Tom Pfannerstill

Bucket of Champagne

Carlos Gamez de Francisco was born in post-revolutionary Cuba in 1987 to a Cuban- Spanish mother and a Cuban-American father. He grew up in Cuba and was educated in an academic style heavily influenced by the Russian Academy. At age five, he determined, with absolute certainty, that he would be an artist. By the time he was 15, Francisco was diligently painting eight hours a day. Today, he often spends 15 hours a day painting and feels "very blessed" to do what he loves. Francisco arrived in the United States at 21 with $650 and knew no English. He spent $600 on art supplies and $50 on a pair of Cortez running shoes – just like the ones Forrest Gump...

Carlos Gamez de Francisco was born in post-revolutionary Cuba in 1987 to a Cuban- Spanish mother and a Cuban-American father. He grew up in Cuba and was educated in an academic style heavily influenced by the Russian Academy. At age five, he determined, with absolute certainty, that he would be an artist. By the time he was 15, Francisco was diligently painting eight hours a day. Today, he often spends 15 hours a day painting and feels "very blessed" to do what he loves. Francisco arrived in the United States at 21 with $650 and knew no English. He spent $600 on art supplies and $50 on a pair of Cortez running shoes – just like the ones Forrest Gump...

"High Expectations III" displays a female figure wearing a purple and pink Victorian style dress. The women’s figure has a bundle of beautiful, vibrant flowers placed on her head. Th...

Carlos Gamez de Francisco was born in post-revolutionary Cuba in 1987 to a Cuban- Spanish mother and a Cuban-American father. He grew up in Cuba and was educated in an academic style heavily influenced by the Russian Academy. At age five, he determined, with absolute certainty, that he would be an artist. By the time he was 15, Francisco was diligently painting eight hours a day. Today, he often spends 15 hours a day painting and feels "very blessed" to do what he loves. Francisco arrived in the United States at 21 with $650 and knew no English. He spent $600 on art supplies and $50 on a pair of Cortez running shoes – just like the ones Forrest Gump...

Carlos Gamez de Francisco was born in post-revolutionary Cuba in 1987 to a Cuban- Spanish mother and a Cuban-American father. He grew up in Cuba and was educated in an academic style heavily influenced by the Russian Academy. At age five, he determined, with absolute certainty, that he would be an artist. By the time he was 15, Francisco was diligently painting eight hours a day. Today, he often spends 15 hours a day painting and feels "very blessed" to do what he loves. Francisco arrived in the United States at 21 with $650 and knew no English. He spent $600 on art supplies and $50 on a pair of Cortez running shoes – just like the ones Forrest Gump...

Carlos Gamez de Francisco was born in post-revolutionary Cuba in 1987 to a Cuban- Spanish mother and a Cuban-American father. He grew up in Cuba and was educated in an academic style heavily influenced by the Russian Academy. At age five, he determined, with absolute certainty, that he would be an artist. By the time he was 15, Francisco was diligently painting eight hours a day. Today, he often spends 15 hours a day painting and feels "very blessed" to do what he loves. Francisco arrived in the United States at 21 with $650 and knew no English. He spent $600 on art supplies and $50 on a pair of Cortez running shoes...

India ink, arches watercolor paper, embroidery thread, foam core

Aquatint and watercolor collage by Jenny Toth, mixed media artist, professor, graduate of Yale School of Art

Abstract. Philosophical. Colorful. This started with the joy of blue like water and sky. More layers later, green more like water, ponds, lakes and rivers showed up. Next came blob...

The art of Philip Wittmann is founded on signals. For him, signs serve as a bridge between abstraction, reality and writing, too. When he was 26 years ...

The art of Philip Wittmann is founded on signals. For him, signs serve as a bridge between abstraction, reality and writing, too. When he was 26 years old, he began painting as a hobbyist using 'pure' abstraction. However, he believed his work lacked a solid foundation upon which to grow. ​He discovered a book on the origins of the Chinese alphabet, which origins are essentially signs, in 2008 while taking a calligraphy class. The 26 letters of our Latin alphabet are less pictorial than the Chinese characters as we know them now. He discovered that pictorial representation is more prevalent when examining the origins of alphabets—all alphabets, in fact—because there is frequently a similarity between the sign's true meaning and what it is meant to represent. For instance, the symbol for a turtle in the original Chinese script resembles a turtle. Wittmann loves signs as they leave room for interpretation. For instance, if one writes “the sky is blue”, one will make for themself a mental representation of a blue sky, even if each one-off us will probably have some nuance in our own mental representation of that blue sky. On the other hand, a sign can...

The art of Philip Wittmann is founded on signals. For him, signs serve as a bridge between abstraction, reality and writing, too. When he was 26 years old, he began painting as a hobbyist using 'pure' abstraction. However, he believed his work lacked a solid foundation upon which to grow. ​He discovered a book on the origins of the Chinese alphabet, which origins are essentially signs, in 2008 while taking a calligraphy class. The 26 letters of our Latin alphabet are less pictorial than the Chinese characters as we know them now. He discovered that pictorial representation is more prevalent when examining the origins of alphabets—all alphabets, in fact—because there is frequently a similarity between the sign's true meaning and what it is meant to represent. For instance, the symbol for a turtle in the original Chinese script resembles a turtle. Wittmann loves signs as they leave room for interpretation. For instance, if one writes “the sky is blue”, one will make for themself a mental representation of a blue sky, even if each one-off us will probably have some nuance in our own mental representation of that blue sky. On the other hand, a sign can...