1: Intro, 2: Plots, 3: Articles, 4: Plant List, 5: Ideas/Donate, 6: Notes, 7: Art April 2007 - May 2007 Show at CHAOS glassworks SUMMER 2008 ON - PERMANENT ROTATING DISPLAY at the Public Library on Main St., Plymouth. 50% or more from each piece will go to gardens. Go there, get the contact info, buy one. Check out a book, too. The Glassworks is located just one block north of downtown (around the bend and behind the gas station) 121 A Hanford Street (Highway 49.) Come visit a working hot glass studio in a mid-1800 stone granary and brewery. Watch the glass blower transform molten glass into works of art. Hours: Wed-Fri Noon to 7; Sat 10-7, Sun 10-6; other times by appointment. Mailing Address: P.O. Box 806 Sutter Creek, CA 95685; Phone: (209) 267-9317 Website: www.chaosglassworks.com Read a Ledger-Dispatch article on their shop. Read another article. Donations to Plymouth Elementary School Gardens are tax deductible to the fullest extent allowed by law. Write check to Amador Community Foundation and note in the lower left corner "Plymouth Elementary School Gardens Fund" and send to ACF at P.O. Box 1154, Jackson, CA 95642. Title of Artwork <click>, Date, Medium, Dimensions (B, H, W) Piece # Codes* Progress Meaning, Notes . . . *Codes: E = painted to edge, W = wraps around 4 edges of canvas - not to be framed - like this, L = labelled w/ name or titles directly on image, B = Painted black on 4 sides, Op = optical illusion. (Click titles to see larger versions of thumbs, etc.) Artist Biography, Meaning of Pieces, and the Butterfly Garden I attended school throughout my youth in Amador County. I graduated from CSU, Chico with a bachelor degree in Arts Marketing and minors in Management of Human Resources and Business Administration. At the time I attended college, we were lucky enough to have a University President (Manuel Esteban) who was a glass blower from a long heritage of glass artists. The ceramics, glass, and computer design and animation programs there were huge influences on my artwork. Many of my friends and I developed new courses at CSU, Chico searching out the links between artistry, the human form and experience (i.e. architecture) and the cold math and rich languages of computers. I remember that altering the skins of objects so they wouldn't pass through each other in an animation - like a curtain brushing up against the wall instead of through it - was a long night or two of work sometimes. 35% of the total sale price of many pieces in the show will benefit the Plymouth Elementary School Gardens. Especially the butterfly garden portion. And I'll probably donate on more than just the listed pieces. Readers are invited to attend the PEP Club fundraiser for the butterfly garden shade pavilion on April 21 (there will be a display for this show.) And of course, attendees of that fundraiser are invited to visit Chaos Glassworks in Sutter Creek during April and May 2007. The gardens help with the continuous agricultural education of children in Amador County, so they may be inspired to search out more knowledge at the univerisity levels for future life experiences. I have recently been reading books on optical illusions. There are many categories of illusions, and many are based on mathematical patterns and imperfect extrapolations from said patterns. The images hanging in the show exhibit some classic examples rendered a little differently. These are pretty simple illusions, but some of them I've chosen to "break" by painting their colors a bit off or by bending a side of the "impossible object" around a corner of the canvas so it is not quite square to the eye any more. "Cube in Broken Cube" looks like an abandoned warehouse, muddied by time and spacial manipulation. "Stacked Trapezoids" has a hidden obelisk to the viewer left with a white point and green and yellow sides. Wlaking to one right, the obelisk falls and a new distortion makes the trap lay on the ground. Below the trap is a broken bar that leads into the "Three Twin Broken Bars  & Aquatic Illusion." This piece distorts the same illusion three times, and must be viewed from all angles. "Three Twin" also has the simple illusion of the merperson and the fish (whose is the tail?) "Stretched Circles" tests the viewer resolve to center the image on the canvas. The two "spheroid" pieces are based on pastel pieces from about five years ago that are posted on my website. The red, yellow, and blue background on one of the pastels influenced the "Rising Spheroid" piece. Spheroids also appear on two plantery themed pieces in the group of sixteen paintings that I am creating for my daughter bedroom. These spheroids look suspiciously like olives, but move like gaseous bubbles in space. Their oblong shape gives away the direction they're floating through the chaotic chemical clouds that is their landscape (airscape?) Another group of images are interpretations of rock walls that I've built. The rocks in this geographic region are generally decomposed granite, quartz, greenstone, slate and others. Many of these rocks weigh over a hundred pounds. Levers and front end loaders make it a bit easier to build sometimes. Some of the paint on these images is a half inch thick. Sand, chalk, pastel, ashes and other textures are mixed in with the acrylic paint to give each rock individual characteristics. The largest image in the show, "Zin Trio", the three leaf composite will hopefully raise the most money for the butterfly garden. It should look nice in that generous person house. This piece can be framed, but the black colors are painted around the four sides anyway. Pay attention to the swoops of color detailing the leaf in the bottom right. "Black Green Orange