The annual AFA Holiday Auction will be held at the AFA Gallery on Saturday, November 21, 2009, beginning at 6:00 P. M. There will be wonderful music provided by friends of Doug Smith. Elegant hors d’oeuvres and desserts will be available, together with champagne. There will be an open bar. The cost is $25 per person.
The featured artist this year is Paul Nielsen, who has donated the raffle piece appearing on the invitation. It is an exquisite, handcrafted necklace. Raffle tickets cost $3.00 apiece or three for $5.00, and are available at the Gallery.
Approximately forty-five works by AFA artists will be sold by live auction at the event. The works will be of all media and styles, and are works of some of the finest artists in northeastern Pennsylvania. The Auction can be an opportunity to acquire fine work at great savings.
The auctioneer this year will be Ken Rivenberg, who has been a great and popular success in appearances at the Auction in recent years. His charm and infectious enthusiasm make the event a fun one for all. Ken has his own auction gallery – Rivenburg Auctions - in nearby Nicholson with weekly auctions.
Decorations will be provided by Linda Welles, and although the theme has not yet been announced, flowers are always the highlight. The centerpieces will be sold at the end of the evening. One year the serving table floral centerpiece was spirited away by James Penedos, only to reappear as the subject of one of his colorful paintings!
The gourmet food effort will be led by Ann Marie Noone, Sue Penedos and Gretchen Ludders. Volunteers should contact Ann Marie at 222-4334.
The annual AFA Auction is the highlight of AFA’s year in two respects. Firstly, it is the most fun event at AFA, with great food, lively music, good company and the opportunity to acquire fine art at a festive occasion. Secondly, it is the financial backbone for AFA, serving as the primary fund-raiser for Artists For Art so that we can carry on our many activities.

Please join us in celebrating Holloween at the 2009 AFA Gallery Costume Ball. I will take place on October 30, 2009, from 8 - 12 AM. Featured are DJ PartsNTafts, hors d’oeuvres and dancing. There is a $10 donation.

Jason Riedmiller and Alex DuBois at will be having an exhibition of their photographs at the AFA Gallery for the month of October. There will be an opening reception on First Friday, October 2nd, from 6 to 9 PM.
Photographer Jason Riedmiller earned a degree in Integrative Art form Penn State University. His works have appeared in Photographer’s Forum and Soph Ride magazines as well as having been exhibited at the Renga 5 Gallery in New Hope, PA and Art:Raw Gallery in New York City.
Over the past three years Jason has been documenting the artists and musicians of Scranton, PA. The first installment of these portraits was displayed in 2007 at The Bog in downtown Scranton.
Jason lives and works in Scranton.
Alex DuBois received his BFA from Hampshire College in 2008. He has exhibited in group shows at the Linder Gallery- Keystone College, The Hope Horn Gallery- Univ. of Scranton, and the Afa Gallery. He also had a solo show was at the Harold F. Johnson Gallery, Hampshire College, Amherst, MA.
About his work, Alex says, “These photographs were taken while traveling alone throughout the United States. My intention was to express what the experience may have been like. These are a collection of earnest, visual questions about how one relates to the unfamiliar, while weaving in and out of multiple spaces and lives. Please accept all omissions of written fact and documentation as my sincerest compliment to you, the viewer, and your insatiable appetite for a bread trail rather than a sledgehammer.”

“Breathing Space” an exhibition of recent collages by artist Zoja Forsberg will take place at the AFA Gallery from August 6th to August 29th. There will be an opening reception on First Friday, August 7, from 6 to 9 PM. Zoja was awarded a one-person exhibition at the AFA Gallery by the Juror for 2008 NEPA Regional Art Exhibition.

The exhibition features mixed media collages which are made with paint, fiber, found objects and some screen prints. Zoja says about her current work, “I approach the happy accident, the found object and the juxtaposition of colors and textures with an open mind. My curiosity to see what can happen when rules are broken often leads to new techniques. The finished mixed media collages often surprise me because they reveal consciousness than I was unaware of during the creation process.”

