GOSTartist Profile: Alexa Ginsburg: A feltmaker and dyer, she purses her ancient craft with modern lighthearted results.

Alexa Ginsburg - A Feltmaker whose colorful creations are proof that a skilled artist can capture wonder in any medium.

Alexa, a native of NYC, grew up in a highly artistic family surrounded by art supplies from the time she was a youngster taking classes at MOMA and Pratt. She always looked forward to the start of a new school year when she'd get a new box of Crayola crayons. She eventually went to Cooper Union, majored in painting and did large colorful abstract canvases.

In her twenties she spent time in Isfahan, Iran where she taught art at the International School. Side trips to Pakistan and a stint manufacturing hand loomed skirts led to a fascination with hand-dyed and embellished textiles in local markets. A seed was planted from the riotous palette of cotton skeins and tribal embroideries she found in dusty villages. This seed would lie dormant for many years as she returned to the States and settled into domestic life, running a desktop publishing company, working as a graphic designer, illustrating and designing children's books and raising two children.

When she found time to return to her own creative work, it was feltmaking that was the perfect medium for her. She was always in search of a "resonating medium" and felting fulfilled everything she was looking for--it is very hands on, warm, soft and malleable. The vibrant colors appealed to her painting background, and it "felt" responsive to her needs as an artist. By taking workshops and joining a felting guild she gained technical skill that helped her realize her intense interest in color, design, form and craftsmanship. She has been working with felt for the last 15 years and it has taken over her life and house.

Alexa creates gorgeous scarves and wearable accessories as well as artful soft toys which appeal to both the young and young at heart! She works surrounded by a feast of colorful fiber-- mostly wool and silk in brilliant dyed colors. She also does a lot of hand dying and combines different fibers together for textural effects. Alexa sells her work at craft shows, by commission, and online (alexaginsburg.com). She constantly builds her skills through workshops with nationally and internationally known feltmakers. Her designs include felted herons, birds of prey, wolves, foxes, raccoons and other wildlife as well as sweeter domestic animals. Visiting her studio is like being in a candy store. She is surrounded by colors, creatures, and creativity.
Alexa reminisces that as a child she wanted to be Picasso or Geppetto-- but she turned out to be a multi-faceted creator of her own!

GOSTartists Profile: Pam and Craig Booth - Sculptures in Clay of Cars and Whimsy

CRAIG AND PAM BOOTH

Cars!  Cars!  Cars!

Clay sculpture, and painting give an active and dynamic feel.

When your passion becomes your life’s work, you are lucky indeed.  This is the case for ceramic sculptors Craig and Pam Booth, whose artistic creations for the past thirty years have focused on one primary subject – the AUTOMOBILE.   Their business, at 1112 Bruynswick Road in Gardiner, is called Car-Toons by Booth.  

Craig Booth and Pam Booth of Car-Toons by Booth, sculptors
who specialize in cars, and the people who love them.

Invention and whimsy typify a Booth car.  Made to order, each piece is typically about a foot long.  The model and color are shown to perfection, and it may also include a portrait of the owner in the driver’s seat, or a blonde in the rumble seat, or a dog racing alongside.  Or perhaps you’d like a wall piece that shows your car with racing flags or rounding a curve in a Prix de France town.  Or a full set of six-inch cars for your dining table.  The Booths can accommodate your fancy.  

And not only for cars.   A visit to their studio reveals many more ingenious ideas-in-clay on display, at many different scales.  They make fire-breathing aroma dragons (you add the incense smoke) and mugs (double-meaning) of pilots.  In a more serious vein, Pam Booth models 24-inch replicas of brides in their bridal gowns out of clay.   If you can imagine it, they can probably make it for you.  

www.cartoonsbybooth.net

Marilyn Perry

3-23-16

Painter Stacie Flint paints with colors that surprise and delight the viewer!

Stacie Flint's paintings are out in the world!

Stacie has an outdoor mural to her credit in Gardiner, NY and several wonderful #GOSTdoors that were displayed during past Gardiner Open Studio Tours. More of Stacie's cheerful Doors are coming too! Her art has been featured on the Chronogram and other magazine covers, and she has produced many commissions and works for publication. Stacie is dynamic member and recording secretary of #GOSTartists and a very active participant in the local arts scene. She recently joined ROOST GALLERY in New Paltz, a community gallery and non-profit community arts organization that should be opening soon in downtown New Paltz on Main St.

