Triada Samaras Artist

Sunday, April 27, 2014

Fun Sewers+Art event this evening at Proteus Gowanus

Fun Sewers+Art event this evening at Proteus Gowanus at 6 pm at 543 Union Street.

"Continuing our exploration of our theme of Water, Proteus Gowanus has teamed up with the Newtown Creek Armada from our sister Superfund site, and Brooklyn Atlantis to present the work of scientists and artists exploring our troubled waterways."

You can find out more about the Newtown Creek Armada here:

https://www.facebook.com/NewtownCreekArmada

and the Overflow opening event here.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1482486968636049/

Friday, April 25, 2014

Pratt Institute: A Community Exchange: The Socially Engaged Artist and the Public Imagination

Above: Installation view, We Are The People.
Project Row Houses, Houston, TX, 2003.

Rick Lowe, artist, activist, and founder of Project Row Houses
Photo: Sam Durant. © Sam Durant.

There are too few good days like this one. Yesterday I attended a fabulous conference at Pratt Institute: "A Community Exchange: The Socially Engaged Artist and the Public Imagination". LINK What better way to spend an afternoon in Brooklyn than to hear of the works and ponder the projects of a variety of socially engaged artists and practitioners?
Ann Messner, Shane Aslan Selzer, May Joseph, Jaret Vadera, Rick Lowe, Mendi Obadike, Uzma Rizvi and Heather Lewis all made the day very special.

The conference opened the dialogue on socially engaged art to brainstorm:
"What is the public’s imagination in relationship to social engagement and its potential within the society we inhabit? What is the nature of the public’s commitment to space and place, and how is it related to a social engagement that formulates new social imaginaries? This conversation will explore these questions and discuss the place of socially engaged art in our many publics." (courtesy the brochure)

Even as the form of socially engaged art struggles to find the language: the questions and the answers that will define it even as it morphs, it is very clear to me that the form has so much promise! And the growing of a new, socially-engaged art program for students developing at Pratt sounds very exciting.

For entirely heart warming socially engaged art projects see Rick Lowe's Project Row Houses at his website http://projectrowhouses.org/
It is truly great stuff!
You can also read the NY Times article on Lowe here
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/17/arts/design/17kimm.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
T.S.

Saturday, April 12, 2014

My work featured at Kentler International Drawing Space

My drawing, "Drifting House", is being featured in the current 100 Works on Paper Benefit exhibition at Kentler International Drawing Space.

Artists' Reception Tonight from 6-8 PM.

353 Van Brunt Street, (RED HOOK) Brooklyn, New York 11231
Telephone: 718.875.2098 /

info@kentlergallery.org

And: SAVE THE DATE!
SATURDAY, MAY 17, 6pm

Triada Samaras Drifting House Acrylic/pencil on paper 8x11" 2014

100 WORKS ON PAPER

BENEFIT

SATURDAY, MAY 17, 6pm

HONOREES:

ALANNA HEISS
Founder and Director of Clocktower Productions; Founder and Former Director of MOMA PS1

DUSTIN YELLIN
Artist, Founder and Director of Pioneer Works, Center for Art and Innovation

MEMORIAL TRIBUTE: MARTHA BECK
Founder of The Drawing Center

OVER 100 ARTISTS generously donate original drawings & works on paper to support our 12th Annual Benefit, celebrating our 24th year.

PURCHASE ONE TICKET: $200
($250 Ticket Holder plus Guest)
GO HOME WITH: ONE NEW WORK OF ART!

All proceeds support Kentler's 2014 Exhibitions, The Kentler Flatfiles and K.I.D.S. Art Education.

Each ticket holder draws a number when they arrive at the event. This number determines when the ticket holder gets to choose one of the 100 WORKS ON PAPER.

PLUS 2 SPECIAL SILENT AUCTIONS:
Silent Auction Artworks and
"Found in Red Hook" featuring unique items and gift certificates from artisans, businesses, and restaurants in Red Hook, Brooklyn.

Tickets are limited!

Artist, Triada Samaras

Tuesday, March 25, 2014

Greek Independence Day and Art

Hello!

