musetouch_issue_16

musetouchVisual Arts Magazine

musetouch.net

Daniel GerhartzA Message of Hope

Kahori MakiAlways Dark, Always Beautiful

Bolek BudzynAct of Love

HappyHolidays

Steve RichardNatalie Dybisz

Vihao PhamSteven DaLuz

Sarah Ann LorethIvan Parhomenko

Larissa Kulik

December 2011

http://musetouch.net

Dear readers,

My empty flat, books and paintings on the floor, few candles, one glass of wine and me...and the New Year. This is how it will be. Some may think it is too sad, pathetic, but I find it inspiring, even sensual. Turn-ing silent, sensitive moments into something magical and creative is the greatest miracle of all.

I want to thank to my dear friends Ljiljana Bursac, Nini Baseema, Kiyo Murakami, Jelena Grujic, Murielle Mirabelle Velay Michel, Ian Fur-niss, Gines Serran, Mark Sadan and to all of you for being there for me and supporting me...as I always do, and to wish you all a Merry Christ-mas and a Happy New Year.

Maia Sylba

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MUSETOUCH MAGAZINE December 2011

EditorMaia Sylba

Graphic designerDejan Silbaski

ContributorsNini Baseema

Ian Furniss

CoverBrooke Shaden

MUSETOUCH is a magazine about visual arts. It has been created by Maia Sylba out of a love and passion for

art with the hope that people will be able to use the publication and website as a platform to showcase their

skills and gain recognition.

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If you want to contribute to the next edition, you can send us an email with your data and a PDF file that

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We would love to see your art so don’t hesitate to contact us and welcome.

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Steve RichardStrong, Beautiful and Iconic

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Steven DaLuzMystery and Etheral Light

192Daniel GerhartzA Message of Hope

038Vihao PhamDance to Feel

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Ivan ParhomenkoSecond Layer of Meaning

214Sarah Ann LorethMy Own Reality

236Bolek BudzynAct of Love

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Kahori MakiAlways Dark, Always Beautiful

266Natalie DybiszEmbryonic Star

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Larissa KulikThe Result of Fantasy

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Steve Richard Strong, Beautiful and IconicTell us who is Steve?

I am 51year old photographer/cinematographer living in Halifax NS, Canada. I shoot fine art nudes and focus mainly on dance and bodies in motion.

How did you first get into photography?

I have been involved with photography for most of my life, well at least 37 of the 51 years. I began playing guitar and had my first manual camera both around the age of 13. When I first started shooting I was interested in musicians, bands, live music performances, etc., probably because that was also a big part of my life at the time. I was lucky to have a couple of friends that were experienced with live performance photographer and they were kind enough to be able to teach me some of the fundamentals of the art form. I think I was around 18 when I began working full time for a portrait studio and that is when I started to fall in love with the studio environment.

What cameras or techniques do you use?

My primary camera is a Mamiya RZ67 IID equipped with the Phase One P45+ digital back. I also use the Phase One 645DF for very long exposures and if I am outside of the studio en-vironment. I do some location shooting but 90% of everything I shoot is in the studio. I am a bit of a control freak when it comes to lighting and spend a great deal of time getting the light to be exactly the way I want it. I also shoot with the same approach I did when I was shooting film and try to get the image the way I want it in camera. I do use Photoshop for converting to black & white and final contrast adjustment with curves, but other than that I try and stay away from most post processing. I don’t think there is anything wrong with images that have a lot of post processing, just for me I love the process of creating the image in camera and have very little interest in sitting in front of the computer.

What do you know now that you wish you knew when you started?

I have this saying that has become my mantra – “it is easy to create an image of a beautiful thing (car, girl, tree, etc.), what is difficult is to create a beautiful image”. I wish I had followed this philosophy earlier on in my development. If so I think I would be much further ahead as an artist. In any visual art you have to develop your craft and your vision, and they can be quite independent from each other. I think developing your craft is much easier to do and al-ways wonder how my work would have been different if I could have developed my eye much earlier on.

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Strong, Beautiful and Iconic

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What are you trying to say with your photographs? I sense the message behind each of them...

I do try and create work with a subtle storyline unique to the image, but I am not driven to express a consistent or strong message. Instead I try to establish a basic framework that al-lows viewers to apply their own experiences and metaphors to the image. I hate when I see work that “hits you over the head” with its message, that is fine for an advertisement but not for art. Essentially what is most important for me is to create work that is strong, beautiful and iconic.

What do you hope to achieve with your photography?

I am not sure I am trying to achieve anything with my work, or at least I don’t have any set goals other than continuing to create images that I am happy with until I can no longer do it.

What’s your dream photography project?

