Wailoa Center now accepting entries for Abstract Only!

Wailoa Center is proud to present the 2018 Abstract Only! annual exhibit sponsored by the Hawaii Island Art Alliance.

Open to all residents in the state, artists are encouraged to enter this year’s juried exhibit by entering online through CaFÉ at www.callforentry.org. The deadline for entry is 7:59 p.m. July 13.

There is a maximum of five entries per artist and all media in 2-D and 3-D arts are accepted.

Hawaii Island Art Alliance on behalf of the Abstract Only! exhibit applied for the state Foundation for Culture and Arts Acquisition Award Selection Committee to review the exhibit.

The juror for this year’s exhibit is Patrick Michael O’Kiersey, a nationally known abstract painter who lives in Ahualoa.

O’Kiersey who was born in Chicago, says: “The beginning of inspiration for my work is nature. I need to spend time in the natural world to draw and later to extend my experience in the studio. I am inspired by 20th century Americans such as Charles Burchfield, Milton Avery, David Park, Jackson Pollock and Robert Irwin.

“My charcoal drawings are often finished works and for many years were also used as starting points for paintings. Gradually this relationship has become less specific, though still essential to my process. For the past 25 years, I have embraced abstraction. I studied under Jay DeFeo in graduate school at Mills College in Oakland. The energy surrounding the Ferus Gallery of 1950’s Los Angeles has been important to me.

“Like the first generation of the New York School, I want to break the frame. That is, to rescue the work from its place on the wall and thus to bring it closer to the viewer in psychic terms. I see nature not as an abstraction. We are part of nature.”

For additional information about how to enter the Abstract Only! exhibit, call the Wailoa Center at 933-0416 or email wailoa@yahoo.com.