Color continues to thrive at Sedona Arts Center in an exhibition featuring Lyn and Ken Mikell, Susan Moody, Karen Puckett, Cheryl Waale, and Karl Williams. Vibrant ceramics, unique glassworks, and brilliant paintings will deck the walls and halls in the Arts Center’s Fine Art Gallery in Uptown, Sedona from now through December 31, 2018. Meet the artists and find your next collector’s piece, handmade ornaments or holiday gift at an opening reception on Friday, November 2 from 5 to 8pm.

Loving Bowls Fundraiser and Silent Auction is December 15! Over ten thousand bowls have been carefully crafted over the last 10 years by volunteer ceramicists and lovingly glazed to be sold within just a few hours in a single day. This year, the event takes place on December 15 from noon to 3pm and will benefit the Sedona Food Bank, Sedona Community Center, Humane Society of Sedona and the arts and educational programs at Sedona Arts Center.

What’s new this year is an expanded silent auction which will feature beautiful fine art paintings, ceramics, gift vouchers for local spas, hotels, and so much more. There will be two preview nights for this year’s silent auction, first on December 7 and then again on December 12, giving patrons a chance to bid early or even take their favorite piece home at the buy-it-now price.

“Our expanded Silent Auction with the Loving Bowls event this year is a reflection of the diversity of support for this event,” says Executive Director Vince Fazio, “Gift baskets, gift certificates, paintings, sculpture, jewelry and other unique objects combine to create over $20,000.00 of retail value donated from the local community of businesses and artists. The Silent Auction is a fun way to support all the non-profits that are involved”

Visit Sedona Arts Center at Noon on Saturday, December 15 for chili, desert, community fellowship and a veritable medley of ceramic goodness and a thousand beautiful objects waiting to find a new home! The event only lasts for three hours, so arrive early, bring cash or credit card, select an armful (or box full) of gifts and unique items and support our 2018 Loving Bowls!

Plus! Don’t miss the Fiber Artist’s Trunk Show December 17 to 21, 2018! A fabulous group of fiber artists have come together to create a special exhibition and sale of wearable art at the Sedona Arts Center. The Fiber Artist’s Trunk Show features 14 artists that create beautiful one-of-a-kind handmade works. Among the works are knitted, felted, woven and handspun works resulting in a variety of scarves, shawls and hats including sparkly holiday and party wear. Bookmarks and ornaments are also featured. Fiber artists start with the most basic of materials often hand-dying and hand-making the fabric itself.

The Verde Valley Sanctuary will receive 10% of all sales from this special trunk show. Attend the opening reception on Monday December 17 from 5 to 7pm to enjoy food, wine and first choice from the collection. The Arts Center galleries will feature trunks and mirrors and the artists themselves will be modeling some of the items. You can buy the works right off their backs!

Participating Trunk Show Artists: Izzy Simmer, Nancy Black, Patty Boldenow, Marci Lebowitz, Janet Klebe, Nancy Bollard, Lucie Giebelhaus, Shelly Schmaltz, Cathy Davies-Sloan, Chris Guenther, Debra Baker, Sandra Blatnic, Caroline Giberti, Jill Suydan and Molly Shuvani.

Fine Art Gallery December Featured Artists:

Lyn and Ken Mikell bring their newly created collaborative raku and hand-painted ceramics with designs of birds, flowers, Native motifs and festive holiday designs. Susan Moody, a well-known and talented local glass artist shares a fresh arrangement of functional mirrors, bowls and coasters. Karl Williams expresses his amazing skills by combining metal with glazed ceramics using owls as his newest character in a long line of expressive works. Cheryl Waale’s horses, birds and trees will captivate you. And Karen Puckett shares all new jewelry designs in fused glass.

About this month’s featured artists:

Lyn & Ken Mikell

A combination of talents come together to create the hand-painted raku vessels the Mikell’s are known for. Ken began his career as a ceramic artist in the early 80’s. His studies introduced him to the raku process of firing to achieve the smoky beauty of the bare clay. Ken does most of the wheel-throwing, while Lyn creates the surface designs inspired by the Arizona landscape they both love. After the firing process is finished, Lyn paints each unique vessel. Together their vessels have developed and grown into amazing works of art.

“We make music and pottery,” say Lyn and Ken Mikell, “Music is ephemeral, and lives in the memories of the audience. Clay pots, however, are some of the oldest articles of civilization. We find a sense of balance in combining the two arts.”

Susan Moody

After a longtime career in banking in the Midwest, Susan discovered her artistic calling at the Sedona Arts Center when she enrolled over ten years ago in and “Outdoor Mosaics” workshop. The creative door swung open as she continued to further her education with a series of workshops on mosaics and kiln formed glass. There was no turning back!

Susan has studied with many nationally known glass teaching artists around the country in order to fully understand the glass fusing and kiln forming processes. She strives continually to explore and experiment with glass and to push the limits of this fascinating medium. The endless possibilities of color combinations and glass layering continue to inspire her to this day. Susan’s glass creations are truly one of a kind.

Karen Puckett

Karen Puckett, a visual artist, loves playing with light, color, heat and glass. These are the elements that help to create light transmission through translucent forms. Over the years she has developed and refined many of her own techniques involving color combinations, glass combinations, hot-glass manipulation, custom findings, wire wrapping, wire embedding, grinding, and fire polishing. All this gives her jewelry creations their unique look and feel. Happily tucked away in her art glass studio in Sedona, Arizona, Karen’s exceptional jewelry creations are a gem in the desert.

Cheryl Waale

Paintings with a fresh perspective are Cheryl Waale’s niche. As she was transitioning from the corporate world, Waale returned to her lifelong love of paint and she hasn’t looked back.

“When I go to art festivals or galleries, I always look for something fresh and different. I knew from the start I wanted to create paintings that caused you to stop and look,” says Waale. From horses to figurative to organic—Cheryl is inspired to use layers to create on canvas the vision she has in her mind.

Through independent study with artists she admires, excellent coaching, fearless experimentation and plenty of brush mileage, she has developed a truly recognizable style—turning ordinary subjects into extra-ordinary works which offer many layers of color and texture. Her art is in private collections throughout North America and Europe. She is represented by galleries in Arizona, Oregon and Washington.

Karl Williams

Williams’ latest sculptures have an artistic style where he seeks to depict emotions and responses that his pieces arouse within a person rather than objective reality. This is accomplished through vivid use of glazes and dynamic application of copper, leather and cane. The combination of these embodies his spontaneous self-expression of what he creates.

Instead of relying only on the basic methods of carving and molding, Williams takes advantage of the complete freedom of using materials with which he is skilled in order to achieve maximum impact on each piece thus sacrificing representation of accuracy while allowing his inner passion to be expressed.

From youth to present day, it is the combination of the natural elements of wood, glass, stone, steel, copper, cane and clay with which Karl uses to fully express the passion and inspiration he receives from nature. His daily walks inspire his deepest passions which are reflected in all his work. 

Sedona Arts Center is one of Northern Arizona’s most well-established cultural organizations and serves as the creative heart of Sedona. Founded in 1958, the nonprofit organization is based at the Art Barn in Uptown and offers year-round classes, exhibitions, festivals, and cultural events that enhance the creative life of the Verde Valley. The Center’s Fine Art Gallery, open daily from 10am to 5pm, promotes the original works of over 100 local artists and regularly offers special assistance for collectors and art buyers, offers private studio visits, and fosters hundreds of arts education opportunities each year. For more information, call the Gallery at 928-282-3865, the Administrative offices at 928-282-3809 or visit us online at SedonaArtsCenter.org.