PAST PROJECT
The Bridge Red Ballyhoo!
To Match The Knight Arts Challenge Grant
Participating Artists: Carlos Alvez & JC Carroll, Rene Barge, Carol K. Brown, Robert Chambers, Lou Anne Colodny, Jim Couper, William Cordova, Elmer Craig, Duane Hanson, Charles Hashim, Vincent Hemphill, Shirley Henderson, Salvatore La Rosa, Jackie Lipsky, Mary Malm, Zaydee Martinez, Gustavo Matamoros, Peter McWhorter, Ron Mitchell, Gary Monroe, Barbara Neijna, Joe Nicastri, Kerry Phillips, Karen Rifas, Tom Schmitt, Ellie Schneiderman, Laura Tan, Sherri Tan, Kristen Thiele, Robert Thiele, Odalis Valdivieso, & Kerry Ware
April 29th, 2012
WORK
ABOUT
Carlos Alvez
Carlos Alves has been serious about art since he was a child and it shows in his passion for making things out of clay, glass, metal, salvaged artifacts, and recycled objects. Drawing from his Cuban roots and his Miami, Florida upbringing, Carlos' themes encompass love, hope, history, culture, politics, nature, animals and a kinship with the sea. Alves is now applying his artistry to large public and private artwork projects throughout the US and abroad.
Rene Barge
Working in multiple media, Rene Barge produces sound works, prints and videos. His works are described as "prismatic relays of the patterns he perceives around him. In each work lies the traces of complex orderings of distortions and filters. As records they simultaneously reflect multiple aspects of change at once, analogous to post-studio, post-digital cubism." (source: Emerson Dorsch) Barge earned a BFA from Florida International University in 1999, where he studied under his mentor, Christine Tamblyn. He has shown individual and collaborative works; notably sound collaborations with Gustavo Matamoros and David Dunn.
Carol K. Brown
Carol K. Brown wasn't raised on an Iowa farm during the Depression (but she does know how to weld). She didn't get an MFA from Yale in 1984. She was not in the Whitney Biennial of 2012. Gagosian Gallery never gave her a solo show in Chelsea in 2004. If she was the recipient of a McArthur Genius Grant in 1990, they didn't inform her. But she did make some stuff.
JC Carroll
JC Carroll lives and works with her partner/ husband Carlos Alves in Miami, Florida. She is considered one of the original pioneers of South Beach gentrification in the late 1980's where she opened ART-ACT Performance Gallery. Having studied theater/ set design and fine art at FIU Wolfson Campus and abroad, she opened ART-ACT to provide a space to further explore the burgeoning art scene of the time. ART-ACT brought to Miami Beach new and exciting artists like Tomata Du Plenty, and group shows from NYC's Rivington School. The theater concentrated on plays of great significance to JC at the time many were based on Political/Civil/Gay rights and AIDS epidemic awareness holding countless fund raisers for the hopes of a cure. JC designed and created a majority of the set designs for these plays. The same values that went into the shows she produced goes into her visual art.
Robert Chambers
Born in Miami, Robert Chambers earned his MA (1990) from New York University and his BFA from University of Miami (1983). He ran the sculpture departments at NYU for a number of years and then continued his teaching career at the University of Miami. Robert Chambers has recently completed several large scale public Art commissions; "Light Field", an interactive 87' tall LED wall of light and "Orbital 1+2", 20.000 lbs marble elliptical sculptures for Miami-Dade Art in Public Places (completed March 2011). Recent exhibitions include "2011 Invitational Exhibition of Visual Arts" at the American Academy of Arts and Letters in NYC. Awards include the Nancy Graves Award and the Louis Comfort Tiffany Award. He was granted a residency at the Fabric Workshop Museum in Philadelphia, PA in 2009 and has work in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, Miami Art Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Art of Miami, FL.
Lou Anne Colodny
Lou Anne Colodny's experiences in dance, theater and museum administration have greatly informed her art. She was a recipient of the 2008 Cultural Consortium Fellowship in the Visual and Media Arts for Broward County in Florida and BEST IN SHOW for her videos in the 2005 Boca Museum of Art's 54th Annual All Florida Exhibition.
William Cordova
William Cordova is an interdisciplinary cultural practitioner living in Miami/New York City. His work is installation based and includes performance, sculpture, film, photography, and drawing. Cordova focuses on architecture, landscapes, and history as a way to reconstruct, reconsider, and reconnect past events to reveal their relevancy in today's social climate. Creating ephemeral monuments through film, photography, and assemblage Cordova seeks to expand the overall experience of the visual arts as a platform for discussing our common experiences, needs, and struggles.
Jim Couper
Jim Couper is a professor emeritus in Department of Art and Art History at F.I.U. He began his career as a pioneer faculty member in 1972 when the university first opened. During his tenure, Couper served as senior painting professor, founding director of the Art Museum (now the Frost), founding director of the graduate program, and a period as department chair. He retired in 2005 after 33 years of teaching and administration. He maintains residences in Miami and Tallulah Falls, Georgia, drawing inspiration from both locales.