As it is Greek Independence Day (!) I thought I would send post a link to a newspaper article about my photographic series The State of Greece 2012: ΕΝΟΙΚΙΑΖΕΤΑΙ - ΠΩΛΕΙΤΑΙ: FOR RENT – FOR SALE that I just received today from a colleague whose husband, reknowned economist, author, and activist Yanis Varoufakis, is also mentioned in the article. Unfortunately the article is in Greek but you can see some of my photos nevertheless.

LINK:
http://www.iefimerida.gr/news/73947/o-%CE%BF%CE%B9%CE%BA%CE%BF%CE%BD%CE%BF%CE%BC%CE%B9%CE%BA%CF%8C%CF%82-%CE%B1%CE%BD%CE%B1%CE%BB%CF%85%CF%84%CE%AE%CF%82-%CF%84%CE%B7%CF%82-%CE%BA%CF%81%CE%AF%CF%83%CE%B7%CF%82-%CE%B3%CE%B9%CE%AC%CE%BD%CE%BD%CE%B7%CF%82-%CE%B2%CE%B1%CF%81%CE%BF%CF%85%CF%86%CE%AC%CE%BA%CE%B7%CF%82-%CF%84%CF%8E%CF%81%CE%B1-%CF%80%CE%B1%CF%81%CE%BF%CF%85%CF%83%CE%B9%CE%AC%CE%B6%CE%B5%CE%B9-%CE%BA%CE%B1%CE%B9-%CE%AD%CF%81%CE%B3%CE%B1-%CF%84%CE%AD%CF%87%CE%BD%CE%B7%CF%82

Here is a description of the project in English:

A project by Triada Samaras, 2012

What is the state of Greece today? The photographic series: The State of Greece 2012: ΕΝΟΙΚΙΑΖΕΤΑΙ - ΠΩΛΕΙΤΑΙ: FOR RENT – FOR SALE explores this question. As a Greek/American artist, I am deeply moved by the economic crisis and current economic realities in Greece. In a multitude of subtle and obvious ways, Greek economic austerity, as a theme, triumphs the Greek visual landscape in this moment. The words: ΕΝΟΙΚΙΑΖΕΤΑΙ - ΠΩΛΕΙΤΑΙ: FOR RENT - FOR SALE dominate the streets, structures and spaces of Greece, repeating themselves ad nauseam along blocks of once occupied homes and shops, spelling out the current, disastrous Greek state of affairs.   It is impossible to ignore these signs, and their menacing forebodings. They point to a co-existent yet sometimes hidden stress, poverty, and lack of a clear future for Greece that are only too obvious to the people of Greece.

As an interdisciplinary and socially engaged artist, my work often grapples with contentious environmental, social, and economic issues in New York City. In addition to feeling an enormous compassion for the people of Greece, I cannot but help but notice the ominous similarities between the current Greek economic crisis and the less visually obvious one on American soil.

I took these photographs in Greece, 2012, to capture the spirit of the economic times in Greece by focusing on the city of Athens. Walking along the streets of central Athens, I photographed Syntagma Square, Stadiou Str, Hermou Str between Syntagma, and Omonia Squares, Monasteraki and Omonia Squares, and the neighborhoods of Pagkrati and Ilissia. I describe these routes and areas as anyone familiar with Athens will know they are neither the poor areas, nor are they off the beaten track, but rather they constitute the central, well traveled, and once affluent streets of former Athens. Today, however, things look very different. As art critic Susan Handler wrote about my work, “Utilizing the language of visual symbolism and the written word, the viewer can read in her photographs the toxic plague that is thriving and destroying the country.”

"It is my sincere hope that these photographs might provoke the viewer to ask questions and to seek creative solutions. To this end, I have created a Facebook page where the pubic can participate freely in the creative process regarding this issue at: Enoikiazetai-Poleitai-For-Rent-For-Sale. I invite everyone to join in this process.

