Janet Fons at Mad Art Gallery for Open Studios this Weekend!

Hillside Aspen

Janet Fons will be exhibiting at MAD Art Gallery during City Wide Open Studios.

Saturday July 30th from 10-4.  Mad Art is located at 2727 S. 12th Street, St. Louis, MO in the historic Soulard neighborhood. Cross streets: between McGirk and Lynch Street.

Autumn Splendor

CWOS is a week long event in July dedicated to the discovery of the hidden creative spaces where local artists work.

Open Studios preview party is at Contemporary Art Museum, July 26, 6-9pm. Check out artwork by the participating artists and map out your Open Studios Weekend visits.

Curator-led bus tour, bike tours and self guided tours. See camstl.org for information.

Janet Fons in "Painting: The Artful Palette" at the Foundry Art Centre

Foundry Art Centre

Gateway Gallery's very own Janet Fons has three paintings juried into "Painting: The Artful Palette", a juried exhibition celebrating the art of painting.

The exhibition which runs from August 27 through October 8, is in Gallery I & II at the Foundry Art Centre in St. Charles, MO.

The reception is August 27 6-9 pm and the resident artists will host an open studios at the same time.

The juror is David Spear, an award-winning public artist based in Columbia, MO.

Visit http://www.foundryartcentre.org/ for hours and information.

detail from "The River Sings"

Meeting of Minds 7 - Janet Fons

While Janet was working at the gallery she made some great progress by adding her creative element to the piece. In the beginning, she mentioned struggling with the technical aspects of not working in her normal routine, but then she decided to think outside of her own box and apply some tissue paper and seal it in the hopes that another fellow artist will add some color. Janet says, "I wanted to connect at least two of the elements on the panel because the pieces were looking very separate and I liked thinking about the initial part as a cityscape and the circle as the moon overhead so I added some "sky" between the two, working with the existing colors. Always looking for a landscape I guess... "

If you would like to learn more about Janet and her process, please visit her blog.

Approximately ten more Gateway Artists will be adding their expertise to this group project by the time this project is considered finished. As they work they have also been documenting their progress on Facebook on the Gateway Gallery Fan Page.

Interview with Artist: Janet Fons

Where do you get your inspiration?

I am inspired by the impressionists and the expressionists. I appreciate their attempts to create an emotion, a spontaneity of style, freezing one moment in time. I like that their approach, materials, and methods were personal and not tied in any way to another artist's dictate. Another painter who has always inspired me is Georgia O'Keeffe. Her individuality as a woman and an artist has always stood out to me. I also admire the work of contemporary artists Bill Creevy for his textured and layered paintings and Susan Ogilvie for her amazing use of color.

What draws you to the medium you use?

I am drawn to oil pastel because the pigments are pure and brilliant. It's a very tactile medium that you hold and apply right onto your surface. I like that it is permanent but non-toxic. There is no dust or fumes and it can really be applied to almost any surface. I've been exploring the use of alkyds as a medium with oil pastel. It liquefies the pastel so I can use washes and glaze layers of color. It also sets the pigment so I can apply a color over another without changing the underlying layer.

I've explored using oil pastel on different surfaces for several years. I wanted change the traditional presentation of matted and framed pieces under glass and the barrier it creates between the art and the viewer . I discovered that Oil pastel can be sealed and the color will not be affected. Some of my early experiments involved painting on paper (Fabriano Murilla) and then gluing the piece to panel and sealing, but the gluing part can be quite nerve-racking because you only have one chance to get it right. So I began preparing my own hardboard panels with a mix of pumice, gesso and soft gel, tinting it after the surface is dry. My panels are cradled and I carry the image around the edges like gallery-wrapped canvas.Most recently, I've been painting larger work on canvas. I like how much lighter-weight canvas is than panel.

Where is your studio and what is it like?
My studio (number 20) is in the Foundry Art Centre in Saint Charles. There are twenty studios located on the second floor of the Foundry. The public is invited to visit and interact with the artists in our studios. I have a single studio which is almost 20 ft by 20 ft with lots of room and light. My windows face west. All the studios have glass half walls facing the walkway that runs around the open atrium overlooking the great hall.

Are you formally trained and if so where?
I have a Bachelor of Fine Art from Michigan State University. My major was printmaking. As a student, my favorite printmaking methods were stone lithography, metal plate intaglio and serigraphy. Printmaking was a rigorous discipline; our finals were a series of five prints (minimum), all hand pulled and they had to be identical. Each method (or class) required at least three editions, so if you were taking a litho, etching and serigraphy class you had nine editions to finish by the end of term. Talk about burning the midnight oil!

You can find out more about Janet on her web site at JanetFons.com or on the Gateway Gallery web site at gatewaygalleryonline.com.

Please come visit Janet and the Gateway Gallery artists at the Gateway Gallery this Friday November 20 from 6-9PM.

Many of the Gateway Artists will be presenting works in the theme of Paris and Other Delights and we will be enjoying some lovely hors d'oeuvres compliments of Mazara's.