Ecosystem At Risk
There’s no doubt about the millions of tons of plastic that’s produced everyday by manufacturers, starting with the oil companies who make it possible for an untold amount of plastics that are readily available in every product possible, including packaging of items, drinks, and food, plastics are no doubt a barrier and a protector of diseases, sickness, and a spread of germs, but an overload of plastic materials leads to an overflow in landfills, leveling up to leftover plastics to float in our oceans, the most obvious plastics can be removed, but there’s a growing concern over microplastics, too tiny to detect or remove, which ends up in our drinking water, leading to health perils for both children and adults, Art Curator, Debbie Dickinson, uses the power of her Debbie Dickinson Gallery to take on microplastics with “Ocean”, a curated exhibit where Debbie’s collection of artists are inspired to create work that speaks on this topic, plus Dr. Beckett Colson of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute who addresses microplastics in the ocean talking about sustainability along with a film that details technology to detect microplastics, this gallery is currently on exhibit here in New York City on 456 West Broadway daily from 11:30am to 5pm from now until November 22 at Perseus.
Bill Buchman
You can always find notes in the things that you do, musical notes provide much needed harmony not just with song, but with your everyday life, music notes are also there to protect, Bill Buchman combines his painting abilities with his music talent to provide a profound telling of oceanic life, Bill takes the notes he’s known for to protect the ocean with “Blue N Boogie”, yellow acrylic notes standing guard as a barrier against pollution getting into our waters; next up is “Island 1” where Bill creates black notes on a White Island, surrounded by blue waters that are the ocean, bringing awareness of how precious our ocean ecosystem is.
Bryan LeBoeuf
As vital as our oceans are, oceans also can represent a symbol of terror if you interpret it as representing another tragic event, Bryan LeBoeuf takes the spectacular force that is the ocean to model it after the tragic events of September 11, 2001 called “Martyr”, where the ocean acts as a vicious force that crashes on land, and the only thing the ocean carries after its destruction are victims, naked woman who have been killed by this natural disaster, much like those more than 3,000 victims killed on 9/11; Bryan’s next painting taps into human beauty with “Alfa”, with the initial offering of showcasing a beautiful woman over black canvas, where her main mission is falling in love with the sounds of the ocean through a seashell.
Carol Calicchio
The ocean is home to an array of fantastic sea creatures and fishes, all roaming through sea life in such unlimited freedom and in beautiful panoply, the truest and beautiful form of aquatic life that Carol Calicchio illustrates stands out with striking colors of orange and blue acrylics on canvas with the most obvious queen of the sea, the “Octopus”, a uniform of 8 arms waving over the blue shades of ocean; Carol shifts acrylics over to red on white canvas to remind us of our love for sea life, taking our love above fan and enthusiastic status and into such fascination of residents in the beautiful ocean, “Hammerhead” and “Eagle Ray Prosphorescent” are those fishes we must take a bow for, their appearance is as lethal as their bite, and their beauty is as non-stop as an obsession.
Christophe Von Hohenberg
If you can take one moment in your life on the beach, you’d want to capture it without question, it can be you, your friends, or your children that stays in your mind forever, Christophe Von Hohenberg takes his use of a 2.8 Rolliflex combined with framed archival inkjet on fine art paper to create “Edition 45”, a beautiful shot of a cloudy day dominating the beach and the ocean it sits with, and if you zoom in closely, you will see a group of beach goers standing by the water doing beach activities like holding a surf board, or standing around in swim trunks and bikinis, loving the beauty that is a beach day, possibly a regular routine.
David Richardson
With the “Ocean” exhibit here at Perseus Gallery, artist are challenged to conceptualize beauty or struggle with the ocean, David Richardson brought history, fiction, and florals in one place with “Poseidon’s Table” where these oils on canvas image the fictional Poseidon ship based off film, and below the waters, accents of florals sit embedded in a sea table that holds up the ocean waters while the Poseidon sails, also based off the god of Poseidon who was at war with another god.
