On view from November 4-25, 2022

Wilmington, Del. (November 3, 2022) – The Delaware Division of the Arts’ Mezzanine Gallery presents 2022 DDOA Individual Artist Fellow Maia Palmer’s exhibition, “Making the Invisible, Visible”, running November 4-25, 2022. Guests are invited to attend a Meet-the-Artist Reception on Friday, November 4, from 5:00-7:00 p.m. (There will be student performance at 5pm from the strings majors at Cab Calloway School of the Arts, with special thanks to educator Julie Murphy).

Maia Palmer was born in Wilmington, Delaware in 1980. She works primarily in acrylics and charcoal, and has also created community murals, digital works, and figurative sculptures. Palmer earned a BFA from Carnegie Mellon University and an MFA from Washington University in St. Louis. She has exhibited nationally as well as internationally in Spain, Germany, and China. Palmer has lived all around the globe and is interested in capturing the unique spirit of each location that she experiences. To read more about Maia and her history, click here for a link to her fellowship page.

Committed to “being a positive force for social change,” Palmer is the high school visual arts teacher at Cab Calloway School of the Arts. She feels strongly about teaching there, saying “I am a product of public school and I want to be part of rebuilding its strength.” One of the most exciting aspects of receiving the Fellowship is “the recognition of my work” and the ability to further its scope and her goal to “help amplify the voices of those who are not always heard.”

Making the Invisible, Visible features a series of migraine self-portraits documenting Palmer’s experiences as a migraineur over the past 15 years. To be clear, migraine is a neurological disease, one that is debilitating and painfully real. Yet it is frequently referred to as an “invisible illness,” as there are often no visible symptoms. Women in particular are subject to dismissive treatment because of this, as Palmer has experienced first-hand.

With these works, Palmer examines her relationship with migraine. She merges autobiographical experiences with imagery and text laden with both historical and personal value. Each of these images captures a real, private moment that she has in fact experienced – from hiding under blankets to wearing hand-made ‘migraine boxes’. She says, “Creating these drawings is a visceral process of acknowledging the larger than life physical and emotional pain that migraine has caused in my life – as well as the emotional and physical growth it has helped me accomplish. I am ultimately a stronger person as I emerge on the other side of chronic migraine, cherishing every moment and delighting in our capacity as humans to overcome and endure.”

Navigating her own experiences, Palmer has embodied the physical and mental trauma of this illness by manipulating surfaces and materials to simulate the experience of a migraine – the tearing of paper, or the piercing of a surface with needle and thread. By making visible the invisible trauma of migraine, she aims to bring awareness to this consistently under-funded, chronically misunderstood disease.

The Mezzanine Gallery, open weekdays from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., is located on the second floor of the Carvel State Office Building, 820 N. French Street, Wilmington.

Image: “Splitting Headache,” 2021, charcoal on paper, 50″ x 38″

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Contact: Andrew Truscott, Program Officer, Marketing and Communications

302-577-8280, andrew.truscott@delaware.gov

The Delaware Division of the Arts, a branch of the Delaware Department of State, is dedicated to cultivating and supporting the arts to enhance the quality of life for all Delawareans. Together with its advisory body, the Delaware State Arts Council, the Division administers grants and programs that support arts programming, educate the public, increase awareness of the arts, and integrate the arts into all facets of Delaware life. For more information about the Delaware Division of the Arts, visit arts.delaware.gov or call 302-577-8278.

On view from October 7-28, 2022

Wilmington, Del. (October 3, 2022) – The Delaware Division of the Arts’ Mezzanine Gallery presents 2022 DDOA Individual Artist Fellow Joseph Barbaccia’s exhibition, Polymer Paintings, running October 7-28, 2022. Guests are invited to attend a Meet-the-Artist Reception on Friday, October 7, from 5:00-7:00 p.m.

All his life, Joseph Barbaccia has been inspired by color and form. He was drawn to their motivating force even before his artistic inclinations and aspirations were clear to him. There were no artists among his extended family or their friends, but “at church on Sundays, I remember always wanting to sit in a pew the had a stained-glass window at the end in order to enjoy the colors close up,” as he studied the statues and the bas-reliefs on the walls.

Barbaccia was born in Philadelphia, but when he was a toddler, the family moved to rural New Jersey. He began drawing in earnest when he was six, at first to capture the attention of his second-grade teacher, whom he admired. But soon his family began to take notice. “Since then, except for six months in 1979 when I took a motorcycle trip [out west], I never stopped making images.” After taking classes at Philadelphia’s Tyler School of Fine Arts, Barbaccia traveled through the United States and the South Pacific, drawing and painting in a “mostly representational style.” In 1996 he settled in Potomac Falls, Virginia, where over the next two decades his experiments with encaustics, freestanding sculpture, and mixed media gained increasing attention and recognition.