Elmer Craig
Elmer Craig is a clay artist who worked and lived in Miami for many years until moving to Kentucky where he now holds a Resident Artist position at Eastern Kentucky University. Craig received his B.A. in 1959 from Ball State University in Muncie, IN and his M.A. in 1961 from Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, MI. Craig taught for 40 years, and was the Art Department Chair at Miami-Dade College.
Duane Hanson (Jan. 17, 1925 - Jan. 6, 1996)
Born in Alexandria, Minnesota, Hanson received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Macalester College in St. Paul in 1946. He continued his studies at the University of Minnesota and in 1951 completed an M.F.A. in sculpture at Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Falls, Michigan. Hanson taught art in Germany from 1953 to 1960 where he worked for the US Army school system. In 1960 he moved back to the US and taught at the University of Atlanta from 1962-65 until relocating to Miami where he taught at Miami Dade College, known then as Miami Dade Community College. Achieving notoriety for a sculpture entitled "Abortion" depicting a young woman lying under a white sheet, Hanson was promptly disallowed the use of his studio on campus in creating these works. Continuing in this social vein, Hanson went on exploring the subject of the dark side of human nature, featuring junkies, race riots, motorcycle accidents, bowery bums, murder victims, and the like until 1970 when he turned his spotlight onto the more mundane, but perhaps more insidious figures of gaudily clad aging tourists, overweight shoppers, bored security guards, trudging maids, and other workaday-joes or hapless denizens of middle America who would otherwise not register on one's radar and for which he became most well known for. Duane Hanson died in Boca Raton, Florida of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma on January 6th, 1996.
Charles Hashim
Charles Hashim received his BFA from the University Of Miami in 1962, his MFA from UCLA in 1964, and was subsequently hired at Miami-Dade College in 1964 where he became the Chairman of Photography from 1967-2003. He was responsible for developing all of the photography courses at Miami Dade College that are still currently all being offered at every campus except for Studio Lighting which is now offered at the North Campus. His solo exhibitions include the Afterimage Gallery in 1973 and Barry University in 1993 and he has participated in numerous group exhibitions including FIU, MAM, and Bridge Red Studios/Project Space most recently.
Vincent Hemphill
Vincent Hemphill was born in Toledo, Ohio and raised in Miami, Florida. A graduate of Parsons School of Design, Hemphill lived and worked in New York City for over a decade before returning to Miami. Hemphill's paintings have shown in galleries and institutions, including locally at Art Center/South Florida, Edge Zones, and Bridge Red Studios.
Shirley Henderson
Shirley Henderson is a painter, courtroom illustrator, and educator currently living and working in Miami, FL. Henderson has exhibited both her paintings and courtroom drawings widely nationally and internationally and is included in the permanent collections of The Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown, Ohio, the Kresge Art Museum in East Lansing, Michigan, the University of Miami School of Law in Coral Gables, Florida, The Polk Museum of Art in Lakeland FL, and the Museum of Art of Fort Lauderdale, in Florida among many other institutions and private collections.
Salvatore La Rosa
Salvatore J. La Rosa was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and raised in North Miami, Florida. A Kent State University Fine Arts graduate, La Rosa returned to Miami and joined the faculty at Miami-Dade College North Campus. In 1975, La Rosa along with Robert Thiele were the first South Florida artists invited to participate in the Whitney Biennial. La Rosa's works are rarely shown publicly. The Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) North Miami featured Salvatore La Rosa in August 2005 and La Rosa is the first artist to have works exhibited in the Bridge Red Studio 5 Project Space.
Jackie Lipsky
Jackie Lipsky received a B.A. from the University of Nebraska in 1980, pursued post graduate studies there as well as the University of Massachusetts between 1985-1989 and now currently lives and works in Miami, Florida. Of her work, Lipsky says, "The materials in my boxes and paper collages have been gathered for many years with great care. Walking in the streets an object catches my eye and I have to pick it up. I am attracted to old photos, cloth, and objects that have some sentiment and emotional attachment to me. Many special objects have been given to me by friends who have in their way expressed some identity with my treasure boxes. I developed an interest in photographic images, some produced with a digital camera, that have been manipulated through the computer and transformed. These images are deliberately obscure and I enjoy the scratches that mark the otherwise pristine surfaces. I am also impressed with objects of fabric, paper and wood that have yellowed and frayed, and have survived the years, and bring a trace of time and age to the work. I like wrapped and enclosed things that have a mystical nature filled with love and care. I enjoy a strength and directness that many of the pieces seem to have."
Mary Malm
Mary Malm, born in Norwich, Connecticut, lives and works in Miami. She attended Norwich Free Academy, and graduated with a diploma in Fine Art, after which she attended Pratt Institute. She completed her education at the University of Miami where she received both her BFA and MFA in Painting, and where she received a full scholarship and teaching assistantship, graduating with honors. Presently she is a professor in painting and drawing at Miami International University of Art and Design.
