The Overall Winning Artists Category consists of the 10 Best Entries received from the 2 media categories of the Painting & Other Category and the Photography & Digital Category.
All winning artists will now be featured on the Light Space & Time website for the month of July 2014 and thereafter, the artworks and links to the artist’s websites will remain online in the Light Space & Time Archives. Congratulations to our artists who made our 4th Annual “Botanicals” Art Exhibition so successful this month. At any time, we invite our winners and other interested visitors to link their websites to the Gallery’s archive page for further ongoing promotion.
The Light Space & Time Online Art Gallery will have digital “Botanicals” Award Certificates, Event Postcard, Event Catalogue and Press Releases sent to you within the next week or so. Thank you for being part of the gallery. To Return to the Botanicals Home Page here.
1st Place – Annie Wang – “White Peonies”
Annie Wang was born in Kaifeng, China, one of the seven ancient capitals of China. In this ancient city, Annie developed her love for art through her creative mother, who was ingenious with her handwork. Annie taught herself to paint in her childhood; she enjoyed painting everything she saw with beautiful designs and flowers that might be on a bowl or a vase.
As a 16 year old, she was admitted to the Art Academy of Henan University, the highest art institute in Henan Province and she graduated in 1994. She also studied the traditional Chinese ink painting techniques from Professor Hao Dawei, the son of the famous painting artist Haoshilin.
In 2007 Annie immigrated to America and has lived in Los Angeles since then. Filled with nostalgia for her hometown and family in China, she finally came back to her love of art. Annie usually buys flowers every week, and paints them while they are fresh and beautiful. She gets her impressions from the masters in Chinese history, but she paints her flowers using her own style. Her composition and style are elegant with freshness and vitality. Annie feels that nature is an artist’s best teacher.
Annie developed her love of flowers with intelligence and inward spirituality. She has finally returned to her career to be an artist. She paints every flower differently to attract many types of patrons who love her style of painting, which is making her a popular artist. She has been focusing on Chinese ink painting of botanical painting in the Chinese art tradition. From her blossoming flower paintings is emerging her own personal style. http://anniewang.foliohd.com
2nd Place – Shaoqiang Chen – “Elegance of the Lotus Looking from Heaven”
Mr. Shaoqiang Chen had passion in traditional fine art since his childhood. He learned painting, calligraphy and seal cutting from the contemporary seal cutting master Hong Huang. Shaoqiang has been creating his art works by not only researching ancient masterpieces, but also by being inspired by the nature and by events and situations daily life.
Shaoqiang states this about his art, “My painting philosophy is that a piece of artwork should have a good balance between realistic and expression. In my paintings, I like to use the basic elements of oriental painting such as different style ink strokes, Ying &Yang to express various postures of flora in the nature. The spirit of tradition Chinese Taoism philosophy is also introduced to my painting. So that the work itself not only expresses what you have seen, but also deliver a deeper feeling of harmony between human and nature, which ultimately drives the meditation to reach a higher ambit”.
Mr. Chen hopes to better spread the traditional Chinese fine art in the United States and let more people appreciate the art form that have been lasting for thousands of years. http://shaoqiangchen.wix.com/delightchineseart
3rd Place – Marty Klein – “Night Dancer”
Since 2006, Marty Klein has been creating images using a small flatbed scanner as his camera and natural objects (often locally grown or foraged) as subjects. His art form is an outlet for his creativity and also as a way to share his knowledge and appreciation of the natural world. Marty’s work has been exhibited in more than 30 group and solo exhibits.
Klein’s experience as a photographer, blacksmith, naturalist, gardener and forager informs and inspires his art. He strives to portray nature’s essences, forms, patterns and colors, the familiar and the less-seen details.
In order for Marty to create a composition, he poses the subjects – leaves, flowers, etc. on the glass plate, with the cover open. He then edits these scans in Photoshop. Typically, this step requires hours of creating backgrounds and cleaning up any stray dust, pollen, etc. His editing process results in images that look to be a hybrid of illustration and photography, displaying surprising depth and detail.
It has been said about Marty and his art, “People with cameras take pictures. Marty Klein makes them.” http://www.martykleinart.com
4th Place – Lynn Watkins – “Rococo”
Lynn Watkins was born in London in 1960, but she has lived most of her life in Cornwall, UK since 1975. Lynn’s creativity and ability for drawing and painting was evident as a child and her passion for art continued through life mainly as a hobby. She experimented with different media and subjects in her spare time. Her ambition was to one day become a professional artist.
It was not until 2004 that she had the chance to fulfil this ambition and inspired by her mother’s garden, it was suggested that she start painting flowers in watercolour which she grew to adore.
Discovering the work of Billy Showell, Lynn was further inspired and wanting to specialise in this subject she applied for The Society of Botanical Artists distance learning course and she graduated in 2011, gaining a diploma with credit.
