As a part of the Valley Arts District Art Loop, Arts Unbound is hosting an exhibit honoring Women’s History Month. We will feature works of art by many of our gallery artists who you can also find at www.artsunbound.org
Friday, March 25th @ 6-9pm
{544 Freeman Street, Orange, NJ 07050}
973.675.2787
Arts Unbound is a non-profit organization dedicated to the artistic achievement of youth, adults and senior citizens with disabilities. Through professional classes in the visual arts and exhibitions in our gallery and throughout the state of NJ, we are committed to unleashing the artistic expression of persons living with developmental disabilities, mental illness and physical challenges.
As a part of the Valley Arts District Art Loop, Arts Unbound is hosting an exhibit honoring Women’s History Month. We will feature works of art by many of our gallery artists who you can also find at www.artsunbound.org
Friday, March 25th @ 6-9pm
{544 Freeman Street, Orange, NJ 07050}
973.675.2787
Arts Unbound is a non-profit organization dedicated to the artistic achievement of youth, adults and senior citizens with disabilities. Through professional classes in the visual arts and exhibitions in our gallery and throughout the state of NJ, we are committed to unleashing the artistic expression of persons living with developmental disabilities, mental illness and physical challenges.
Thank you to Caro, Rene, Gail and all those who came out and showed love and support for Arts Unbound. So many children…so much candy!
Special jewelry making class held at the Arts Unbound Studio in Orange New Jersey. Led by craftsman, Gayle Mahoney, artists create enamel pendants and earrings to be for sale at our retail location in Maplewood.
Grand Opening Reception for our Pop-Up Store:
November 18, 2010 @ 6pm
RAFFLE! PRIZES! GREAT HOLIDAY GIFTS!
147B Maplewood Avenue - Maplewood, NJ 07040
Soon to be ours… We explored the space to be generously given to us through a state grant for 4 months as a “pop-up store.” Once the lease is signed, we will be staying for a stint through February of 2011. Though the space is bare now, there are plenty ideas that will run it’s course to amount to our beatuful new retail location.
Design ideas???
Arts Unbound is a professional studio and gallery specializing in the visual arts for youth and adults with disabilities. We embrace people of all disabilities including those living with mental, physical and developmental challenges, and we believe that disability often spurs on tremendous creativity and talent often expressed in the arts. Our professional art classes are taught by artists and/or art teachers skilled in various mediums (photography, ceramics, jewelry making, painting, assemblage and digital design) and our gallery features works of art by student artists and independent artists living with special needs. Please check us out on our website www.artsunbound.org or come by and visit us in our studio or gallery at 542/544 Freeman Street, Orange, NJ. Hours are Monday-Friday from 10:30 am to 3:30 pm and Saturday from 12:30 to 5:00 pm.
Who Are We After All?
I am in a reflective mood with a respectful tone and a grateful gesture, thinking about all of the artists whose work has come to define Arts Unbound. We are no longer an organization of a few but rather one of many gifted talents whose work line the walls of our gallery each and every month. From our veteran stars such as the prolific Tracy Reinhardt, Nicolenanina, Christian Markovic, Tom Yezza, Colleen Creedon, Laura Kaufman, Beverly Kohn, Justin Canha, Stanley Winarsky, Debbie Davidson, Tom Wade, Sara Sanders, Robert Otterbine and Mary Drylewicz to the many newer artistic voices – Amy Charmatz, Chris Miller, Renaldo Byrd, Ellen Angelastro, Jon Gabry, Elizabeth Crelin, Brad Friedman, Lisa Dornfeld, Dashir Johnson, Anie Knipping and Cheryl Wulfers.
