A new City Public Art project is currently in its installation phase. The “Beautifying Bins”: Trash Can Public Art Project can now be seen at the Santa Clara street parking garage in downtown Ventura. This was a collaborative project between the City of Ventura Parks, Recreation & Community Partnerships department and the Environmental Sustainability division.

The project sought out artist(s) to transform trash bins into functional and artistic receptacles. The project encouraged the chosen artist to transform the bins into works of art to minimize vandalism, encourage recycling, and instill a sense of community pride. The Commission selected artist Cathy Winton for her creative designs that were attractive, fun, and the colors corresponded to the floors of the parking structure.

“Providing the public immediate daily access to high-quality works of art is key to building Ventura’s civic pride and community identity. It is the goal of the Public Art Program that the entire city serves as a showcase that weaves art into our residents’ everyday life,” stated Tobie Roach, Public Art Project Specialist. For more information on current public art opportunities visit the Public Art website.

The Studio Gallery in Channel Islands Harbor, will be open until 7 pm on August 7th, National Night Out. Dotty Pringle will show 8 rocks that will be the first in series of teaching/representing a bit about each Channel Island, with a different American Indian mermaid and story. Each are originals and never duplicated.

Dotty will do another 8 American Indian mermaids with different stories about each one in her second in the series. She has finished San Miguel, Santa Rosa and Santa Cruz mermaids and these first 3 will be at the Studio Gallery, Fisherman’s Wharf in Channel Islands Harbor in Oxnard.

Pop-up exhibit opened on July 28 for Ventura artist John Robertson’s large-scale acrylic paintings celebrating scenes from the Ventura County Fair, a favorite past-time of the artist and his family. It will be on display at the Agriculture Museum through September 9.

Known nationally for his large-scale sports paintings, many of which are on display at major stadiums, Robertson paints what he sees–local people and scenery–using house paint on large rolls of canvas to accommodate the grand-scale size. The Agriculture Museum is located at 926 Railroad Avenue, Santa Paula.

For more information visit venturamuseum.org or call 805-525-3100.

A Conversation with Merion Estes Sunday, July 29, 3 to 4:30 p.m.

Oxnard’s Levity Live at The Collection, 591 Collection Blvd.

The tools of her trade have included fabric, glue, acrylic and spray paints, glitter, photo downloads and paper, gradually moving almost exclusively to the use of collaged fabrics and photos, with hand painting assuming much less importance. At first glance we are seduced by the beauty of her work. Closer inspection reveals a worrisome sense of man’s depredation of the natural world.

Merion was a founding member of Double X, a women’s art group, and a consistent champion of women’s issues. In a recent exhibit at The Pasadena Museum of California Art, The Feminine Sublime, Merion’s work was described as a counter-narrative that upends previous ideas of the sublime in painting with a unique feminist perspective.

Merion Estes states “The beauty and fragility of life and the tragedy of man’s intervention is my subject.” To learn about Merion visit www.MerionEstes.comCollateral.

$15 for general public; $10 for seniors. free to FOTM Members.

Visit www.FocusOnTheMasters.com or call 805.653.2501 for tickets.

AfterGLOW Fundraising Event:

Join for a celebratory dinner at the Camarillo home of Edy & Sal Santangelo immediately following the Artist Spotlight Interview. Paid reservations are essential and required prior to July 24. We expect this AfterGLOW to sell out.

$30 FOTM members,

$40 Non-members.

Maps will be given to paid guests at the interview.

The Scripps Howard Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the media company E.W. Scripps, recently approved a volunteer grant in of $1,250 for the Buenaventura Art Association, Ventura’s 64-year-old nonprofit artists’ cooperative. BAA is relocating its downtown gallery to Bell Arts Factory, 432 N. Ventura Ave., and will use the funds toward constructing three moveable walls to increase the display space in its new home.

The grant will cover about a quarter of the cost of the 4-by-8-foot double-sided modules, which will add 192 square feet of wall space to the gallery.

Retiree Don Scott, a longtime BAA member and former board director, applied for the foundation’s help based on his 36-year career at the Ventura County Star and its predecessor, the Ventura Star-Free Press, both of which were Scripps newspapers. He and his wife, Mary Kolada Scott, also a BAA artist and former Scripps newsroom employee, have successfully applied for similar grants over the past several years for BAA projects. #SHFoundation

A memorial and celebration of Joe’s life will be held Saturday July 21, next to Art City in the Avant Garden, 5:00 pm to 7:30 pm, 197 Dubbers Street, Ventura, off Olive Street up from West Main Street. Refreshments will be served. His friends and art associates are invited. (Park in nearby lots and take care walking across Olive.) Hosted by ARTLIFE, INC. a 501c3 organization.

Joe Cardella was born in 1945 in New Britain, Connecticut. An early stint in the U. S. Navy to Greece and Mykonos made a lasting impression. He eventually made the southern California coast his home to evoke that idyllic sun-lit ocean place of myth, art, and creative energy.

Settling in Ventura in 1988, he helped transform the local art scene into an innovative community, inspired local artists and encouraged others to make art, many for the first time. Works on paper, mail art, conceptual art, Fluxus art, sculpture, assemblage and graphic art were his own media. He helped form the Ventura Artist Union.

He also began publishing the international magazine ART-LIFE in 1981. He solicited artists here and around the world to submit 200 multiples of their single work that he bound in the Original Limited Edition Monthly magazine for 25 years—“A masterpiece in every issue,” he boasted.

He died May 15, 2018 of esophageal cancer. His ashes will head back to Greece for dispersal. His legacy of promoting the creative arts here and elsewhere will continue through a trust he leaves behind.

Some of the wonderful water colors by Beverly Cunningham can be viewed in the lobby at the Poinsettia Pavilion. Others at beverlycunningham.com. (805)659-1489.

Arts & Eats will be held in downtown Ventura on Saturday, July 21 from 6 – 8pm. Fifteen galleries, restaurants and shops open their doors for art receptions and complimentary tastes. The event is free to the public.

Richard Franklin and Susan Seaberry will display their artwork at Fox Fine Jewelry from July 12, – September 9, with an Art Reception on July 21 from 6 – 8 pm. Musician George Spike will sing and play guitar during the reception.

Richard Franklin was born in Berkeley, CA and has studied art across the country and Italy. He has studied fine arts including drawing, pottery, and ceramics.

Susan Seaberry, blends romanticism and classicism, has created art her whole life. She says, “It’s always been art. It’s always been my main focus.”

If you can get to Bell Arts Factory before school starts you might meet Gabriela Molina, a young artist who has been given a studio there until school starts. Gabriela has been attending Bell Arts kid’s program since she was five. She stated “as I reflect on my years spent at Bell Arts it is evident that it’s played a key role to my artistic growth and my desire to pursue a career as an art educator. I will dedicate my remaining months at Bell Arts as a guest artist.” This wonderful artist will be attending U C Riverside in pursuit of a Bachelors in Fine Arts degree.