The prolific artist has exhibited widely – over 35 group shows and 10 solo exhibitions – in galleries and major venues throughout the East Coast and the mid-Atlantic, including the Greater Reston Art Center, Delaware Contemporary, Rehoboth Art League, and Washington’s Corcoran Gallery. He’s been the subject of dozens of articles and reviews, both as an artist and as an illustrator with three published children’s picture books (and a fourth underway).

Barbaccia had always had a large studio, but in 2018 he and his wife (also an artist) moved to Georgetown, Delaware, where his workspace was smaller. Realizing “I would have to change my materials and methods to accommodate the new reality,” he landed on polymer clay as “the perfect choice.” The material – with its transparency and a full color spectrum – allows him to create in both two and three dimensions. It led Barbaccia in a new direction. “Approximately 90% of the artists creating with polymer clay create jewelry. I thought the time was right to expand its visual range.”

As well as inspiring Barbaccia, working with polymer clay has challenges. Using atypical art materials, “I sometimes come up against limiting parameters in applications to shows or competitions . . . [including] a list of accepted materials that doesn’t include polymer clay.” And the pandemic has led to a scarcity of his chosen material. But he continues to push against these and other constraints and revels in “showing and sharing my work.”

The Mezzanine Gallery, open weekdays from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., is located on the second floor of the Carvel State Office Building, 820 N. French Street, Wilmington.

Image: “Avatar,” 2021, polymer clay, 20 x 14 x .1 inches

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Contact: Andrew Truscott, Program Officer, Marketing and Communications

302-577-8280, andrew.truscott@delaware.gov

The Delaware Division of the Arts, a branch of the Delaware Department of State, is dedicated to cultivating and supporting the arts to enhance the quality of life for all Delawareans. Together with its advisory body, the Delaware State Arts Council, the Division administers grants and programs that support arts programming, educate the public, increase awareness of the arts, and integrate the arts into all facets of Delaware life. For more information about the Delaware Division of the Arts, visit arts.delaware.gov or call 302-577-8278.

LEWES – DNREC’s Division of Parks & Recreation, Cape Henlopen State Park, and the Fort Miles Museum and Historic Area, are hosting the annual “Delaware Goes to War” event at Fort Miles beginning at 10 a.m., Saturday April 27. The public is invited to explore Fort Miles to see what it was like to live in the 1940s, during the war, and to experience a part of the U.S. military coast defense that the fort provided.

Visitors can learn about what soldiers underwent in Delaware during this global conflict through exhibits, artifacts, and special presentations for the “Delaware Goes to War’ event. There will be live 1940s-era music by the WW Tunes, plotting room demonstrations, vintage military vehicles, a U-858 surrender reenactment, and more.

Between 5 – 6:15 p.m., the Rehoboth Concert Band will hold a free concert for visitors with paid park entrance fee. Bring a beach chair to listen to 1940s-era music, while overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.

Admission to the Fort Miles Museum is $5 per person. For more information, contact the Fort Miles Orientation Building at 302-644-5007. For a detailed event schedule, please follow Fort Miles Museum and Historic Area on Facebook.

Contact: Beth Shockley, DNREC Public Affairs, 302-739-9902

Vol. 49, No.100

LEWES – DNREC’s Cape Henlopen State Park will host the WWI Mobile Museum for the second year at the Fort Miles Museum and Historic Area from Monday, Dec. 3 – Saturday, Dec. 8. Visitors can explore and celebrate the centennial anniversary of World War I inside the Fort Miles Museum.

Visitors can learn what soldiers experienced in this global conflict through exhibits, artifacts, and special presentations. The guest presenters will include State Cultural Preservation Specialist John P. McCarthy, retired U.S. Navy Captain William Manthorpe, Coastal Defense Study Group member Terry McGovern, Ebony Doughboys Living History group member Steven Jones, and Fort Miles Historical Interpreter Tyler Drieblatt.

The WWI Mobile Museum event is free. Tours of WWII Battery 519 will be available for $5.

For more information, contact the Fort Miles Orientation Building at 302-644-5007. For a detailed schedule, visit https://destateparks.com/History/FortMiles.

This program is partially funded by a grant from the Delaware Humanities Forum, a state program of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Contact: Beth Shockley, DNREC Public Affairs, 302-739-9902

Vol. 48, No. 324

DOVER – DNREC’s Division of Parks & Recreation, in partnership with the Fort Miles Historical Association, will host an open house for the public review and comment on proposed capital improvements to the Fort Miles Museum and Historic Area in Cape Henlopen State Park. The open house will feature informative exhibit boards on the proposed updated master plan for Cape Henlopen’s Fort Miles facilities and surrounding areas, and opportunities for the public to get information from DNREC staff and provide written feedback.

The open house will be held 5 -7 p.m., Monday, Oct. 16, at the Lewes Public Library, 111 Adams Ave., Lewes, DE, 19958.

Proposed capital improvements include upgraded and expanded parking areas for the museum complex, as well as an outdoor venue area at the north end of Battery 519.

Funding for the project comes entirely from foundation grants and private contributions raised by the Fort Miles Historical Association.

Media Contact: Beth Shockley, DNREC Public Affairs, 302-739-9902