"These bugs and birds have always inhabited my work, even after I began to produce nonrepresentational 
		paintings and installation art almost 20 years ago. These mixed-media works depicting oversized insects 
		and birds explore the intervals between fiction and fact, irony and literalness, the social and the private 
		through the use of bees, wasps, ants, and birds as metaphors for identity, class, and power. The Tagalog 
		word "Samantala" has a dual meaning: the adverb "meantime" or "meanwhile" and the noun "abuse." 
		Despite their symbolic prowess and beauty, the subjects depicted here are captives of their own bodies 
		and environment. In addition, the social structure of these animals display some similarities to the dilemmas 
		of mankind. Like the insects, we're still, lamentably, colonized in many ways.

		Acrylic or resin, sand, troweled cement, and occasionally, beeswax were used to create these works.

		The paintings in this show can be read in many ways, but so far, I'm having fun with them." 

		MARIANO DEL ROSARIO, 1999

      		"Initially my work emphasized social commentary on an image-conscious culture in which women are 
		engaged in a preoccupation with physical appearance, fleeting youth, and fear of aging. Throughout the 
		years the women portrayed in my work have reflected my feelings, fears, and coming to terms. Women 
		have been the obvious subject matter in my paintings.

		Equally important, light has been and remains a subject of my work. I am fascinated with the ability of 
		light to evoke a sense of time, place and memory. I have chosen the light of the California outdoors and 
		of the tropics because of the particular intensity. Also, my attraction to poolside settings stems from 
		childhood memories of summer afternoons at my Grandmas pool where I only briefly glimpsed a sense 
		of joy and security.

		Stylistically my obsession with precision and minute detail reveals my life-long tendencies…  I grew up 
		with the magical notion that if I could make something look "really real" it would "come true."  I am still 
		creating an ideal world in my paintings.

		Ironically these images can not exist in physical reality as they are highly contrived composites of many 
		real or imagined sources. I go about constructing each new image as though I am making a film. I select 
		models, wardrobe changes, locations, and props. For the photo sessions I devise scenarios for my 
		models so they can project what I envision. With the resulting photos I add, re-arrange, delete, and 
		make-up information, indeed, whatever it takes to achieve a strong composition and create a picture 
		which conveys my current and evolving concerns.

		As I have grown my work has evolved in a careful and subtle fashion. The women are beginning to 
		express a sense of calm and they are less confrontational. Other objects and elements are entering my 
		work and gaining greater presence. A more gentle, playful, and joyous atmosphere is developing.

		I like to think that my work is now a personal commentary -- perhaps a visual diary of my journey towards 
		maturity and self-acceptance."

		D. J. HALL, 1999

		"Composition offers the most varied range of possibility for abstract painting, allowing the artist to 
		explore beyond mere decorative concerns. I use composition in the process of self-realization and in 
		turn, to express my understanding of humanity.

		I am most interested in composing around and about the white space of the canvas. This white space 
		is most sensuous and evocative to me, when it is left pure, unencumbered by texture or repetitive 
		markings. The white space is dynamic, expressing my inner "light" or my feeling for space. It is the 
		mysterious, ever-fluctuating space of the mind with its past and present. The wide expanse we so desire 
		to embrace and the knowledge of boundaries, which experience brings.

		This inner light or space is made plastic through the choreography of grid-like elements, each of which 
		originate intuitively and possess their own attitude, rhythm or force. The space becomes elastic - 
		expanding and contracting, embracing and emancipating the painted or drawn elements which in turn 
		shape it. Elements dissolve and step forward; grids loosen, then tighten; notes run and then slow in 
		suspension.

		The paintings have an emotional, intuitive foundation upon which a minimal number of primary forms 
		and colors are organized. The works acquire soul when they achieve what Le Corbusier termed a state 
		of "mathematical lyricism", wherein the architecture of the painting delivers an expression of the artist's 
		light."

		ELENORE WEBER, 1999
		White Light series

		"The pictures, for which this statement is written, are topographical views of Brooklyn's Gowanus Canal, 
		the divisional canals between Brooklyn and Queens, and the neighborhoods that border them. These 
		areas are isolated and tend to have a long history of industry and manufacturing of one kind or another. 
		This type of landscape, taking into account regional differences, can easily be seen in any number of 
		places across the Northeastern and Central United States, also known by the pejorative "Rust Belt."