The situation in Greece is not an exception. In fact, economic austerity and the principles of economic austerity are being recreated elsewhere, even in the United States, as this text is being written. No one is ultimately immune from these economic realities. In Greece we say, ELLADA PAEI (Greece goes). But where are Greece and the rest of the world going? It appears no one knows for sure." Triada Samaras

Text & Photos: © Triada Samaras 2012

This coming summer I will be going back to Greece to continue photographing as well as to see my family there.

Triada

Monday, March 3, 2014

Collaborative Artwork

I love working on collaborative art work! Especially when the I do not know the collaborators personally and they live in another country. My friends at Athens Art sent me this work to "change". And so I did! And it will change some more after I return it to them. Triada

Tuesday, February 18, 2014

"Three-D Zentangles"

Here are some photos and information from one of my current projects as a William Paterson Art Professor in Residence at Eastside High School. I have created the SteamemPOWERment blog to document the work of a collaboration of art science and math teachers with WiIlliam Paterson University Art Professors in Residence and many high school students via a Geraldine M. Dodge grant. Here is my recent blog post:

"Three-D Zentangles" Project In the Works

The "Three-D Zentagles" project LINK has now begun in earnest with the first phase of this project consisting of students using content area vocabulary words in their classrooms to write onto strips of white paper. Students are urged to be creative in their handwriting. Several classes are involved in this effort including art and science classes at GOP and SOIT.

Science classes are using their science vocabulary words, and art teachers are using their art vocabulary words. Below is a small model of a "Three D Math Words Zentangle" created by Art PIR Triada Samaras to give teachers an idea what the finished installation will roughly look like in the science glass display-case currently in the halls of GOPA. In addition below, there is an image of the writing strips in a box that is already to use for the upcoming installation

Professor Samaras will be also developing this project with her Art Methods WPU students who are both pre- and in-service teachers in the Education Department there this spring. These students will not only be asked to make a "Three-D Art Praxis Zentangle" but will also carefully reflect on the learning outcomes and goals of such an art project.

Thursday, February 13, 2014

Students create Sunflowers and Colanders mural

Last night I taught graduate students at William Paterson University/WPU who are in-service elementary and early childhood teachers. The title of the class is "Creativity and Play" and I co-teach this class with Dr. Janis Strasser from WPU. The topic was "observational drawing", a topic that often frightens students, as observational drawing has a very bad rap for very good reason! However these students triumphed over their own hesitations and created an amazing mural which is now hanging in the halls of WPU. I look forward to hearing their comments as to the meaning of this piece in the coming week. Triada

Sunday, February 9, 2014

More Student Text Art

The text art works below are created in my Fine Arts Foundation Class at Kean University. These are non-art majors: their majors include criminal justice, biology, occupational therapy and many others. I love to see my students' choices of figures as well as the words they select as well as where they choose to place these words. Often students choose figures from popular culture; sometimes they do a self-portrait.

As I wrote earlier, LINK many people are surprised to find that undergraduate, non-art majors in a university can create compelling art works. For me, it is a no-brainer. I have always believed that, “Art is not the possession of the few who are recognized writers, painters, musicians; it is the authentic expression of any and all individuality” (Dewey p. 109). For more text art work see LINK . Triada

Saturday, February 8, 2014

A page from the journal of Triada Samaras

I love the unexpected image that is sometimes created when I am shooting photographs. This image of the World Trade Center area from the West Side Highway southbound was shot with my cell phone, an i phone 5. Besides adding a little definition to this image, I made no other changes or alterations: no filters; no tints, no nothing. I am convinced every camera has an intelligence all its own.

Student 2-D and 3-D Line Work

These works are created by stundets in my Art Foundations Class at Kean University. As I have mentioned before they are not art majors. In these pieces, they are working on the element of line in 2-D then line and text in 3-D. The addition of the text in the 3-D exercises complicates the problem of communication for these students and makes it necessary for them to think and implement creatively. Triada

Student Self Portraits

These student works are from my Art Foundations Class at Kean University where I teach studio art to non-art majors. I am always so interested by how the students choose to express themselves when it comes to their self-portraits. Don't they all tell fascinating stories without words? Triada