Zoja graduated with a BA in 1966 in Sweden. She has also attended Lackawanna Jr. College, and studied fine art and interior design at Marywood University from 1985-1995. She worked as interior designer for Leung Hemmler Camayd Architects from 1988-1992, and from 1993 to the present has been an interior designer for her own firm, Zoja Forsberg Interior Design.

‘Natural Constructs’, photographs by Amy Ahearn-Gray and Michael Nathaniel Meyer will be featured at an exhibition at the AFA Gallery opening on July 2rd and continuing through August 1st. There will be an Opening Reception on First Friday, July 3rd, from 6-9 PM, with an Artists’ Talk at 5:30 PM.
As a photographer, Amy Ahearn-Gray’s main attention is toward the natural world. She uses her photographs as a way to share her visual perception with others. The beauty and simplicity of nature provides her with a sense of comfort and relaxation in what is, at times, a stressful world.
The title of her series is “Found Objects of Nature”. Each image is an abstracted micro-photogenic botanical, found in nature. The subjects photographed were objects she came across throughout her daily journeys. She envisions photographing the objects outside their natural environments, singularizing their unique structure. Each object is abstractedly photographed with a macro lens, meant to obstruct the viewer’s thought or to delay the viewer’s comprehension of the subject. All objects were photographed from a variety of angles to capture and emphasize their texture and form. Various images are then grouped to allow the eye to flow among the objects within the complete photograph. The series of photographs is cohesive by similar sizes and color. Each photograph has neutral tonality, consisting of warm blacks and shades of browns. Some of the work of Joyce Tenneson, Karl Blossfeldt, and Tom Baril inspired the basic idea for the series. Using their botanical images as references, the images are created using Ahearn-Gray’s personal touch and style.
Born in Pennsylvania, Amy Ahearn-Gray began her college career as a Graphic Designer at Pennsylvania College of Technology. After a year studying Graphic Design, in 2002 Amy moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where she began her life as a photographer. She studied at the University of the Arts, earning a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography. In May of 2008, she received as Master of Fine Arts in Photography from Marywood University. During the final months of her graduate education she worked for the Himalayan Institute / YOGA+ Joyful Living magazine as a photographer. Currently, Amy is employed by FILA, USA working a Product Photographer in Maryland.
The photographs of Michael Nathaniel Meyer are from his ‘Journeys’ series, recording spans of time through which he has passed. Though each of these photographs represents a span of time that he has passed through, they are not meant to be specific passages, nor are they memories or documents. Rather, each photograph is the experience of a forward trajectory through a landscape of time that is hurtling past. He says, “Our experience of time is limited to the present moment, our recollections of moments gone by and our anticipation of moments to come. We cannot re-live the time that has passed, freeze the present, step ahead to a future moment or alter the speed at which one becomes the next. Our level of awareness of, or obliviousness to, that constant passage, though, alters our perception of our velocity.”
The photographs were created with regular 35mm cameras: the film was wound forward through the camera unexposed and then exposed as it was rewound past the open film gate (with the shutter on T). This creates roll length negatives that are then cut to 8” lengths, scanned and printed as 4″x40″ inkjet prints.
Michael was born in Auburn, Maine. He is currently a Brooklyn-based photographer who splits his time between his personal projects, freelance assignments and teaching workshops exploring the power and potential of photography. Running throughout his work is an interest in the passage of time and the process of perpetual shift that is remaking the world moment by moment. His photographs have been widely exhibited in the New York Metro area and New England. His work has been called “distinctive” by Susan Danly, Curator of Photography at the Portland Museum of Art, and “accomplished” by Marilyn Kushner, former Curator of Photography at the Brooklyn Museum. 

He has studied at Fordham University and Big Brothers Big Sisters of NYC, receiving a Mentoring Supervision Certificate, 2006. He graduated from NYU Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA with Honors 2002, majoring in photography. He also attended the School for International Training in Cape Town, South Africa, in 2001 in a program entitled “Arts, Culture and Social Change”.