My favorite subjects to photograph are bodies in motion and almost anything dance related. If I could have a dream project it would be to collaborate with one of my favorite ballet troupes on a dedicated book project.

Do you maybe have your favorite photograph?

There are a number of photographers like Jan Saudek, Jean Loup Sieff, and Howard Schatz that have consistently created wonderful world-class images that I consider iconic, timeless and truly inspirational. When it comes to my photography, I don’t think I am at a stage where I am consistently creating work at this level, so it is hard for me to pick any of my images that stand up to this measure. I do have work that I am happy with, and though it may not be at the level of the masters, I still think it is very good. One such image is plate 69 from the Cloud Busting book (http://www.steverichard.com/#cloud-busting/31) . This is definitely one of my favorite images.

What’s the biggest life lesson you’ve learned through photography?

Probably discovering that there is beauty everywhere if you look for it.

How do you see yourself in the future?

At this point I am very lucky in my career that I am doing exactly what I love to do. If in 10 years from now I am still creating images on my terms, I think I would be happy.

MS

steverichard.com

http://www.weisschristian.com

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Daniel GerhartzDaniel Gerhartz was born in Wisconsin in 1965 where he now lives with his wife Jennifer and their four young children. His interest in art piqued at an early age when a teenage friend suggested they spend one dreary afternoon drawing. It was at that moment that he discovered his lifework. Daniel began his art education at the American Academy of Art in Chicago where he studied in the classical tradition and immersed himself in applications of technique and design. After a brief stint in commercial art, he began pursuing fine art; visit-ing museums to study master works and painting alongside contemporary artists. Daniel found his passion in painting from life. This direct approach to working with the figure and landscape allowed him to see and attempt to capture the infinite nuances of light, color, and form. This continues to drive his enthusiasm today. Since then he has been featured in solo and group shows across the country and has won several awards at prominent national invita-tional exhibitions and his work has been collected both nationally and internationally.

The artist’s skillful and technically adept work celebrates the created world, the human form, personal relationships with a connection to landscapes and environments of special impor-tance.

Daniel Gerhartz has established himself as an important American painter among the leading talents of our time.

“ My goal is to effectively record the richness of our human experience, the contrasts between life and death, the dance and dirge, the beautiful and common, joy and sorrow, hope and despair, while in the end, offering a message of hope and pointing the viewer to the eternal. As I paint my subjects from life and have the privilege of studying the awe inspiring breadth and depth of the beauty of the created world, it is humbling to ponder the greatness of our Creator.”

Daniel Gerhartz

danielgerhartz.com


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Daniel Gerhartz A Message of Hope

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Vihao Pham Dance to FeelVihao Pham is a self-taught photographer who stumbled across ballet by chance. While studying economics at Cornell University, he befriended a fellow student who had a passion for photography and dance. Intrigued by the photos of ballerinas in her portfolio, Vi-hao had his friend introduce him to her ballet studio in northern Virginia. He built a rapport with the students over the years and eventually began shooting projects with them. Not con-tent with shooting in a studio setting, many of Vihao’s shoots take place outdoors in everyday locations not normally associated with dance.

vihaopham.com



Dance to Feel

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Bolek Budzyn Act of LoveInfluenced at his beginnings by the surrealist movement, he dedicated a particular passion to Dali, Delveaux and Delmotte. He turned then on what he considered the purest and the most concise representation of the pictural expression : The Primitive Flamands.

His passion carried him to explore the techniques of various masters who contributed to the development of his painting : Leonardo da Vinci, Rembrandt, Vermeer, Van Gogh, etc ... Poetry did not miss either from his quest for absolute : he showed an unbounded passion for Villon, Beaudelaire and Rimbaud.

Music is also essential for his works. He only paints on classical music, Budzyn being particu-larly keen on the Baroque and Mozart of whom he says to be as vital as the wine...Fond of garage rock , he reserves this kind of music to his moments of relaxation.

Mastering the techniques of the greatest representatives of the XV-th and XVI-th century painting (Van Eyck, Hieronymus Bosch, Memling, Van der Weyden ...) Bolek Budzyn takes you into a world in which beauty of formes, magic, realism of characters, force of colours, bal-ance, diversity of scenes and control of light are mixed together. Of an unbounded generos-ity and imagination, Bolek Budzyn is able to paint the portrait of a pure and angelic woman (Aurore, Hathor, Lae, ...) as well as the most fascinating apocalyptic scenes of “Boschian” type (Pandemonium, Forbidden Poems). The human caricature (The Crazy Horse, Stultitia, Drunkenness ...) is the main characteristic of his art, in settings in which the themes and the expressions of subjects do not leave you indifferent.

