Antelopes on Parade
In many cities around the world, summertime brings an assortment of strange visitors into the streets. Purple cats, plaid catfish and mirrored mushrooms all come out to bring an element of color and whimsy to the hot summer days. It started with cows. In 1999, the city of Chicago was overrun with colorful, life-sized statues of cows that seemingly roamed the streets of the city. When they arrived their appearance was only a dull white, but when they made their public debut, their coats were exploding with design and color. They delighted the residents and visitors of the city of Chicago and the concept took off. Now cities all over the world host parades of animals, fruits, objects, symbols whatever represents them best as a community.
The City of Lancaster, the Lancaster Museum/Art Gallery, and the Lancaster Museum/Art Gallery Associates are implementing the second year of this exciting public art project for the community of the Antelope Valley. Five fiberglass antelopes will be designed and created by local artists, unveiled at the California Poppy Festival™ and then installed in prominent public locations throughout the summer. Symbolic of the history of the Antelope Valley, the antelopes will also combine the unique artistry of local artists, partnership with community sponsors and public display venues throughout town to inspire and reflect the spirit of pride, partnership and collaboration that art can build in our area.
These antelopes, each sponsored through generous donations, will preside over different areas of the Poppy Festival grounds at Lancaster City Park on April 24th and 25th. But their work is not done when the Poppy Festival ends. They will spend the summer in public and semi-public locations in downtown Lancaster for all residents and visitors to enjoy. When they have soaked up enough of the summer sun, the antelopes will then travel to The Lancaster Museum/Art Gallery Associates fundraising event where they will be auctioned off to raise funds that will help the museum to bring quality exhibitions and programs to the citizens of Lancaster and residents of the Antelope Valley.
The City of Lancaster and the Lancaster Museum/Art Gallery Associates wish to express their deepest gratitude to the 2010 Antelopes on Parade sponsors for their support of this community and public art program:
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The BLVD |
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Antelope Valley Harley Davidson |
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High Desert Medical Group |
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Lancaster Honda |
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Waste Management |
The five artists for the 2010 herd of Antelopes are:
Donna Weil
Donna Weil was born in Washington D.C. in 1945. After the war her family moved back to Southern California where she lived in the San Fernando Valley, attended North Hollywood High, Los Angeles Valley College, and, after moving to Del Mar, attended the Interior Design Guild of San Diego. She has three children, four grandchildren, a beautiful home in the mountains that she shares with her talented roommate, and a flock of animals.
Donna's art career began in the first grade, when her teacher and the principal of Fair Avenue School, called her parents to discuss the possibility of her receiving professional training. Luckily she was introduced to a gang of artists by her neighbor, James Mastropietro, a noted watercolorist. They set her up with paints and an easel, and the rest is history.
Anyone who has seen Donna's paintings knows her love of the "West" and vibrant color. This is attributed to her great-grandfather, Buffalo Bill Runcorn, who helped settle the Badlands of North Dakota and her childhood neighbor, Nudie, the Rodeo Tailor. Nudie would invite the neighborhood kids over to his shop to meet and visit with the "movie cowboys" and Donna would love to jump into his trash and collect colorful leather to make collages and doll furniture, the true start of her art career. A recipient of numerous awards, Donna's art has been in galleries in London, Beverly Hills, Pavo Real, Lake Hughes, Lancaster, Wrightwood, Santa Clarita, and Tehachapi.
Donna has served as the primary muralist for schools in El Segundo, CA and Ventura, CA. Her murals are in homes throughout Southern California. She is creator of "Weilones", home portraits, collected world-wide, and her new addition, "Dakota Millie's Western Funky" art collection.
Kris Holladay-Fregoso
"Anything that doesn't move on its own is fair game to sew down," said fiber artist Paula Reid, an inspiration to Kris Holladay in the mid 1990s before she received her Master's in Sculpture at CSUN in 2002. Kris applied Reid's lesson when she completed a series of assemblages using broken mirror, metal, plates, musical instruments, jewelry, and paint.