‘everything here is free’, an exhibition of the works of Cassie Rose Kobeski and Terra Steele, will be held at the AFA Gallery from Thursday, June 4th, through Saturday, June 27th. There will be an Opening Reception on First Friday, June 5th, from 6 to 9 PM, with an Artists’ Talk at 5:30 pm.
The paintings and drawings of Cassie Rose Kobeski are of various media: oil, gouache, and watercolor. All are representational and are influenced by the cartoon universes of Ub Iwerks. Cassie’s multi-media pieces are what she is best known for and ‘everything here is free’ will show an installation piece of fabric, wax, and found objects.
Terra Steele describes her works on display as a series of explorations, translating moments, glimpses, and emotions into something visual – hopefully something striking, yet subtle – that can be slowly tasted, taken in, and enjoyed, like the best piece of chocolate. She says, “I am interested in pattern, the play of color, and the subtle energy that runs through everything, emerging in momentary glimpses of beauty that can make one smile even on the worst of days.”
Terra received her Associate Degree in Fine Arts at Keystone College, and her BA in Art History and minor in World Religion from Temple University in Philadelphia, PA. She currently resides in Dunmore, PA; is the Director of Interpretive Programming at the Everhart Museum; and is involved in the local arts & culture community. In addition to painting, printmaking, & design-work, Terra teaches art history and karate.
Cassie Rose Kobeski received her MFA from Parsons School of Design in Manhattan where she was a teaching assistant for the undergraduate program. She has received her BFA from Marywood in Painting and Art History. Cassie has exhibited in various arenas in Manhattan such as the Chelsea gallery district, the National Arts Club in Gramercy Park, the Lower Manhattan Cultural Center, and independent galleries in Brooklyn and Soho. She has also shown work in Florence, Italy.
Cassie is currently an instructor inthe Art Departments of Marywood University and Keystone College. She has also been an artist-in-residence with the Everhart Museum, teaching painting, drawing, and multi-media approaches to the museum’s collection. Cassie is also co-founder of an independent record label, Summersteps Records. For the past eleven years it has fostered emerging recording artists and avant-garde musicians, and has produced records with national recording artists.

‘Ut Pictura Poesis’, an exhibit of paintings by Louis N. Pontone will take place at the AFA Gallery from April 2 through April 25. There will be an opening reception on First Friday, April 3, from 6 PM until 8 PM.
Lou Pontone is a founding member of Artists For Art, the parent organization of the AFA Gallery. He was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY, and lived in northeastern Pennsylvania for many years. He now resides in Jeffersonville, NY.
A painter for more than forty years, Lou has taught at Keystone College, Misericordia, the Everhart Museum School and the Lucan Center for the Arts in Scranton. His work is represented in many public, private and corporate collections.
For more than forty years, he has made the American landscape and the natural world among the principal subject matter of his paintings. The strict representation of the seen work was never his goal; interpretation and self-expression point the direction the work takes. Working over the whole surface, Louis’ technique involves altering and weaving the shapes, readjusting the colors and building up the textures. This pushing and pulling of the picture plane achieves a rich and highly developed work of art.
About his work, Pontone says: “While I aspire that these landscape paintings be lyrical and decorative, subliminally they often carry over an indescribably ‘edge’ which is an extension of my human nature. Each painting becomes a record and reflection of my personal vision.”