Staunch to his masters, Bolek Budzyn paints on wood. His medium includes about ten kinds of substances, of which : amber, aspic and turpentine of Venice. He also uses a range of old pigments such as Lapis Lazuli, Yellow of Naples and Cinnabar “True Vermilion”. His control of succesive glaze painting techniques provides his works with an unique colour, depth and picural brightness.

Boleslas Budzyn was born in Roubaix, in 1950. Launched 25 years ago and exposing his works since then at SCHEMES Gallery, in Lille, he works know almost exclusively on order.

Who are you Bolek?

So who am I? I’m a esthete in love with beauty and absolute. I’m just a painter,doing what iI can,t he way I can. We are living in a frantic world, a world thrown down in a crazyrace for success, fame and selfishness. I’m taking my time to do my work:”Anything not done with the time will be fogotten by the time!”

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Act of Love

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Why do you paint?

At the age of six, I knew I will be a painter. Pride and fame are not my targets. I’m living for passion and faightfulness for all the beauties of the world, of our mother earth! I’m serving the art of painting, not using it for myself.I’m flying on eagle’s back, kissing the wind, talking to horses and walking at night with a black jaguar, trying to share my visions of a bigger universe with those still having kids eyes and opened hearts. Painting for me is an act of love. A pure emotion between imagination and the tip of the paint brush.

Is it important to remain true to yourself and your individual vision as an artist?

The most important thing in life is to be true,really true to oneself and to give unconditional love to every living being. So there will be no past,no future, only eternety of the present!It’s hard to see myself as an “Artist”. Of course in a way I am an artist; But I’m just a man too, and the word “painter” is quite enough for who I am.

How do you see? What is it about the scene or subject that speaks to you, makes you feel and causes you to create a painting?

My imagination is feeding upon all i see,all i feel in this and other worlds. Things are more intricated between what usely someone see and the invisible world!

From where is your inspiration coming from?

I keep on walking the path of my old Masters from the past; Jan Van Eyck, Memling, Bosh, Bruegel......etc.......and all the famous painters who wrote the History of Art, just walking in their steps.

How do you see yourself and your art in the future … what do you wish?

Wish I would offer to everybody what I can do the best: ”paintings” for years and years to come, and share the joy and hapiness of my imagination with more people.

MS

“I am dedicating this words to Maia Sylba, all the “two legs” of the planet and to all my very true brothers: Animals!”

Bolek Budzyn

bolek-budzyn.com


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Natalie Dybisz

Natalie ‘Miss Aniela’ Dybisz is a fine-art photographer based in London, UK, producing pho-tography both for exhibition and for professional commissions. Her work has been featured in numerous media worldwide, including NY Arts, Fahrenheit Mexico, El Pais, ALARM Chi-cago, PH magazine, Vogue Italia, BBC, American Photo, and The Guardian.

Natalie’s work has been exhibited internationally in Europe and the US, with representation in Madrid, LA and San Diego, and six solo exhibitions to date. Miss Aniela is currently work-ing on her innovative (commercial) series ‘Surreal Fashion’ and fine-art series ‘Ecology’. Her self-portraiture-based work from 2006-09 has been extensively showcased in shows, press and books, with her book Self-Portrait Photography published in the UK and US in 2011, and her second Creative Portrait Photography to follow in spring 2012.

missaniela.com


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Embryonic Star

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Steven DaLuz Mystery and Etheral Light“I am compelled to do work that conjures up a sense of mystery and ethereal light, whether figurative or abstract. My interests are evenly split between the two. While identified more with abstract works that are often landscape-referential, employing a process using metal leaf, chemically-induced patinas, oil, and other mixed media, I also consider the figure as endlessly relevant, with inherent potential for poetic introspection. Landscape, spirituality, and the figure all serve as inspiration for me. Collectively, my work often reflects upon primal questions about origins, the expressive beauty of the human figure, the aesthetic power of light moving through an imagined atmosphere, and the sublime. In my search to find a genre that best describes my work, I’ve chosen the term, “Neo-Luminism.

Like the “Luminist” style of the mid-19th century, for my purposes, “Neo-Luminist” art concerns itself with the glowing effects of light. It differs, in that “Neo-Luminism” does not necessarily concern itself with traditional landscape, does not rely on the masking of brushwork, nor is it overly concerned with detail. While it may share a feeling of tranquility, calm, and the sense of light piercing a soft, hazy “sky”, Neo-Luminist” works may also be dramatic and turbulent. It normally has aspects of ethereal light, and hazy atmospheric qualities. It may also be present in figurative works, so long as reflective properties of underlying surfaces are exploited to convey the effect of light.

