel paintings, presented on Thai gossamer paper, appear as a landscape or figure, but as viewers get closer the piece often looks abstract and features a pixilated or cube-like pattern.
Price recently earned membership into the prestigious International Association of Pastel Artists Master Circle. Fewer than 250 members worldwide are awarded this top tier distinction. Price also creates one-of-a-kind monoprints using the pure pigments of pastels; an entirely new and unique form of art.
Frank Fitzgerald's pop-up show will feature oil and acrylic paintings that have, at their center, a relationship to the Chicagoland suburbs.
Each work encompasses a gestural and tactile response to Fitzgerald's experience as an artist and an art educator in the Midwest suburban landscape. He uses a variety of techniques, ranging from creating layers with under painting to thicker, more gestural applications of paint.
Fitzgerald's paintings blend occasions of costuming and artifice with the flora of a manicured suburban nature. Creative play is revealed through his array of personal symbols, which provide an entry point into the theater of his colorful, surreal canvases.
Patrons are invited to the Opening Reception from 6-9 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 24, to visit the gallery, meet the artists, enjoy live music and experience the arts. The event is free and open to the public.
The gallery is at 18620 Belvidere Road in Grayslake. For more information, contact Kendra Kett, director, at (224) 388-7948 or visit www.thebluemoongallery.com.
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