		The "Canalscapes" suggest through their layering and overlapping of debris and accumulated rubble a 
		visual record of time past and present. What it is today is indistinguishable from what it was in the past 
		and the remains of years past stand silently mocking the canal of today. This synthesis of histories is 
		what makes the Gowanus unique.

		The Gowanus canal by virtue of its isolation seems to determine its own direction and fate. This same 
		isolation creates a menacingly alien landscape. But the inherent beauty of reflected light and local color 
		coupled with a quiet stillness that permeates everything, creates a unique environment of both inspiration 
		and melancholy."

		RANDY DUDLEY, 1999

		Peter Saari's recent work is inspired by his visits to the Catacombs located just outside of Rome. 
		Some of the paintings are named after the ancient streets where the entrances to the Catacombs are 
		located and others are named after the Catacombs.

		The arched niches or arcosolia are forms that can be seen in some of the cubiculi or small painted 
		rooms located off the maze of corridors that constitute the subterranean "architecture" of these places.

		The painting entitled "Paleochora" is named after a deserted mountain village on the Greek island of 
		Ithaca. The village possesses a number of Byzantine era frescos in a terrible state of decline.

		PETER SAARI, 1999

		"My interest in industrial imagery is completely aesthetic as I have almost no practical experience in 
		any of the technical fields from which my work is derived. It has been through my understanding of the 
		ceramic medium and its inherent limitlessness that I have been able to invent my own technology to suit 
		my sculptural needs. My current work is a synthesis of conventional clay processes such as press-molding, 
		hand-building, and wheel-throwing, fired at low temperature and painted to suggest the passage of time."

		STEVEN MONTGOMERY, 1999

		Shimon Okshteyn's hyper-real new black and white graphite drawings on canvas of such everyday 
		objects as freshly packaged pasta from Balducci's and a seventy-five watt light bulb are remarkable 
		for depicting both the object and the photograph of the object which serves as the formal subject of the 
		drawing. His handling of light in its encounter with transparency -  the glass of the bulb, the plastic of the 
		pasta package is particularly marvelous.

		These drawings are also highly autobiographical. The range of subjects Okshteyn has painted over the 
		years, from old hats and clothings, to out-of-date appliances, to high-class comestibles,  reveals his own 
		unfolding interaction with life in the United States after his years in the Soviet Union.

		Also included in the show are two very large sculptures in wood and metal, which depicts shoe lasts. 
		Like the drawings, the sculptures participate in a kind of chain of representation in which priority is given 
		not to the shoe but the last, not to the bulb but the photo. Like the drawings, they also have the strong 
		aura of a very private history about them.

		SHIMON OKSHTEYN, 1999

		"With my paintings, I present the naive simplicity and optimism of the 50's and early 60's. People viewing 
		my work should be transported back to a time when a large segment of the country believed that anyone 
		could become president or an artist.

		Most art has become functional; a subliminal guide which instructs us on how many cups of detergent to 
		use in our wash.

		The "Draw Me" and "Art Contest" ads which many people have seen but not heard, has finally gotten their 
		say.

		My pictures are by no means mere copies of the ads. They are enhanced images. The representations 
		have been improved by using colors where there were none, and by often moving the subject and print 
		on the canvas to its best advantage.

		The goodwill and chance of opportunity these advertisements afforded are magnified by the large scale 
		and sweep of my paintings."

		NATHAN JAMES
		September 29, 1998
                                   

		"All of these drawings were begun from life and completed over months or years in the studio. They were 
		developed through memory until they fully recalled the experiences in which they were conceived, and 
		those experiences have always been deeply shaded by the memories they have evoked.

		I think a lot about Dickens's stories and Bach's music, and this is how I see when I read and listen."

		DIANNE SALFAS, 1999

		"Twenty years ago, I photographed the street facades and window displays of the wholesale fabric stores 
		along lower Broadway. I liked the combination of stone, glass and cloth, reflected skies and street, the 
		simultaneous grime and freshness of the color.

		The photographs in this show were taken in New York recently, but are related to the earlier work. The 
		subjects are metal shutters and plywood, painted and weathered, on derelict or closed-down stores in 
		midtown. The colors and the geometry of the surfaces spoke to me: each image with its own voice.

		I always hope that the print will reveal something unexpected. It is impossible to know whether this will 
		happen at the time of taking the photograph; however somehow choices for subjects do present 
		themselves. The camera sees both ways, out to the world and in to the photographer. Occasionally, 
		through viewing the familiar, the unfamiliar also appears and the two can spark a new recognition.

		JOHN STOCKDALE, 1999