She recently published an article in the Poughkeepsie Journal, this past Feb. which is shown below. Images of her work are available on her website:  http://stacieflint.com

Come out to visit Stacie and all the other GOSTartists on the Gardiner Open Studio Tour this coming April 30 - May 1, 2016, Saturday and Sunday, 10am - 6pm both days.  More info, Artist Guide and Self-Guided Tour Map available for download at: http://www.GOSTartists.org

Also, don't miss this year's Early Bird Raffle, and your chance to win a gift certificate of up to $100 by signing in at any of the GOST studios between 10am  and 11am on either of the two days of tour.

Poughkeepsie Journal, Feb. 26th, 2016 - What Inspires Me by Stacie Flint

GOST Art Exhibit "Creation," in Gardiner, NY at Ulster Savings Bank, Starting April. 1 thru May 12 2016.

Join us for the Opening for this show: Apr. 1st 12pm - 2pm.

This opening is open to the public. Please come in and 

talk with the artists who will be at the opening. All these 

works of art are for sale to the public. 

This is also a great opportunity to pick up an Artist Guide 

and Tour Map for the Gardiner Open Studio Tour which will 

be Apr. 30th - May 1st 2016.

Gardiner Open Studio Tour Art Exhibit at Ulster Savings Bank - Apr. 1 - May 12, 2016.

Artist Profile: CYNTHIA WINIKA - Pyrotechics and Mycology come together to add nature and chaos into a unique kind of mixed media work process.

CYNTHIA WINIKA


Cynthia Winika is a talented mixed-media artist whose life has given her a background in both Western and Eastern traditions.  She is also the best-known teacher of encaustic painting at R & F Paints in Kingston.  Easy, outgoing, imaginative, and very engaged, she has helped many an artist (myself included) master the challenges of painting in molten beeswax.

In her own work, Cynthia is constantly exploring ways to bring life and art together.  One literally explosive example is the use of fireworks, which she lights above a large paper.  As the fireworks die, their afterlife of marks and fired elements become part of collages to which she adds her own drawings and sketches, bits of found objects, colored papers, and transfers.   Anchored in wax, visible from two sides, the works assume a new life in a larger, created whole.  

Similarly, Cynthia brings her adventures as a serious mycologist to bear in her art.  Gathering all manner of fungi from as close by as her backyard, she experiments with making mushroom spore prints in encaustic paintings that illuminate the imagination as the stars illuminate the sky.  These natural and mysterious elements are gathered into beautiful works of art.

Cynthia’s resume is a long and rich list that reflects a life of teaching, creating, and displaying art in institutions around the United States.  Her studies took her to Hawaii and Taiwan, as well as more familiar venues closer to home.  She is a stalwart of the Women’s Studio Workshop in Rosendale and her work has been collected by several museums, including the Museum of Modern Art.   In 2006, an exhibition of her fungi-based art in New York City was written about in the New York Times.  More recently, the International Encaustic Artists named her the best teacher of 2014.


Marilyn Perry
3/14/16

GOSTartists Block Party Opens Doors in Gardiner, NY

GARDINER GETS DOOR'ED in advance of the Gardiner Open Studio Tour

September 26th was a beautiful autumn day in the hamlet of Gardiner; people strolled the art-lined sidewalks, visiting with one another and patronized local establishments There were donkey rides and face painting. This village-wide collaboration between the artists of the Gardiner Open Studio Tour, local businesses and property owners on Main Street was an exciting moment to be part of.

 The installation of the doors had mostly taken place the days before the party, but GOSTdoors, tents and balloons were still going up all morning to make ready for this party.

Traffic slowed as drivers cruised past the 30 or so #GOSTdoors lining the village's Main street from Cafe Mio to the Gardiner Reformed Church and all around Bill Richards green lawn in the center of town.

