Sager Takes Best of Show in "Bits and Pieces"

The Factory Tree by Rachel Sager (Export, PA)

  33.5" x 22"  Smalti, gold smalti, marble, industrial gears, wood

Best of Show

From Mount Sterling, KY comes the news that Rachel Sager's work The Factory Tree has been named Best of Show in the Gateway Regional Arts Center's "Bits and Pieces" mosaic exhibit.  The show runs from January 4th through January 31st.

From Sager's website:

"With The Factory Tree I continue to explore where nature and industry meet. The tenacity of a tree growing and twisting itself around a steel beam or an abandoned factory being slowly camouflaged by saplings were images that kept returning to me as I created this piece. The inexorable push of life, especially under duress, inspires me to think in geologic time. Where others may see destruction and loss at the thought of one life-force overtaking another, I see a grace and a beauty in this struggle.


The Factory Tree has been engulfed by metal, but that has not destroyed it. On the contrary, it has transformed itself into something very different."

Juror Sherri Warner Hunter gave Honorable Mentions to two additional artists.

Waiting  by Shawn Newton (Wallingford, CT)

 32" x 19"  Stained glass

Honorable Mention

Journey by Linda Mix Yates (St. Paul, MN)

4 Panels, each 21" x 21"
Ceramic stained glass, smalti, glass gems.

Honorable Mention

Warner Hunter is one of the US mosaic community's most beloved artists, authors and teachers.  She specializes in large-scale three dimensional works built on concrete substructures.  

Photo from www.sherriwarnerhunter.com

Warner Hunter gave a one-hour interview to the local National Public Radio station and Opening Nighters enjoyed her eye-opening Gallery Talk.   12 artists from the US and The Netherlands are featured.  Terri Pulley, Visual Arts Director at the Gateway, tells us the exhibit is already judged a huge success with several of the pieces already sold.

Enjoy -- Nancie

More:

"Bits and Pieces" at the Gateway Regional Arts Center
January 4 - 31
Tuesday-Friday 10:30 - 5:00;  Saturday 11:30 - 4:30
101 East Main Street
Mount Sterling, KY 40353
(859) 498-6264

Rachel Sager:  www.rachelsagermosaics.com
Shawn Newton:  www.bitbybitmosaics.com
Linda Mix Yates:  www.lindamixyates.com
Sherri Warner Hunter:  www.sherriwarnerhunter.com

All photographs courtesy of the artist unless otherwise noted.