‘Enlightened Dogma II”, an exhibit of photographs by Curtis Salonick, will be shown at the AFA Gallery from March 5-28. There will be an opening reception on First Friday, March 6th, from 6-9 PM, with an artist talk at 5:30 PM. As a special treat, you are invited to be a part of Curtis’s ‘Birthday Photo’ at 7:30 PM at the reception.
Curtis is a self-taught, freelance photographer who has always been fascinated by art, with its creativity and discipline. His artistic direction began when he received his first 35 millemeter camera at age 16. He soon moved from 35 mm. to medium format, developing his skills both in the darkroom and in the field. Not content with traditional aspects of photography, he wanted to find a more creative outlet to express himself.
His images revolve around the interaction with the model. Most of the images taken are not totally themselves; they are just one component of several images used to complete a final, dramatic image. The process - developed over the years of searching – uses black-and-white, 4″ x 5″ duplicating film to transfer individual parts of an original negative to create a multi-layered negative, from which the final prints are made. The style that results he likes to refer to as Gothic Surrealism.
Curt describes it as follows: “Photography, long seen as the depiction or reflection of what is, provides for me the starting point of what is a creative process that transforms and manipulates several simple images into a final composite. My work is an on-going exploration of what I view as the four pillars that support the Human Condition. They are:
#1 – LIFE That which defines our physical being in the present.
#2 – DEATH Defined by the end of our physical being, an unknown of which we posses no comprehension, so we can neither accept nor deny it. Therefore we mourn it.
#3 – SEXUALITY The driving, dominant force that perpetuates the species.
#4 – RELIGION The golden parachute: a means to an end, a reason for being, a flicker of hope in the Great Unknown, defining man from birth to death and beyond.”

The AFA Gallery will be having its 2009 AFA Winter Member Show from Thursday, February 5th, through Saturday, February 28th. The Opening Reception will take place on First Friday, February 6th, from 6 to 9 PM.
It is expected that more than 40 works will be exhibited in all media, from paintings to ceramics and photography. The artworks of AFA members reveal a wide variety of artistic styles. AFA members come from throughout the northeastern Pennsylvania region.
The AFA Gallery is located at 514 Lackawanna Avenue in downtown Scranton. Normal Gallery hours are Thursday-Saturday, noon to 5 PM. Further information may be obtained by calling 570-969-1040 or visit the website at Artistsforart.com or the blogsite at http://afa.jgrabowski.com.

Bread and Puppet will be at AFA Gallery on Saturday, January 3rd, as a part of the Drawing Socials. The performance is titled, ‘The Dirty Cheap Opera’, after Bertold Brecht.
Showings at 6pm and 7:30pm
$5 or $2 with student ID.
Donations welcome!
Bread and Puppet are outrageous contemporary political puppets on tour for over 20 years.
Questions, call AFA at 961-1040

‘Pop Mandala’, an exhibition of paintings by Steve Kursh, will take place at the AFA Gallery from January 2 until January 24. The opening reception will be on Friday January 2nd (First Friday), from 6 to 9pm, with an artist talk at 5:30pm.
Opening days are Thursday, Friday and Saturday 12-5pm. The AFA Gallery is located at 514 Lackawanna Ave., Scranton.
Steve Kursh describes the show as follows. “Mythologies, social philosophies and religious beliefs have long been the basis for a sizeable portion of humankind’s output of art. In my contribution to that output, I have come to the mandala as the appropriate vehicle to present my thoughts.
Mandalas have existed in all cultures as a sacred place - be it natural or constructed - to remember The One in control of the universe. It is a place to perform a certain ritual or practice, or for the use of a great teacher or mystic. In it’s external representation a mandala is a diagram of the cosmos. Internally it is meant to be a guide to the psycho-physical practices of the believer. In that sense, my use of images from a wide range of sources, all part of my physical existence, is an effort at finding some residue of the sanctity of the universe and it’s potential in us. The mandala is most recognizable as an element of Hinduism and Buddhism, belief systems whose underlying themes are dominated by the possibility of world transformation and individual liberation. In the same light, the purpose of art is to define or make a blueprint for a more ideal way of seeing this world.
What does all this mean? Nothing.
What is the message? It’s about enlightenment. After the formal concerns and physical aspects of a painting are considered, the only thing that makes any difference is your experience. Sometimes it’s there and sometimes it’s not, but enlightenment is where a painting wants to take you.”