VEME STUDIOS First Annual Group Show: 'Pollinators'
Open from June 21st through July 28th in Greenport, North Fork of Long Island.
Opening reception 6/21 6-8pm to celebrate the rich tapestry of creations inspired by the delicate dance of pollinators in nature.
With multimedia work by:
Emily Cate Sabree, Erwin List, Kara Hoblin, Matt Durso, Melissa Gabrielsen, Michael Javidi, Peter Treiber Jr., Renee Brown, Scott Bluedorn and Verona Peñalba.
At the heart of our show lies the concept that artists themselves are pollinators, fostering the growth of creativity and enriching our collective cultural landscape. Each artist was invited to contribute two pieces of work, each in a different medium, showcasing their versatility and depth of artistic vision.
Get to Know the Artists:
Emily Cate Sabree | emilycatesabree.com
Emily Cate Sabree is an oil painter interested in how disposable items and leisure activities are integral to contemporary American consumer culture. Originally from Jackson, Mississippi, Sabree lives and works in Manhattan.
Emily is a resident artist member of the Salmagundi Club and a member of the Art Students League of New York where she studied portraiture and figure painting with Sharon Sprung. A former art educator, Emily has degrees in museum studies and curriculum and instruction. Her work is in private collections across the United States. Emily is currently working on large scale oil paintings for release in late 2024.
Erwin List | erwinlistsanchez.com
Erwin List Sanchez is a Mexican-born artist who resides between Cozumel & Greenport, New York. He creates life-size animal sculptures inspired by nature and the wastelands. List Sanchez forges and welds railroad spikes to create his sculptures, a material he has been working with since 1996. In recent years, he has also incorporated natural materials found on land and underwater into his sculptures, such as rocks, driftwood, corals, and shells. His very first figurative sculpture with railroad spikes was that of a porcupine. Sanchez has also created works for conservation projects, such as the Janos Biosphere Reserve in Northern Mexico.
I believe "progress" has had a negative effect on the natural world and is driving many animals to extinction. For me the goal is to create awareness of the interaction between human beings and nature by the juxtaposition of my sculptures in the urban environment.
Kara Hoblin | karahoblin.com
Artist, Kara Hoblin works in various media, including chalk, drawing, painting, photography and collage. A sense of childlike wonder is apparent through the whimsical narratives of her work. Inspired and drawn to the natural environment she finds comfort in the feeling of the earth beneath her bare feet, icy saltwater on her skin, or crisp air brushing against her face. Working collectively to share, connect, and inspire others through creation and exploration of our natural light and darkness.
“Through the work I create, I am a vessel or conduit for helping to protect, heal, spread compassion and love in our society and environment. Continually being surprised and ignited by the human psyche, a river of emotions, and oceans of understanding fuel my creative process.”
Matt Durso
Matthew Durso is a horticulturist, writer, and cartoonist. His writing fuses folklore, plant ecology and ecosystem ecology into short science fiction stories of social utopia or, conversely, societal collapse. His art work draws inspiration from plant/human anatomy and electron microscopy to create abstracted cellular landscapes. He is influenced by the work of artists such as Daniel Zeller, Anselm Kiefer, and Daniel Richter.
“In my painting and drawings, my goal is to deconstruct whatever form i am exploring into a network of patterns that reveal its relation to systems and entities outside of itself. For example, a cross section of an anther (the pollen bearing reproductive structure of a flowering plant) under a microscope can become the wingspan of a butterfly or be colored a way that bears reference to the electromagnetic radiation of sunlight which drives photosynthesis”
ON POLLINATORS
"Pollinators are key actors in the complex systems that sustain all life on earth.
While modern day humans have only existed for about 300,000 years, insects, plants and birds have coevolved for tens and hundreds of millions of years! Over the millennia plants have evolved to manipulate pollinator behavior to ensure the propagation of their species and pollinators, in turn, have become dependent on the plants they visit for food and habitat.
Nature offers us many examples of mutualism where organisms of different species have evolved to form associations with one another to provide each with benefits. We often think of ourselves as being separate from nature, but we are as inextricably linked to these natural systems as monarch butterflies are to milkweed. Cultivating a landscape that supports a diversity of butterflies, beetles, wasps, moths and birds is not just necessary for the health of our planet and our food systems, but it is also FUN! So turn your backyard into a homegrown national park! " MD
Melissa Gabrielsen | clayforme.com/
On Pollinators: "Concentrating mainly on functional art forms, I was thrilled at the prospect of branching out and exploring new mediums. With ceramics as my favorite medium, I decided to work with precious porcelain. Using recycled dried clay and colorants, I tinted the porcelain to hues that resonated with me. Bringing the clay back to life and sculpting pollinators from it. This new process brought me a sense of excitement which i will continue to explore in the future.
