Husband and wife Jim and Ella Wright are an art family. Jim started metal sculpture in 1969 at a small store on Ventura Ave called the Magic Forest. He moved on to craft shows and street fairs and is now full time artist since retiring. Ellen Wright retired as a right away agent for So Cal Edison. She took a group of stain glass classes from Calico Art glass in Ventura. After completing two different sets of classes in stain glass and doing a few projects she was told of a fused glass class and completed that.

They decided that was where their hearts were and now work in both metal and glass.

They continue to learn and expand their work shop meeting new people at the craft shows that they are vendors at. They are always looking for new Ideas to form into projects, and enjoy doing custom work for customers

They sell at the First Fridays Art Walk at the Stone Works gallery and second Saturdays at the VC Art Market at Figueroa plaza and Main. Facebook [email protected] to learn more about them.

Art City Gallery presents First Friday on Sept.1: Art History Series 1, 9-12 pm. 197 Dubbers St., Ventura

Cameron Leggett and Sophia Grace Kidd present the first installment of the Art City History Series, part of a broader cultural-anthropological inquest archiving the city of Ventura’s avant-garde history, from the mid-eighties to the present.

From 9:00—9:30 pm—Paul Lindhard will guide the audience through a historical slide-show incorporating early images taken by such eminent photographers as S. Dirk Shafer of early works by Paul Lindhard, Joanne Duby, and Rudy Calderon, among others.

After 9:30 Cameron Leggett will continue the slide show with generative art utilizing images of Art City and other subjects run through Pure Data while Opal Gann performs accompanying soundscapes and electronic tonalities.

$5 Suggested Donation

Also Art City Gallery presents Was Ist Das? on Sept.8. A cabaret hosted by Jason Poston and Mathew Godfrey and curated by Kevin Carman from 8-11pm. A benefit for the Art City Mural Project. 197 Dubbers St. $10 suggested donation.

Exhibition of artworks by Buenaventura Art Association members will be augmented by three individual shows: Kathy Ikerd of Santa Paula and Lili Miura of Port Hueneme in the Clophine Dooley Gallery, and Darlene Roker of Ventura on the main gallery’s red wall.

Ikerd’s show, titled “Excursions,” Miura’s “Femmes Japonaises” and Roker’s “Black and White (With a Touch of Color)” will be on display Sept. 5-Oct. 8. Two receptions are planned, 5-7 p.m. Sept. 9 and from 5-8 p.m. the following Saturday, Sept. 16,Oct. 7-8 corresponds with the Ventura ArtWalk.

Throughout this run, smaller groupings by Carol Simson and Mary Kolada Scott, two Ventura artists whose works earned outstanding merit awards in the current BAA show, will be up in the gallery’s central hallway.

Buenaventura Gallery, 700 E. Santa Clara St. which is open 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays. For more information, visit the BAA website, www.buenaventuragallery.org, or call 648-1235 during gallery hours.

Growth is the fundamental objective of all biotic components, every factor requiring energy and sustenance for proper evolution. The work featured in this group exhibition draws equally from environmental experience, mass media, and sub-cultural positions while seeking to convey the often overlooked or undervalued messages of organic development and human influence.

18 artists explore the subterfuge and effect of their individual mediums, juggling immediacy of expression, perfection of surface, and ambiguousness of meaning.

Thomas Hardcastle, a renowned painter based in Ojai, will debut a new set of large scale oil paintings at the Museum of Ventura County throughout the month of September. His latest collection of work, “Icons and Archetypes,” is comprised of large scale oil paintings that present the artist’s perspective of select popular cultural icons and exploitive archetypes. He will host an artist’s reception on Friday, Sept. 1 from 6 to 9 p.m. at the museum.

Hardcastle will be on hand at Friday night’s reception to share more about his artistic techniques, inspirations and intentions with attendees.

Learn more about the artist at http://www.ojaistudioartists.org/tom-hardcastle.

In May of 1999, the City Council established the Municipal Art Acquisition Program to document the history of visual art in Ventura through the annual purchase of important works of art created by area artists. The collection provides increased access to art of the highest quality and of distinctive merit through its display in the public areas of City Hall and other municipal buildings. The 2004 pastel by Bill McEnroe (1922-2015) can be enjoyed in the art collection in the corridors at City Hall.

Ventura artist Noel Diotte has finished his amazing wetlands mosaic located by the Ventura “ponds.”

On his site he says “Wetlands Mosaic is done…..except polishing, scraping old glue, grout. May make a ceramic Lizard on the top….the butterfly flew to the ground….shattered!”

Would you like to know where this is located? [email protected] will tell you.

Photo by Pam Baumgardner