Making new friends

Senator Thomas H. Kean, Jr. shows his support for our venerable organization this evening at an event in Kenilworth. Senator Kean, who grew up in and maintains his office in Westfield, is on the board of the New Jersey Council on the Arts. We look forward to staying in touch!

Senator Kean with WAA president Michael Endy and board member Sheilia Lenga

Recap: Roselle Park Loves Art!

We are so pleased to have participated this afternoon in Roselle Park's RP Loves Art! street festival. Located on several lovely, tree-lined, residential blocks of Chestnut Street, the attractions were local art, music, theater & dance groups, alongside local food vendors. The weather, for a change, cooperated.

Our own WAA board members Mary Ann Iannitto (pastel portraits) and Ginny Puskar (acrylic painting) created original art live at the event, and drew lots of attention. We also set up exhibit walls in the street to display the locally-focused artwork of several more WAA members.

Over the afternoon we met many new friends, had fun arguing about art & artists, enjoyed real food, and had our pictures taken many, many times.

         

Our set-up, mid-Chestnut St

         

Roselle Park Mayor Carl Hokanson with Michael

         

Ginny Puskar demonstrates acrylic painting

                         Montclair Museum's mobile kids' elephant project

Councilmen Meola & Templeton visit our booth

         

Mary Ann Iannitto created pastel portraits

         

the Planet Dance dancers were awesome

         

...and the crowd was happy & large!

See you again next year, RP Loves Art; this year was great!

WAA participates in Roselle Park Loves Art ! this Saturday

We have been receiving press for our participation in tomorrow's Roselle Park Loves Art ! event (Saturday, September 19, 2015). ase bring up to five pieces of art to exhibit at our pop up gallery, even if you can only stay for a portion of the day. If you would like to do some paining on the streets or other demos, please bring along your materials and show the community your art in action. 

We have a handful of WAA artists that will be joining us for the event to exhibit their work and do live painting, but we can certainly use more. Let's show the surrounding communities that the Westfield Art Association truly supports the arts. We are looking to have a strong presence at this event. Ple

The art portion of the event runs from 2:30 until 6:00. We can use some help setting up and breaking down so please show up a bit early and/or leave a bit later if possible. 

The Art Walk and WAA gallery will be held on Chestnut Street between Grant and Clay Avenues. Grant Ave will be open to traffic and we will be able to drive up Chestnut Street to unload your art ONLY UNTIL 2:00. Chestnut Street will be closed to traffic after 2:00. Parking is available in the parking lots of Robert Gordon Elementary School and Roselle Park Middle Schools. Please see the attached map for details. 

We hope you can join us at this event tomorrow. It will be a wonderful opportunity to meet the community and show your work.

Recap: The Sketchbook Project

Our first Art In The Park event was a resounding success!

Along with our friends in the Roselle Art Association, we hosted the Sketchbook Project on Saturday in Warinanco Park. Despite an overcast day with a little light rain, we welcomed over 200 visitors to our tents to view a worldwide selection of artists' sketchbooks. The one constant among the visitors, who ranged in age from 3 to 90 years and included local artists, students, families and community leaders, was the big smile on each and every face.

This free event was fully funded by a public grant from the Borough of Roselle and enjoyed the sponsorship of the Union County Board of Chosen Freeholders and the Office of Parks & Recreation. Special guests who attended the event on Saturday were Freeholder Bette Jane Kowalsky, Nicole DeAugustine from the Office of Cultural & Heritage Affairs, and General Assembly member Jamel Holley, who addressed the happy crowd. We were also pleased to offer free, blank artist sketchbooks to each child in attendance, a gift made possible by the generosity of the Freeholders and Dick Blick Art Materials.

Also among Saturday's attendees was the founder of the Sketchbook Project, Steven Peterman. This event was special for the Project as well, for although they have travelled to nearly every state in the country since 2006, our event marked their first-ever visit to New Jersey. After such a long wait, Steven was thrilled by the impressive size and enthusiasm of the NJ crowd.

This event has been a long time in the making, so its success is a great joy, especially to WAA board member and Education Outreach Coordinator Laura Brown. Upon joining our leadership board last year, Laura immediately announced her goal of finding a way to host the Sketchbook Project here in New Jersey. Many moths of meetings, emails and paperwork later, we have made her vision come true. The real benefactors of her vision and hard work are all of the people, young and old, who came out to the park on Saturday to be inspired.

With the success of this event, we are looking ahead to our next Art In The Park event. In the meantime, please enjoy these photographs from last Saturday.

New WAA Member Exhibit at Limani in Westfield

The new WAA member exhibit has been hung and is ready to view. Please stop by Limani Seafood Grill in Westfield to see artwork by various WAA members. Thank you to Maxine King and Virginia Puskar for curating and coordinating this exhibition. It's a good one!

You can check out more about Limani Seafood Grill by clicking here.