Abstract of Flight" shows figures rushing up faster than their pigment can carry them. The spraypainted background on this and other pieces gives a nice ethereal atmosphere. A light absorbing black mist instead of clear watery fog. The "Effigies" painting lends a feel of emotional balance with its forced black ground in a greener environ. "Copper Curves" has the most liquid of the black environments with its subjects wholly part of the background. "Gray Plains" and "Black Through Yellow" add a nice piercing yellow light to the feel. "At the Diner" (my favorite piece) utilizes inverted outlines against golds, grays, and blacks. The "Swamp Thing" portrait was made using only paint scraps dried in jars. "Sun" is a one happy fat sun from many dozens of sun symbols in my sketchbook. The "Study with White Squares" is an abstract pole on a field. There are some humorous and some serious pieces. "Law and Order Marathon" shows a suited figure giving the "A-Okay" symbol with a giant red hand that replaced its head. "Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament" shows what could either be the peace symbol used as a tuning fork or radio tower or the peace symbol targeted by the viewer scope. The following text is taken from cnduk.org - where one may read the full origin of the peace symbol at the "C.N.D." Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament website. "Gerald Holtom, a conscientious objector who had worked on a farm in Norfolk during the Second World War, explained that the symbol incorporated the semaphore letters N(uclear) and D(isarmament). I drew myself: the representative of an individual in despair, with hands palm outstretched outwards and downwards in the manner of Goya’s peasant before the firing squad. I formalised the drawing into a line and put a circle round it. " I'd like to thank everyone who attended the show and who visits online. The Right Hand Wall as You Enter the Gallery 5015, 5019 Click titles to see better. Centered (3 choices) or left (2) title is usually best view and medium size file. "Large" image means it probably 300K! Some descriptions of pieces are in other galleries on this website. Black Orange W* Z.T. at Show Large 1250 Zin Trio W, B* Large Z.T. 1250 pixels The Wall in Front 5006, 5007, 5011, 5005, 5012, 5002, 5010, 5003, 5008 Optical Illusion Wall W* Opti Wall 1250 Stretched, Falling Spheroids, Diner W* S, F. S., D 1250 C.N.D. Peace Symbol W* C.N.D. 1250 Trapezoids W* Trapezoids 1250 Rising Spheroids W* Rising Spheroids 1250 The Left Hand Wall 5013, 5014, 5001, 5022, 5021, 5020, 5018 Wall of Walls W, B* Wall of Walls 1250 Broken Cube W, L* Broken Cube 1250* I like the Pink piece - Tibetan Prayer Flags, Mistletoe, and Free Tibet (signed by Ed Ved of P.J.), hung near it at home. This piece is from the 16 Paintings for a. Gallery Gray Plains, Black Through Yellow, Spotted Pink W* G.P., B.T.Y, S.P. 1250 The Wall Behind 5023?, 5025, 5004 Abstract Pole, Angles, Broken Bars / Aquatic Illusion W* A.P., A, O, B.B. 1250 The Hall Wall 5017, 5009 Swamp Thing * Swamp Thing 1250 Sun W* Sun 1250 Mostly Correct List of Pieces in the Show 5001 - 5025 5001 Cube in Broken Cube $390 Acrylic Is it the back wall or an outcropping? 12 x 12 x 1.5 5002 Stacked Trapezoids, Fallen Obelisks $390 Acrylic Move right to left to see obelisk stand again. 12 x 12 x 1.5   5003 Impossible Frames with Parallel Bars & Totem $390 Acrylic Breaking the optical illusion with the colors. 12 x 12 x 1.5 5004 Three Twin Broken Bars  & Aquatic Illusion $390 Acrylic Feet or fins? Bars break differently as you move. 12 x 12 x 1.5   5005 Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament $390 Acrylic 10% of Sale Goes to C.N.D. 25% Sale to Garden 12 x 12 x 1.5   5006 Stretched Circles $390 Acrylic One is centered, another pulls it down. 12 x 12 x 1.5 5007 Falling (Ovals) Spheroids in Circles $390 Acrylic Chaotic space, loss of gravity. 12 x 12 x 1.5   5008 Rising (Ovals) Spheroids in Space $390 Acrylic Rising slowly in front of chemical clouds. 12 x 12 x 1.5   5009 Fat Old Sun $290 Acrylic Happy, healthy, hydrogen, helium. 12 x 12 x 1.5 5010 Copper Curves on Black $520 Acrylic, Ashes, Spraypaint Night space with metallinc leaves floating. 12 x 24 x .75   5011 At the Diner $790  Acrylic, Ashes Spraypaint A diner in the 2D world. 12 x 24 x .75   5012 Law and Order Marathon $390 Acrylic, Ashes, Spraypaint Everything a-okay, don't worry! 15 x 30 x .75  5013 Blue White Rock Wall $440 Acrylic, Ashes, Pastel, Spraypaint A rock wall the artist built. 30 x 15 x .75   5014 High Contrast Rock Wall $440 Acrylic, Sand 35% of Sale Goes to Garden. 30 x 15 x .75   5015 Black Green Orange Abstract of Flight $490 Acrylic, Spraypaint Rushing higher and higher. 15 x 30 x .75 5017 Swamp Thing $240 (after Breccia art) Acrylic Made solely with paint scraps. 12 x 16 x .75   5018 Large Rock Wall $990  Acrylic, Mixed 35% of Sale Goes to Garden. 48 x 30 x .75 5019 Zinfandel Leaf Trio $2150  Acrylic 35% of Sale Goes to Garden. 30 x 48 x .75   5020 Spotted Pink Study $175  Acrylic Resting in a bough of white. 5 x 5 x 1.5   5021 Black Through Yellow $125 Acrylic 35% of Sale Goes to Garden. 5 x 5 x 1.5 5022 Gray Plains $255 Acrylic Curling back showing light. 8 x 10 x .75 5023? "Study with White Squares" same price as "Gray Plains"   5025 Effigies on Angles $225  Acrylic Staying on the line. 12 x 10 x .75 Hello - Galleries - Plants Unless otherwise specified, all images, copy, and artwork contained within the michaelspinetta.com domain are copyright 1975-2006 Michael J. Spinetta. All rights reserved. Any form of publishing copyrighted material requires permission of the artist. Artist retains copyright after sale of artwork.