Last year, when the Antelopes on Parade first started, Kris immediately envisioned an antelope covered with a mosaic design that included mirrors on the antlers, but ended up completing a more traditional and practical antelope by painting Joshua trees on it. This year she was chosen to do another antelope, and could not have been more thrilled to execute her assemblage concept.
The seeds of inspiration for Kris' assemblages come from the remains of her grandparents' estate once the auctioneers had cleared out their house. At the time Kris was in high school casting metal, and her father thought she could use the bits and pieces of metal for her artworks. While much of what her father gave her was plated and not appropriate for melting, it held stories of the past from when her grandfather served in WW II, and after the war when he traveled to and fro living in various countries with his family. Chains, medals, broken jewelry, teeth, and other miscellaneous bits and pieces that were left behind, held meaning for Kris.
Kris and her husband live in a remote, beautiful, peaceful and inspiring area of Rosamond called Willow Springs. Currently, her days are spent working with students at R. Rex Parris High School, while in the evenings and weekends she is free to work in her studio on her paintings and assemblages/mosaics.
Kierstyn Swann
Kiersytn Swann was born and raised in Santa Clarita by her professional artist father, Jeff, and her amateur artist mother, Wendee. She moved to the Antelope Valley at the age of seven, and has been homeschooled since kindergarten. Now 16, Kierstyn attends Grace Chapel in Lancaster, where she performs in the hand bell choir.
Kierstyn's inspiration for her antelope design came from a whim. She wanted to make something educational and patriotic; something that would encourage people to learn about their heritage, as well as discover the history around them. The image in her mind came to life on the blank canvas of the antelope and she is very happy with the finished product. Her favorite part of the antelope is the color. She found that it was fun painting, trying to mix the right colors, and is pleased about how the antelope shines in the sun.
In addition to painting, Kierstyn's other hobbies include costuming, reading, sewing, comic books and manga, Facebooking, fan art, being macabre, sculpting, web design and Urban Ninjitsu. She hopes one day to be an accomplished artist and to visit an old plantation house with her father.
Mike Mullich
Mike Mullich was born and raised in Burbank, California and moved to Lancaster in August of 1971 where he worked with Lockheed Aircraft Company for thirty three years; mostly in Quality Assurance. He has had artistic hobbies all his life founding "Mullich's Stained Glass" in 1994, and retiring from Lockheed in 1999.
With over thirty years of experience in the craft, he not only designs and makes various stained glass products, but also teaches the art and holds "shop sessions" every week where clients can work on small projects and hone their craft. People can also buy supplies and tools, and refer to the extensive reference library in his studio for design ideas.
Mike and his wife are involved in various charities, particularly the Knights of Columbus and Mount Carmel in the Desert (Lake Los Angeles). He decided to apply for Antelopes on Parade after seeing an antelope on display last year at the Lemon Leaf Cafe. Mike loves a good "challenge" and thought it would be a unique way to promote stained glass in the valley.
Cecily Willis
Cecily Willis grew up in the Fairfax/Hollywood area of Los Angeles, and later lived in South Pasadena before she settled in the Santa Clarita Valley. She received her MFA in Painting from the Otis Art Institute and has been a professional artist for over 40 years in the fields of textile design, fashion illustration, and newspaper and corporate graphic design. She is proud to say that she was an advertising artist for the Los Angeles Times during that newspaper's heyday. She is now retired, living in Newhall, California and devoting all of her free time to painting.
Cecily is very grateful for her commercial art background and hopes that she conveys the same kind of commitment, devotion and integrity in her own personal work that she gave to her commercial art clients.
She attended Otis in the '60s-a very exciting time to be in art school. It was the great era of shaped canvasses, hard-edge painting, and performance, conceptual, and installation art. However, Cecily went through school just wanting to paint and draw realistically. She was always asked when she was finally going to "break free" & "really express herself"-through abstract art. After over 40 years, Cecily still finds realistic portraiture to be the best way in which she can really express herself.
Edgar Degas said that "Art is not what you see, but what you make others see."Cecily loves when people relate to her art-when they see the same things that she sees or something entirely different. She loves that she is a citizen of this world-that she is not "terminally unique."She considers her paintings a success when they can erase the boundaries that separate her from her fellow man.
