Salon Highlights Art, Architecture, Film

The third in a series of monthly Hillside Salons of the University of Massachusetts Amherst, will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 17 from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, 125 West Bay Rd., Amherst. It will feature one of the museum’s architects, Kevin Chrobak of Juster Pope Frazier, Northampton.

Chrobak will discuss how an architect uses tools such as sunlight, building orientation, vistas, natural materials and imagination to create a space that fits the building owner’s and users’ needs. The architect will also talk about how this collaborative process contributed to his plans for churches, apartment buildings and offices in the local area. The salon’s format allows each artist 20 seconds per slide to show 20 views of his or her work, a total of only about six and a half minutes per person. After these, the gathering is open to discussion.

Hillside Salons are held on the third Tuesday of each month. Space is limited; for more information or to request a reservation, call (413) 545-4336, or e-mail: Hillside@umass.edu.

In addition to Chrobak, other artists to be featured:

Daniel Schrade of Hampshire College. For about 10 years, Schrade has been integrating text and word fragments into painting on canvas and paper. “In 2003, I started to add figurative personages into my paintings, often as elements that occupy the liminal spaces between fore-and background,” he notes. Motifs are repeated and worked out in varied forms in series so they become “a kind of very personal cultural archive” that includes the “Afronaut” and “Brother Beethoven” figures.

Stephen Petegorsky of Florence. The photographer says he has been drawn to photograph animals for as long as he has been making pictures. Petegorsky is inspired in part by museum dioramas, creating more personal ones by using diverse backgrounds. His other portfolios include landscapes, an ongoing project based in a prosthetics clinic in Nicaragua, and “Gold Leaf,” a work about time, memory, change and mortality.

Kate Geis of Northampton. This Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker is perhaps best known for her feature-length film Riversense, that describes a way of life through the eyes of several whitewater paddlers drawn to dangerous water for different reasons. Geis has also produced television programs including the 1995 Billboard Music Awards, the Second Annual Saturday Night Live Mother’s Day Special and the All-Star Fiesta at Ford’s Theater.

Michael Mazur of Leverett. The owner of Earthworks, a garden design and construction company, Mazur has spent 25 years building gardens throughout New England which include sculpture, artistic bouldering, stone walls and flatwork. Mazur’s work is on display at the Boston Flower show each spring.

That American Ingenuity? It Works

Things of beauty and quality last.

Etsy is an online marketplace "to buy and sell all things handmade." It's been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Inc., BusinessWeek, on CNN and The Martha Stewart Show

Artists and creators of nearly every stripe post images of their wares and buyers can search by color, description, browse, or even post a query for a one-of-a-kind creation that exists only in their mind.

Read about "This Handmade Life" - vignettes about the people driven to create and their environments, learn about people who live and work near where you live (there is a search option to shop local), or enjoy the beauty.

Take a look at the work of artist Nancy LaBerge Muren, who states in her profile "Light is life! There is no greater element in a painting than the light that illuminates it and defines it."

Found during an online search using the terms "horse, painting" (potential gift for a colleague), her work stands out - there is currently one print available with an equine theme.

The print is one of 150 and she describes the day as the "sun was glorious, the horse was magnificent and his owner was so proud as they got ready to perform, I call this one 'Warming Up to Show'" - available to order online.

Etsy is a business model that serves a growing market. Artists and artisans can enter the digital visual feast to find customers around the world - and encourages entrepreneurial artists and designers - wherever they create.

Such as Richmond Castano Sr., co-founder of Twin Leather, who makes bird toys. At 96, the ever-creative entrepreneur is considering Etsy as an additional venture to feature his toys, which feature colorful knobs and fruit-like growths, very much like three-dimensional art. Castano manufactures components such as leather “twisters” - a curly ribbon of vegetable-tanned leather that appeals to parrots.

From the site: The concept was conceived by Rob Kalin in 2005. A painter, carpenter, and photographer, Rob found there was no viable marketplace to exhibit and sell his creations online - other e-commerce sites having become too inundated with overstock electronics and broken appliances. Ever industrious, he, along with Chris Maguire and Haim Schoppik, designed the site, wrote the code, assembled the servers, spliced the cables, and launched Etsy on June 18, 2005 after only three sleepless months.

(Jockey and horse, from Mountain Brook storefront, on Etsy.)



Quick View: Etsy Stats
Total Members: more than 1.5 million
Total Sellers: more than 200,000

Items Currently Listed: more than 2.8 million

Total $ sold (Gross Merchandise Sales)
2005 = $166,000
2006 = $3.8 million
2007 = $26 million
2008 = $87 million (Full Year Forecast)