Zaydee Martinez
Zaydee Martinez holds a M.F.A. from the University of Miami and B.F.A. from Florida International University. Her work is in the collection of the Lowe Art Museum in Coral Gables, Florida International University (three locations) in Miami, and numerous private collections.
Gustavo Matamoros
Gustavo Matamoros lives and works in Miami as composer, sound artist, performer, curator and educator. He studied Music Theory/Composition at University of Miami (Dennis Kam, John Van Der Slice, 1979-83) and later with Earle Brown. He became interested in conceptual music, electronic arts and concert production. He was the technical coordinator of New Music America-Miami Festival (1987-88) and as director of SFCA he founded the Subtropics Experimental Festival of Music and Sound Arts (1989).
subtropics.org/gustavomatamoros
Ron Mitchell
Ron Mitchell was a wood sculptor. Mitchell was full time faculty member at Miami-Dade College's North Campus teaching Sculpture, Art Appreciation, and Humanities. Mitchell left MDC in 1977 and since left Miami, and no additional information is currently available. If you have any additional information for Ron Mitchell, please contact us at info@brideredstudios.com.
Gary Monroe
Gary Monroe, upon earning an MFA from University of Colorado at Boulder (1977), returned to his home in Miami Beach, where he spent a decade photographing the old world Jewish community, which then characterized South Beach. Gary Monroe has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Florida Department of State's Division of Cultural Affairs, Florida Humanities Council, and the Fulbright Foundation to support his photography.
Barbara Neijna
Miami artist, Barbara Neijna, creates large-scale monumental sculpture, site-specific installations, and large format photography that communicate social issues concerning survival and the environment. Her vision for art is both concrete and conceptual. Her work can be seen in public and private museum and gallery collections throughout the United States and Europe.
Joe Nicastri
Joe Nicastri is a painter and sculptor who resides in Miami, Florida. Over the past thirty years, he has exhibited his paintings and sculpture in major galleries and museums across the country. His work is represented in many public and private collections.
Glexis Novoa
Glexis Novoa was born in Holguín, Cuba in 1964, raised in Havana and received a BA from The National School of Art, Havana in 1984. He lives in Vedado, Havana and Little Haiti, Miami and works anywhere.
Kerry Phillips
Kerry Phillips has shown extensively in Miami including projects with Bridge Red Studios, Locust Projects, the Miami Art Museum, the Art & Culture Center of Hollywood & the Girls' Club Collection. In 2010, she won Best in Show at the Boca Raton Museum of Art's annual All Florida juried exhibition.
Vickie Pierre
Vickie Pierre was born in Brooklyn, New York and currently resides in Miami. Pierre's recent solo exhibitions include If You Win Me, I'm Forever, Art and Culture Center of Hollywood and You Poor, Sweet, Innocent Thing, Diana Lowenstein Fine Art.
Karen Rifas
Karen Rifas was born in Chicago and lives and works in Miami. She received her MFA from the University of Miami and has taught at many institutions including New World School of the Arts.
Rafael Salazar
Rafael Salazar was born in Cuba and currently resides in Hialeah, Florida. Salazar's photographic series of street performers in Barcelona were exhibited in 2012 "Under the Bridge" at Bridge Red Studios in North Miami.
Tom Schmitt
Born in 1929 in Columbus, OH, Tom Schmitt has lived and worked all over the United States until settling in Miami where he currently lives and works. Of his recent work, Schmitt says, "The reductive color field paintings I make are computer generated. Made of colored light."
Ellie Schneiderman
Ellie Schneiderman is a ceramic artist. She specializes in sculptures that are one of a kind, functional, clay works. Ellie founded Art Center/South Florida on Lincoln Road in 1983 and served as director for ten years.
Janet Slom
South African-born Janet Slom is a painter, installation and performance artist. Her paintings are in collections internationally, including the South Africa Parliament. Solo and group exhibitions include Silvermine Art Guild (CT) and the United Nations (NY).
Laura Tan
Laura Tan is a visual artist who works primarily with oil paint, mixed media, drawing, watercolor and collage. Ms. Tan has worked as a professional artist for over 20 years.
Sherri Tan
Sherri Tan is a figurative artist whose work includes collage, sculpture, photography, books and recently, set design and film. Her work has been exhibited in galleries and museums across the US.
Kristen Thiele
Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, Kristen Thiele lives and works in Miami, FL. Thiele received her BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1995 and her MFA from Miami International University in 2012.
Robert Thiele
Born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Robert Thiele is a sculptor who divides his time living and working between Brooklyn, New York and Miami, Florida. Thiele received both his BFA and MFA from Kent State University in 1964 and 1966.
Odalis Valdivieso
Born in Caracas, Venezuela, lives and works in Miami. She is the recipient of several Miami-Dade Community Grants and the South Florida Cultural Consortium Grant.
Kerry Ware
Kerry Ware was born in Southern California and received an MFA in painting from the University of Miami. Ware has exhibited paintings frequently in group and solo exhibitions.