Features
‘Water’ Quenches Creative Thirsts at Gallery 364 Show
by Harold Egeln (edit@brooklyneagle.net), published online 03-16-2009
Southwest Brooklyn Space Goes International
By Harold Egeln
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
BAY RIDGE — From the city’s Narrows to Switzerland’s Lake Lucrene, the new “Water” art show for March at Gallery 364 in Bay Ridge signals Bay Ridge’s first art gallery entry as an international showcase.
“I grew up by the beautiful Lake Lucerne, and my father would often show me the boats and vessels docked and sailing on the lake. It gave me a sense of wonder and set off my imagination,” said Swiss citizen Marco Schmid – an artist known as “Mr. Kong” — at his first Brooklyn exhibit featuring his acrylic paintings of his stylized mermaids “Marina” and “Rivera.”
He recently began a one-year tour of the United States with artist Vero Schmid (“Queen Kong”), and the couple will be criss-crossing the country in search of art adventures and exposure. “This is a remarkably wonderful space to exhibit, and we’re glad to be doing this in Brooklyn,” said the artist sharing the space with many Brooklyn-based artists.
H2O was the artist formula for Gallery 364’s theme of the month show and sale – “Water” — framed inside the entire first floor of an historic brownstone house on the residential tree-lined block of 72nd Street in Bay Ridge, a destination and home to the area’s growing art colony.
There was a contest for the best in show and honorable mention, a feature of the gallery founded in April 2007 by professional photographer Georgine Benvenuto. Making those waves were two winners. One was “Fire Hydrant Frenzy,” a black-and-white photograph taken in 1969 by Anthony Almeida of children splashing in the hydrant’s spray.
The other winner was Trisha O’Donnell’s “Beach” painting of a Coney Island scene with people resting on the beach. By pure coincidence, the two artworks were mounted side-by-side on the wall.
For Park Slope artist Carole Harris, her photo of raindrops dripping off flowers — “Crying Sunflowers” — was among the many and greatly varied photographs and paintings that dazzled viewers as artists and photographers took up the challenging “Water” theme call to them.
Harris, an English professor at NYC College of Technology, is looking forward to her two-month-long show at a Starbucks in Park Slope, at 164 Seventh Ave. Titled “Route 441 — Signs from Flannery O’Connor’s Milledgeville,” it is running from April 1 through May 31 with photos of the fiction writer’s town in Georgia.
For Brooklyn artist Katarzyna Polkowska, born in Warsaw, Poland and a Pratt Institute graduate, her “The Rising Sun,” showing the sun rising over sea waves in a stained glass mosaic on wood artwork, gave a rare look at a now uncommon and ancient art medium.
She noted, “Artworks made with stained glass mosaics are not seen too much these days. I love the medium and glad that I have this opportunity to exhibit in this fantastic space.”
Photographer Larry Nicosa, a frequent exhibitor, displayed his black-and-white photo of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in the mist with a fogbank along the shoreline. It made the towering structure seem like it was emerging from or descending into the mists of time.
“Wow, this is just great!” exclaimed attorney Bob Howe, president of the Merchants of Third Avenue as he enjoyed the “Water” art show on his home turf of Bay Ridge, mingling with regular and brand-new first-time visitors
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