Dominique Mulhem
If you’ve never been to Venice, Italy, you are missing out on being in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, even in its most peril condition, Venice beauty is only enhanced, like it is here with Dominique Mulhem, who takes Venice, submerges it in deep water, flooding the city of inland life to be called “Under Venice”, this chromoluxe of Venice shows how beautifully terrifying it could be for Venice to be flooded, but the sting of that catastrophe is eased with bikini-clad woman and alligators swimming as high as Venice’s buildings go, this French artist conceptualizes his work from a media variety inspirations which include traditional paintings and computer-generated images and animation; the beautiful water also plagues terror in a more modest way with “Save My Planet” from floating in deep blue, planet earth is saved by a life preserver with a little girl standing by in 3D.
Douglas Dubler
The ocean is sometimes best witnessed in its still and calm form, along with an easy sky to compliment a water’s stillness, add in “Mystic Dawn & Raven” by Douglas Dubler who takes fine art on digital print that’s mounted on Dibond, here we see Monk like figures looking onto what could be a pre-dawn sky to see how they’re guided by one of the most powerful birds on earth, standing on water as these Monk likes too are at one with God, Douglas combines light, exposure, and color over ultra high quality digital photography to create an outstanding case of how mother our oceans are.
Dragana Connaughton
Continuing on the course of fine art digital print, we turn now to Dragana Connaughton, one of the filmmakers involved in the screening about microplastics shown here at this event, who also takes her talent of conceptualizing award-winning photography in two forms of art that celebrate ocean, the sky, and wildlife, first up is the “School Of Mullet”, an up close and personal look at the mullet of fishes single filing in and out of the ocean at once, beautifully showing off their gills as well as the crisp presence of ocean waters, “Wave Of Mullet” acts in the same manner as its predecessor, but only it takes place directly in the water, with more emphasis on ocean colors blue and green, and then there’s “Pelican”, taking fine digital art up into the sky, an on the brink of sunrise sky with clouds sandwiching the space with a pelican flying over nature’s canvas before daybreak.
Eva B. Gorson
Acrylics on canvas are emphasized at any level of texture you want it to be, but it all comes down to how thick the colors need to be to convey the main idea of your work, Eva B. Gorson celebrates the Debbie Dickinson Gallery “Ocean” awareness exhibit, as well as life in the ocean with intended rich use of blue, black, green, and white, all in glistening storytelling notion, first up with “Smiling Ocra” who loves their aquatic life without any doubt, then the ocean floor has its time in the water with “Ocean Garden” where water and grass colors are brought out for its intended purpose with the blackness presence of the fish, and blue and green take a backseat to emphasize black and white with modest acrylic use to reveal the intense force of an “Ocean Wave”.
Evan Sebastian Lagache
The connection between water and planet are not only spiritual with how rich life on Earth is, or how important one element plays to ensure long-lasting survival, but how colors connect with one another, Evan Sebastian Lagache feels the mother that is the ocean through “Oceania”, a blue body of acrylic on canvas that gives you the brutal importance of how the ocean is to our ecosystem with dark blue and white foam to represent the aftermath effect of the ocean’s force; that same blue continues on with Evan’s conception of the planet “Neptune”, a similar construction of the ocean, but “Neptune” sits idol, powerful, and non-threatening with its standard shade of blue.
Geraldo Perez
With art, your job as an artist is also to see things for what it is, taking a step into a more realistic approach on how you see life, acrylics are used more modestly to enhance the meaning of mixed media which Geraldo Perez is always a master at doing, Geraldo first starts with “Bathers” as 3 women on the beach look onto the ocean or another direction while a cautious swimming sign exist on a cloudy day; ride the “Tide” in 2 ways, one way is through your surf board with ocean and street signs on the beach, and with Tide detergent, proud sponsor of your surf board.
Iran Issa Khan
While photography doesn’t involve a paintbrush or canvas, the use of film, flash, and digital print are put to capture an image as you see it, no changes and no filters, Iran Issa Khan has devoted her life to photography with captivating and award-winning results, laid out on archival pigment print for everyone to see in full display, Iran’s “Golden Pleasure” is a fine example of experiencing a flower in a way that it can only be seen, as is, nothing has been painted on, touched up, or enhanced, the only takeaway you see here and how it connects to the ocean is that any alteration that damage our oceans proves dangerous to earth.