Works of art emanating from our classroom are equally strong and appealing and include beautiful creations from the students in our many classes (Jespy, Groovers and more) and a strong and capable team from the Fiddle Foundation classes whose work will be exhibited this month of February, as well as young artists from local schools including the city of Orange, Bloomfield and West Orange. And then there is the volume of work created by those on the other end of the age spectrum, our senior citizens who participate in the Generations program to produce lovely pieces of jewelry, fine art and craft that continue to sell strongly during the course of the year. We are grateful to a group of foundations who continue to support us during strong and lean times – The Kessler Foundation, Grotta Fund, Wallerstein Foundation, Bass Foundation, Newark Diocese, Daniel Jordan Fiddle Foundation, The NJ Council on Developmental Disabilities, The Sklaw and Chancy Foundations as well as several prominent banks – PNC, Wachovia and Columbia. We are proud to have a group of art teachers with uncommon abilities in instruction – Program Coordinators Kathleen Heron and Stefanie Garwin as well as Barbara Folts, Billie Aber, Sherri Zuckerman, Susan Lisbin, Richard Toglia and Jason Robinson – also Jody Blatman, Teri Furr and TerryAnn Bligen . In addition to a wise and generous Board of Directors and Board of Governors and a dedicated staff (Tashea Patterson keeps the organization ticking and together), we continue to gain strength from a group of volunteers who bind us with their wisdom and skill – Joe Ruggiero, our IT Coordinator, Russell Klein and Kai Cole, Marketing and Sales, Karen Miller and Cheryl Mayo, Bernie Searle, Diane Klein, Fabienne Daniel, Hanie Warshaw and Katherine Decotiis to name but a few.
Coming to work each Monday morning and seeing new works of art drying on the studio tables or newly hung in the gallery by our gallery director, Robert Ramos, makes me smile. I bow to all those who are gifted with a brush or a lump of clay, a camera or objects combined uniquely and colorfully on a canvas. I am equally grateful to those who have joined our family because of their commitment to the arts and to the disability community. You are Arts Unbound.
Many thanks…..
Gail Levinson, Director
What Do the Arts Mean to You?
Filed under: Uncategorized — artsunbound @ 8:32 AM
I am not an artist. But I do take great pleasure in incorporating art into my life whether it be exposure in a formal space such as a museum or gallery or in a performance venue such as a theater or club. If I am in a car or on a walk watching the landscape or see the work of business or the imprint of cultural that reveal design or tradition, I find art to be appealing, enlightening, and always informative. It adds feeling and texture to my existence and makes me think beyond myself and my individual needs and wants.
Having worked in the human services field for many years and finally landing in an arts agency serving students and artists with disabilities, I am constantly fulfilled by the varied, often exciting creations of visual art that line the walls of our studio and gallery, and in the incoming submissions of artwork from artists across the state. My day is always more complete when I am stimulated by works of art, when colors, shapes, styles and forms come streaming across my daily palate in ways that make me think and feel. I am always the better for it.
These past many months of economic instability have hit the arts community along with other sectors, hard and fast. Arts Unbound is lucky to be alive as an organization, having received support from foundations and donors who are committed to keeping us in business. To them all, we are extremely grateful. Many nonprofit agencies, particularly the small ones like us, are no longer in existence or struggling mightily, and arts organizations throughout the country have had to cut back with staff reductions and scaled back or cancelled exhibitions and performances.
The art world is diminishing even as we need it more.
All of this has prompted me to write this month’s blog, as we enter the holiday season, about the importance of art, not just as a another type of product that we are seeing less of, but as a sustaining force in the lives of people that keep societies aware, fulfilled and educated. The art form will always be with us in some manner because people are creatures of expression and creativity, however it is disconcerting to see the arts threatened during an economic downturn. During hard times the arts are considered by some to be expendable and not central to the needs of society. If one were to take this trend to an extreme and contemplate the very worst – a world without art – well, that is a frightening and deeply depressing thought.
I invite readers of this blog – whether you are an artist, art enthusiast, student or teacher of the arts, marketer of the arts, even a person who doesn’t enjoy the arts – to submit your comments, pictures and ideas and to answer the basic question…. What do the arts mean to you?
Let us see where this goes… Season’s Greetings.
Gail Levinson
Director, Arts Unbound