My intention is not literal narrative. Instead, I strive to evoke a feeling within the viewer. As Magritte aptly said, “People who look for symbolic meanings fail to grasp the inherent poetry and mystery of the image.” My artwork need answer no questions, present a political position, nor expound upon a narrative. For me, the pure “beauty” or personal aesthetic of art need not explain anything. At its best, the raw image alone can be enough to pose questions and ignite the imagination of the viewer. “

Steven DaLuz

stevendaluz.com


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Mystery and Etheral Light

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Ivan Parhomenko“The works of Ivan Parkhomenko are highly conceptual in character. Each of his paintings is a conceptualization of the proper order of life precisely expressed in the language of images, the place and role of a person in the universe. A certain surrealism and symbolism in the subjects of Ivan’s paintings help one understand the substance of their conception more clearly.

Ivan Parkhomenko’s ability to create a second layer of meaning in the images of his paintings by using symbols is worth special mention. A classic example of this is his painting picturing a girl on an umbrella. Each element of the painting contains and portrays the deep essence of the pro-cesses taking place in modern society. Water is a symbol of information. The fact that the girl is on top of the umbrella and the raindrops are disproportionately large reveals the new informa-tional state of society, when information has begun to renew itself several times over the course of one person’s life. In this new informational state, no one can cut himself off from information (hide under the umbrella). This means one must organically integrate oneself into the universe. A person’s hair is an antenna. The girl’s hair waving freely in the wind flows smoothly into the space of the universe, portraying the organic unity of man with the world surrounding him. The flute (a symbol of harmony) which the girl is playing shows that her world view enables her not only to understand the world correctly, but to harmonize with the universe; that is why the freely falling drops of water do not disturb her, but rather organically surround her like living planets of the Cosmos.

In his paintings Ivan bears the idea of a holistic, mosaic (and not kaleidoscopic) perception of the world.”

Konstantin Pavlovich Petrov

arthit.ru

http://www.arthit.ru/surrealism/0027/surrealism.html

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Ivan Parhomenko Second Layer of Meaning

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Sarah Ann LorethSarah Ann Loreth is a 24 year old self taught photographer from New Hampshire USA. She believes in light things and dark things and finding the balance in between. Her aim is to cap-ture the stillness in emotion while creating a reality found only in her imagination.

sarahannloreth.com


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Sarah Ann Loreth My Own Reality

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Kahori Maki Always Dark, Always BeautifulBorn in Japan, in 1969, Kahori Maki studied Fine Arts at the Art Student League of NY following graduation from Nihon University’s art department in 1992. Kahori is an active freelancer since her return to Japan in 1994. She has produced a wide variety of illustration, installation and painting. Her fascinating work takes inspiration from nature, animal and fashion to create exquisitely dark pieces, a stunning mixture of fantasy and realism.

Kahori Maki works in various media including drawing, painting, video, and installation. Her projects have included work for Levi’s, Comme des Garcons, Dover Street Market, Edwin, And A, Vogue Nippon, and The Hiatus. Besides her commercial work, she has had more than ten solo shows of her work since 1995.

“Paradoxically, living in Manhattan made me realise how much nature pervades urban life in Japan. When I moved back to Tokyo, I rediscovered how present Shintoism is in the city. I felt like nature was a part of the human soul, something eternal, something poetic and beautiful. You could say I work in response to urban life, yet express myself by depicting nature. The ex-tremes of nature and urban life continue to inspire my work today.”

Kahori Maki

k-maki.com


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Always Dark, Always Beautiful

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Larissa Kulik The Result of Fantasy“I am from Russia, from a tiny small town the Ostrov. In my work I use a lot of different mecha-nisms for different audiences and I am often asked about the meaning of my art works. Maybe I’m trying to show the relationship we have with all that surrounds us, because I believe that in this world there are no coincidences. Ropes and strings are a metaphor, telling stories of connec-tions that lead to a single plot. Any seeming randomness is unexplored regularity. And the world is much more complicated than people can comprehend, and much simpler than people think. Sometimes all the clues are right in front of us!

My work is the result of fantasy. Images are born of themselves, and only then I understand that all this existed in my mind long ago. I sincerely rejoice when the viewer understands what I want to express in my work! Unconsciously, we fix a lot of details that form a system of symbols and affect our mood and behavior. I’ve been listening to music, visited exhibitions of different artists, I read a lot about dreaming and I try as much as possible to learn the history of world culture. This is my main source of inspiration.

Nowadays there are many opportunities to realize our most fantastic ideas. This opens up new horizons for creativity and digital art collects huge audiences. Not only among artists, but also among the spectators and connoisseurs of visual arts. I hope that the meeting with the characters inside my art works will not leave the viewer indifferent, but rather will cause them to come to me again and again, to see the continuation of my stories.”

Larissa Kulik

annmei.deviantart.com

http://annmei.deviantart.com/

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The Result of Fantasy

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