Matt Stock
Finding the perfect conception of the ocean has to start with finding the perfect moment for the artist to create, sometimes using shapes as perfect as possible do help bring an artist mixed media situation to life, you will find that with Matt Stock as Matt uses shapes perfectly to visualize “Mermaid Tapestry” of a beautiful figure of the sea in true woman form that’s only allowed to be drawn as taking a picture of a human being, flowers give a perfect effect of the ocean floor with golden seaweed done smoothly; “Into The Deep” evolves into the beauty of an actual woman that’s scuba diving down into the ocean floor with perfect circles and bold colors, plus bikini-clad woman to make you love the realism behind it.
Michael McDyer
The use of acrylics mean more than just conveying an idea, it means going deeper onto your cotton canvas like Michel McDyer does with his acrylics, using them to express how much you love art for the sake of art itself, leading you to go deeper with your idea in such glossy panoply, Michael’s “Crest” doubles down on acrylics by layering more acrylics after one session is fully dry to create a living 3D painting of the ocean in blue, plus waves crashing onto very wet sand as the ocean overflows on inland; “Inshore Clam” this time takes super-layered acrylics to give you the ocean in layers (water, foam, and sand); “Beach Shells” is all about the edge of the ocean after the foam crashes down, foam, water, and sand are blended in on a bed of seashells with sand on bottom, and ocean on top.
Michelle Hall Parish
Symbols of the ocean are obvious, and sometimes not so familiar, you don’t hear very much about coral reefs found at the bottom of the ocean, and it’s unprecedented that their representation are not on canvas, but on glass, Michelle Hall Parish takes fused glass that’s artist proof to create the “Bubble Coral Bowl”, a stark display of immersing yourself into what it’s like to see what ocean life on the ocean floor is, clear, transparent, and translucent as the ocean itself, sometimes solid and opaque.
Dr. Beckett Colson
Meet Dr. Beckett Colson, an Engineer with the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) who’s developed instruments to advance scientific exploration of our waterways and the deep-ocean, Dr. Colson was on hand to demonstrate a device he’s created to detect microplastics in our ocean, Dr. Beckett also illustrated what microplastics appear to be, pieces of sand and rock can be deceiving because they can be disguised as microplastics, these microplastics end up hurting our sea life, harming fishes and other aquatic life where results can be deadly, microplastics also end up being ingested by human beings apparently by water, where adults and children are at risk, Dr. Colson’s microplastics detection device has been said to be so powerful, that it can detect what diseases a human being are going to suffer from.
Tom Fitz & Dragana Connaughton
Tom Fitz of Schoolyard Films, plus artist and filmmaker, Dragana Connaughton sat with Debbie Dickinson and Dr. Beckett Colson to talk about their feature presentation of “Paradise Polluted” which was shown here at Perseus Gallery in front a full house of attendees where the film sheds light on endangered albatross on Midway Atoll, and young scientists from Hawaii are investigating how plastic in the food chain of the ocean impacts sea life and wildlife.
Thanks to the Debbie Dickinson Gallery at Perseus, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and Schoolyard Films, we have all come together to express our deepest concerns about the future of our ecosystem, and the one vital resource that powers all people, places, and things on this planet, the ocean, plastics pollution is a peril issue in itself, as more efforts need to be followed such as recycling and slowing down oil companies from powering our overload of plastic waste, but microplastics pose a serious and imminent threat whether it’s disguised or in plain sight to our aquatic wildlife, and to adults and children who consume it through fish and drinking water.
Now is the time to see the Debbie Dickinson Gallery titled “Ocean”, now in beautiful display on 456 West Broadway at Perseus in lower Manhattan here in New York City, doing its part to strengthen the effort of ridding the world of microplastics, everyday from 11:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., from now until November 22.
Sponsors include Human Longevity, Inc, Kimberly Hotel, Bang & Olufsen, John Doroughty of Blackbarn Restaurant, Vias Imports, HGU NY, Parthenon Framing, Neuhaus, Harney & Sons, and U.S. Private Jets