It was the day of the GOSTartists’ block party on Main Street. As part of the festivities, local high school students from Wallkill HS joined in the spirit of the day, painting their own doors under the enthusiastic eyes of their teachers, parents, friends and GOSTartist, Lady Pink who coordinated the student project. Together they worked out on the green and painted their own doors live, for all to see. The capstone of the day was to offer visitors a chance to bid on the wonderful hand painted GOSTdoors created by the Gardiner Open Studio Tour artists.

The event was a great success.  The theme of the day was art and community. And the purpose was to bring art to the hamlet, and raise funds for the Gardiner Library. Thanks to donations from the artists and others and sales of several GOSTdoors to generous friends and neighbors, money was raised for the Gardiner Library.

The block party was also intended to raise awareness of the upcoming Gardiner Open Studio Tour. During this free event, local artists will be welcoming the public into their studios on Columbus weekend, October, 10, 11 and 12, 10am-5pm.

We would like to thank all of the GOSTartists whose art adorns our lovely town: Pam Booth, Stacie Flint, Keri Gould, Lynn Isaacson, Leonie Lacouette, Marsha Massih, Andrea McFarland, Meadow, Annie O'Neill, Jonathan Pazer, Marilyn Perry, Lady Pink, Roger Smith, Jean Tansey John A. Varriano and DM Weil.
We also had doors painted and contributed to the exhibition by friends of the Tour, including Ryan Cronin, Liz Glover Wilson, Julie Muck, and Bruce Pileggi.

We would like to thank all the following for their assistance and support in bringing the GOST-artists’ Block Party to life: Tracey Bartels, Bill Richards, Tuthilltown Spirits, Laurie Willow and Ophelia the donkey, Kay Churchill, Bill and Elaine Case, Emily Santos, Pasquale's Pizza, Docinha Sweet Shoppe, Andy Cimino, Horatio Geminiano, Carol Berman, Olivia Profaci, Francheska Geminiano, Dawn Correa, Tammy Grandolfo, Carl Zatz, Petey Hop, Debbie and Raffaela of Walden Savings Bank, Cathy Erenzo, Gable Erenzo and the art students of Wallkill HS.

The GOSTdoors of Gardiner will remain up until after the Gardiner Open Studio Tour, this weekend, Oct. 10, 11 & 12, 2015. 10am - 5pm all three days.

Artist Guide, and Tour Map available at many local businesses in Gardiner and New Paltz, NY. Also available for download on our website: www.GOSTartists.org

Finally a big thank you to visionary Gardinerite and project director for the GOSTartists' block party, Robin Hayes.

GOST Artiner

Doors before Tours -- BLOCKPARTY -- the GOSTdoors return to Gardiner, NY en masse

Block Party - Main Street in the Villiage of Gardiner, NY. September 26th 2015, 3pm - 7pm.

Hosted by the GOSTartists, there will be live painting demonstrations, children's activities, live music, food from local vendors, and a silent auction of the #GOSTdoors. (A portion of the proceeds will be donated to the Gardiner Library.)

Silent Auction of the #GOSTdoors

If you have seen the #GOSTdoors in their ones and twos as you drove around in our area this past Spring, you know how much fun they were. Well, now you can see them all up close, they're clustered on Main Street in Gardiner. Get out of the car and come by for a look. There are new works from the GOSTartists, and also by other local artists.  There are more doors still to come before the block party weekend so keep your eyes peeled for new ones.... Now you can even take one home with you! Bidding begins at 3pm and closes at 6:45pm. 

Fall 2015 GOST -- the Gardiner Open Studio Tour

This Block Party is a kickoff event for the Fall 2015 GOST -- the Gardiner Open Studio Tour which will be held, as always on the second weekend of October; 10/10 - 10/12 from 10am to 5pm all three days. 

At the block party there will be an ongoing slideshow about the Tour, you can pick up our free Fall GOST Tour Map/Artist Guide at our booth, meet some of the artists and also check out the three new building-sized murals painted right in the Villiage of Gardiner earlier this year by three members of the Tour. 

Put the Fall GOST on your Calendar

On the Tour this Fall there are new artists to meet, and new studios to visit, and everyone of our group always has new work to show. So even if you been somewhere before there is always more to see and enjoy.

More info, Map and Artist Guide downloads at: http://www.GOSTartists.org

We hope to see you at the party and then on the Tour!

Thanks to Robin Hayse for organizing this block party.