Participating in the Pollinators group show has opened my eyes to the literal pollination occurring around me. Ideas for this show flow to me like bees to flowers for nectar. I find it exciting to view this show as if we, the artists, are pollinators ourselves, enriching the world around us with art." MG
Michael Javidi | michaeljavidi.com/
Michael Javidi is a multidisciplinary craftsman whose training at the North Bennett Street School’s furniture-making program prepared him for a career in wooden boat building. Drawing from his experience as a shipwright and furniture maker, Michael launched Michael Javidi Design in 2019. His work draws from his multitude of experiences, focusing on building intuitively. Organic in form, the pieces strive to balance beauty and comfort, function and form.
On Pollinators: "I’ve always been drawn to flowers. A blend of function and form evolved to lure in pollinators. The “flowers” series comes from my exploration with molten bronze poured into water. The delicate structures created in the process reminded me of the elements of a flower. Leading me to create my own." MJ
Peter Treiber Jr. | petertreiberjr.com/
Peter Treiber Jr. is an artist, farmer, carpenter, and printmaker. Drawing from life on his family’s farm, his works demonstrate the tremendous value he places upon the handmade. With art making indiscernible from his other daily pursuits, his work includes tools, art and furniture objects, clothing, and plant material, all of which is from and of the land. He hopes to bring attention to the myriad ways in which agriculture can be adjacent to art and art adjacent to agriculture.
On Pollinators:
"I found a most exquisite paper wasp nest inside a sculpture in our field. A work within a work, if you will. The wasps gather fibers from dead wood and plant stems and mix it with their saliva to make these hanging masterpieces. Large and scary and fully capable of stinging you, these sculptors are also pollinators. Bonus for us plant growers, they are also predators to some garden pests. Knowing that this nest would slowly melt back into the landscape, I decided to steal some of it back to my studio and find a way to work with and accentuate this incredible material." PT
Renee Brown | reneebrown.net/
Renee Brown, a New York Based artist delved into photorealism while earning her BFA at the Hartford Art School. While in attendance she became the first recipient of the Helen Charleton Scholarship for her work in portraiture and was granted the Jerry A. Shoham/Jerrys Artarama Connecticut prize for painting. After graduating in 2017, she attended the Summer Undergraduate Residency at the New York Academy of Art and has since exhibited her work across the east coast. Her work has received numerous awards including 2nds place in East End Arts Galleries Juried Exhibition “50 Reasons Why”, International Art Magazines art prize challenge no.128 “Favorite Subjects” and “outstanding in Painting” during Gallery North’s Outdoor Art Fair and Music Festival.
On Pollinators:
"When thinking about pollinators for the show, my first thought was to create a bumblebee. A classic pollinator but one I’ve grown to love over the years. They seem so unbothered, just happy to dive into some fresh flowers and bring life to a beautiful ecosystem. These fuzzy little guys do so much for us. I immediately knew I wanted to paint it in my traditional medium. Every. Fuzzy. Detail.
For my second piece, I explored the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens during cherry blossom season and fell inspired by the flowers. They had thousands of tulips in bloom, and countless different varieties, I never knew about. This species spoke to me. It reminded me of a beta fish’s tale. The paper is a unique paper, somewhat translucent and nonabsorbent. I wanted to play with ink and take inspiration from Japanese art styles." RB
Scott Bluedorn | scottbluedorn.com/
"As a fine artist, illustrator and designer I work in various media including painting, drawing, print process, collage and found object assemblage. I draw inspiration from cultural anthropology, surrealism, and nautical tradition, and I seek to distill imagery that speaks to the collective unconscious, especially through myth and visual story-telling - a world I define as a “maritime cosmology”. I live and work on the eastern end of Long Island, a place of consistent inspiration in its natural riches, important history, and as a stage for the consequences of anthropogenic climate change- themes I am considerably interested in exploring.”
Scott Bluedorn lives in Sag Harbor and has a studio in Bridgehampton.
On Pollinators:
“I am very interested in the non-human world (a term I prefer to “natural world”) for the many lessons we can gather as humans. Pollination in particular is an amazing mechanism that drives plants and benefits many organisms, including us. I like to think about all the metaphors that pollination can engender, like spreading ideas, creative collaboration and social change. These are the lessons we must learn and re-learn as a civilization." SB
Verona Peñalba | veronapenalba.com
Verona Peñalba was raised in Nicaragua and currently resides in Greenport, NY. She studied painting at Atelier Canova in Rome, Italy.
Verona is interested in natural connection and the flow of energy in all its forms. Using water as her main medium to represent feelings of calm, confidence, courage, curiosity and compassion.
On Pollinators:
"My obsession with freedom and exploration makes me strongly relate to pollinators. I am captivated by their wings, which allow them to fly and explore their environment and foreign lands.
This ability to fly is taken literally in these pieces, where I have painted wings but also created them out of fabric treated with cyanotype and flowers, manifesting the feeling of spreading wide open and free.” VP