Wilmington, Del. (April 1, 2024) – The Delaware Division of the Arts’ Mezzanine Gallery presents E. Schwinn’s exhibition, “Within the Intimate Realm,” on view from April 5-26, 2024. Guests are invited to attend a Meet-the-Artist Reception on Friday, April 5 from 5:00-7:00 p.m.

Schwinn creates patterned collages that incorporate found images, saved fragments, half-finished drawings, abandoned paintings, and collected patterns. Each piece is a gathering of elements that allows her to discover an interior world, coalescing into a type of psychological portrait. Schwinn’s patterns unify the piece but also hide and obscure parts from view.

Schwinn is interested in how we collect experiences and memories and internalize, connect and grow them into a sense of self. The artist explains, “My work is an exploration of identity, how we as humans construct our identities and reveal and hide parts of ourselves. The collages hold clues that can suggest narratives and entice you deeper into trying to understand the meaning, but at the same time, the patterns frequently screen or cover parts of the imagery. For me the work is a metaphor for the process we go through as humans to develop and hide ourselves.”

Schwinn’s personal language has been influenced by both “outsider” art and surrealist processes for tapping into the unconscious mind. She combines fine art composition with patterns, craft materials, and magazines to create pretty images with things hidden below the surface.

Schwinn lives and works in Wilmington. She is also a teaching artist who works with students from preschool aged to older adults. Schwinn holds a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University, and a MFA in Painting from the University of Texas at Austin. Read her Delaware Artist Roster profile.

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.

Images in the banner: I wanted to transform into the place between the sky and moon, 2023, collage and mixed media on paper, 10.5” x 13.5”

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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.

Wilmington, Del. (November 1, 2023) – The Delaware Division of the Arts’ Mezzanine Gallery presents 2023 Established Fellow Ron Meicks’s exhibition, “Encaustic Constructions,” on view between November 3-24, 2023. Guests are invited to attend a Meet-the-Artist Reception on Friday, November 3 from 5:00-7:00 p.m.

Meick’s latest series of artworks, abstract wooden sculptures called “constructions,” are painted with encaustic (wax) pigments. The work is informed by both Russian constructivist art of the 1920s and the natural world. “I was a beekeeper for over ten years, which is how I got interested in encaustic sculpture/painting,” finding that the accumulation of wax provided him with “an enticing material.”

Meick creates wooden constructions that range in size from miniscule (8 inches) to monumental, some as tall as 6 feet. After they’re built, he paints them with a veneer of hot encaustic paint composed of beeswax, damar resin and infused with pigments. This wax application softens the hard-edge structures and presents color references to connection points, elements in the composition, ending points, weighting of mass, balance, and reflection of color. The counterpoint of color and space increase the layers of meaning and emotional content.

His recent work is strongly guided by contemporary current events or relevant political issues.  The war in Ukraine, a country “being dismantled by destruction,” is the visual basis for this latest sculptural series.  Meick finds his biggest challenge to be “making objects that are relevant in concept, visual, and emotional terms.” As well, he finds challenges in “the physical effort of making objects.”

Originally born in Sidney, Nebraska, Ron Meick received his BFA in sculpture from Rhode Island School of Design. Ron Meick is currently an artist with the Washington Printmakers Gallery, Washington, DC, and in October 2023 he had a solo show featuring large scale prints. He has also shown his work throughout the U.S. and is in many private collections along with The Library of Congress. He currently resides and works in Arden, Delaware.

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.

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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.

Wilmington, Del. (July 25, 2023) – The Delaware Division of the Arts’ Mezzanine Gallery presents Hannah Whiddon’s exhibition, “Between Light & Shadow,” running August 4-25, 2023.  Guests are invited to attend a Meet-the-Artist Reception on Friday, August 4 from 5:00-7:00 p.m.

Drawing inspiration from the beauty inherent in everyday life and the human form, Whiddon’s paintings transcend specific places and times, evoking feelings and memories rather than representing them. Her pieces celebrate human sensuality, employing compelling subjects, a vibrant palette, and bold, painterly textures.

Hannah Whiddon’s artistic journey has included participation in several exhibitions in the mid-Atlantic region. Her talent was showcased in the esteemed Sarah Silberman Art Gallery in 2016, and she further distinguished herself with a solo exhibition at the Baltimore Art Gallery in 2020, featuring a captivating collaboration with Charmed Kitchen.

In 2022, her evocative work earned her a place at the Hunt & Lane Gallery in Rehoboth Beach, and she continued to make an impact on the local art scene with a group pop-up show organized by the Village Improvement Association. Whiddon was awarded a Delaware Division of the Arts Artist Opportunity Grant in 2022 and was selected for the first-ever Artist Career Development Pilot Program cohort in 2023.