Lynn has completed commissions of floral paintings in acrylic on canvas and regularly sells her miniature watercolour paintings and prints. Her work is lively, bold, very detailed and never impressionistic. www.lynn-watkins.co.uk
5th Place – Jessica Manelis – “Poetry Is”
Award winning photographer, Jessica Kimmel Manelis has been creating art since grade school. At age 11, she began taking art classes every Saturday afternoon. Throughout high school, she continued drawing and painting in a variety of mediums and ultimately settled at Moore College of Art & Design in Philadelphia, to pursue a career in the professional arts.
While at Moore, she received many accolades from her instructors and won competitions where her work was featured in several magazines. Upon graduation, Jessica began a career as a graphic designer and soon found that it was creatively stunting. Thus, she set out to pursue her true creative passion.
Self-taught, Jessica fell in to photography as a means of generating reference photos for future art projects. However, she discovered that the photo process was more fun. Embracing the medium, Jessica’s work has been exhibited in several group shows in New York, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and most recently at the Connecticut Academy of Fine Arts in Mystic, CT and upcoming at the Naples Art Center in Naples, FL, in August. Her work has been described as “wonderful”, “brilliant”, “gorgeous color and detail”, “great perspective”.
Currently she lives with her husband, two kids and two dogs in southern New Jersey, where she continues to photograph the world around her. www.jessicamanelis.com
6th Place – Marti White – “Wild Roses”
Marti White is a mixed media artist from Tucson, Arizona. Her work is exhibited both nationally and locally throughout Arizona.
Marti works in watercolor, acrylic, collage, assemblage and other mixed media. She is president and Signature member of the Contemporary Artists of Southern Arizona, Juried Member of SAWG, Signature Member of ISAP, Associate of The Drawing Studio and member of the Contemporary Art Society, an arm of Tucson Museum of Art.
Marti’s artwork is an expression of her inner self. She seldom plans her work, but rather, she lets it evolve. www.combymartiwhite.com
7th Place – David Fishman – “Ceropegia woodii”
David Fishman has always been interested in nature and photography, with a desire to capture that perfect image. David learned photography mostly through practice, lots of experimentation and a strong curiosity to question experts in the field.
While hiking, David is always formatting scenery in his mind. Because of his detail orientation and his fascination with the unusual, he enjoys capturing patterns, textures and shapes of unique botanicals. By photo-stacking he creates a sharp depth-of field in his images and by removing the background, he then takes away any distractions within his compositions.
David has had solo shows at the University of Washington. His botanical images have won many awards in local, and international competitions. In addition, He has been on photo assignments at botanical gardens.
Through his art, David hopes to share his awe and wonder, and to educate those who will view his stunning, often times bizarre botanical portraits. www.fishmanbotanicalportraits.com
8th Place – Karen Sirnick – “Reflections 5”
Karen Sirnick is a self-taught photographer who lives and creates in Wellington, FL. Karen possesses a deep love of nature and this subject has been a major influence in her photography choices. With her passion for photography, Karen continues to take additional courses and by experimenting with various photographic techniques.
Karen continues to explore new ideas in pursuit of creating beautiful and interesting images. Karen’s work has been accepted and shown in a many juried exhibitions in the Southeast Florida area. ktsirnick@comcast.net
9th Place – Veronika Popova – “Composition 3”
Veronika Popova has had a lifetime love of the arts. Her journey as a future artist began when she was age 12. Once during a school break her grandpa gave her a paintbrush and showed her the basic techniques and with that, she fell in love with art.
Veronika attended and finished at the Rostov Art School in Russia. After graduation, she worked as a graphic designer for several years. She experimented with and tried different things in her adult life such as, graphic design, interior design, crafts, and designing prints for clothing. Eventually, she understood that her biggest creative passion is painting.
Today, she tries to explore different materials, styles, and textures. Most recently, her greatest interest is in flowers. She enjoys painting flowers while using different mediums such as, watercolor, oil, and acrylics.
Veronika has now moved to the United States and she finds her creative inspiration in her home state of beautiful California. http://nikapopova.carbonmade.com
10th Place – Debra Van Swearingen – “Translucent Tulips III”
Debra Van Swearingen has had a passion for photograph since the age of 11 when her father gave her a Kodak instamatic. Being a visual person, it seemed very natural to view life through a lens.
After graduating from the University of Oklahoma, she worked for the Department of Defense in contracting and pursued photography in the evenings at the Oklahoma School of Photography. It was after a year of cancer remediation in 1996 that Debra decided to make her passion her profession. She established a studio in the Paseo Arts District of Oklahoma City in 1997 and has become an accomplished award-winning photographer in the photographic arts field.
Debra’s subjects usually involve the “beauty of nature” in the form of botanical images, trees, and landscapes, as well as nostalgic-themed still life’s and old architecture. She prefers working with natural light. Although she has used film for many years (making fiber prints and hand-coloring with oils and pencils), she now strives to give each image its own individual appeal utilizing digital technology.
Her work is displayed at her studio/gallery and private collections, and may be obtained through her website. http://dvanswearingen.photobiz.com