“Between Light & Shadow” showcases the artist’s profound understanding of the interplay between light and darkness. Each painting is a testament to her skillful brushwork, texture, and composition, masterfully highlighting the allure of her subjects while invoking contemplation and introspection. The exhibition presents a variety of works, some featuring dramatic scenes where shadows elongate and intertwine, imbuing a sense of mystery and intrigue. Other pieces gracefully capture the delicate balance between light and shadow, artfully representing the ephemeral nature of the world around us.

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: Hannah Whiddon, “Kick” (2023), acrylic, 18”x24”.

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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.

Wilmington, Del. (May 25, 2023) – The Delaware Division of the Arts’ Mezzanine Gallery presents 2022 DDOA Individual Artist Fellow Aaron Terry’s exhibition, “Patterns for Saturn,” running June 2-July 28, 2023.  Guests are invited to attend a Meet-the-Artist Reception on Friday, June 2 from 5:00-7:00 p.m.

Aaron Terry, a Wilmington resident and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Art & Design at The University of Delaware, created site-specific work for the Mezzanine Gallery located in the Carvel State Office Building. Terry made a series of screen printed fabric wall hangings that provide a contrast to the hard surfaces and neutral palette of the building.

Aaron Terry’s work dances between sculptural, sonic, and printed materials that present visual allegories of personal politics embedded in the color, flash, and cadence of today’s rapid-fire media parade. Sourcing from personal drawings, recordings, sound bites and news media, the work resurrects new conversations with old ghosts, and questions the potential for a better future. As visual pop and politics synthesize in continuous flux to create an extended detournement; Terry utilizes repetitive sonic and visual elements to reinvigorate progressive ideas nested in music and cultural references that have devolved and diminished through false familiarity over time. His work grapples with finding “truth” in a sea of today’s excessive media.

Patterns for Saturn considers the importance of dreamlife: time spent outside of lived reality. This includes a loose sense of meditation: time spent shaking off contemplation and frustration with today’s crushing sense of political and cultural hooliganism. Abstract patterns and a soundtrack blanket the walls of the gallery, to remove the viewer from the space: the Carvel State Office Building in Wilmington, DE. This is both a respite from and a comment on the architecture and atmosphere of state and governmental buildings in general. The visual patterns and sounds produced in the space are meant to provide a space for escape, contemplation, and meditation.

Terry’s work has been seen in ten solo exhibitions and over 30 group shows, as well as a half-dozen murals and installations. He is a member of Philadelphia’s Vox Populi artist collective. In 2022, Terry received a Delaware Division of the Arts Fellowship in Visual Arts: Works on Paper.

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. Please note that the Gallery will be closed on June 19 and July 4 in observance of holidays. 

Image: Aaron Terry. “Salad Daze”, Screen Print on Denim. 44”x96”. 2022.

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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.

Wilmington, Del. (March 29, 2023) – The Delaware Division of the Arts’ Mezzanine Gallery presents 2022 DDOA Individual Artist Fellow Tad Sare’s exhibition, “Projected Perspectives”, running April 7-28, 2023. Guests are invited to attend a Meet-the-Artist Reception on Friday, April 14 from 5:00-7:00 p.m.

Tad Sare is an experimental animator and artist currently living and working in Wilmington, Delaware. Sare uses the storytelling medium of animation to explore perception and interpretation of juxtaposed and sequential images. He employs hand drawn techniques while collaging/overlapping photographs, live action video, and sound elements digitally. His work borrows ideas, filmic devices and tropes from espionage and thriller literature and cinema to examine the relationship between the perceived and the unknown of visual information.

‘Projected Perspectives’ gives a snapshot of two recent site-specific artworks Sare created using his own eclectic subject matter and animation techniques. ‘Triptych’, originally exhibited at the top of a ladder within an old rice store in Japan, incorporates visual representations of ‘floating’ or ‘soaring’. Viewers are encouraged to watch the video from a vantage point that simulates the experience of climbing to the top of that ladder. ‘Pipes of Perception’ depicts a strange journey in and around water pipes. The exhibition also includes the hand drawn elements that were used to make the animated short films.

Since 2009, Sare has taught art at Delaware College of Art and Design (DCAD), where he currently serves as the Program Chair of Animation. He is also a teaching artist for a mentor program through Cab Calloway School of the Arts. At PAFA, his alma mater, he continues to teach in the Summer Arts Academy. In 2022, Sare was awarded a Delaware Division of the Arts Established Fellowship in Media Arts:Video/Film.

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.

View the artists’s website here: www.tadsare.com

View the artists Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/tad_sare

Image: “Kitchen Windowsill (Triptych Background Element),” 2022, graphite on paper, 14” x 18″

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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.