{"id":9707,"date":"2011-06-22T14:35:39","date_gmt":"2011-06-22T19:35:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/?p=9707"},"modified":"2011-07-06T12:15:34","modified_gmt":"2011-07-06T17:15:34","slug":"zentangle-what-a-tangled-web%e2%80%a6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2011\/06\/22\/zentangle-what-a-tangled-web%e2%80%a6\/","title":{"rendered":"Line Art Doodling — what a tangled web\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Hope Wallace<\/strong> <\/strong><\/p>\n

A Line Art Initial class is coming to the Wassenberg Art Center in the form of a one-day class for ages 11-14 on July 16 <\/sup>as part of our summer art camp series. This kind of freeform doodling is an increasingly popular form of art which uses repetitive patterns and is suitable for any skill level.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
A Line Art Initial by Scott Kraemer. (Photo submitted)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Our class will be taught by Scott Kraemer of Bryan, one of the artists exhibiting in this year\u2019s 55th<\/sup> Annual June Art Exhibit. This is a great way to increase focus and creativity and can be very relaxing. It\u00a0can also reduce the intimidation\u00a0of preparing to work on\u00a0a blank canvas.\u00a0\u00a0 From simple lines to intricate stream-of-consciousness drawings, the process combines these images into one larger, complex drawing. Students will create a letter, suitable for framing if desired, for their project.<\/p>\n

In an age of keyboards and lightning-fast technology, stream of consciousness doodling is the perfect way to slow down the thought process and incorporate the use of hands.\u00a0 It can be very beneficial to the drawing process, where potentially good ideas are often hurried over in this age of technology. Thoughts and feelings can be explored in a more thorough, less rushed manner.<\/p>\n

If your young person would be interested in signing up for this fun way to expression please call the Wassenberg Art Center at 419.238.6837 to preregister. Class size is limited.\u00a0 All materials will be provided. Class fee is $45 members and $55 non-members.<\/p>\n

The Wassenberg Art Center is located at 643 S. Washington Street in Van Wert.\u00a0 Contact us by phone at 419.238.6837 or by e-mail at wassenberg@embarqmail.com.\u00a0 Visit the website at www.vanwert.com\/wassenberg to learn abut more classes and activities.<\/p>\n

De Lempicka was a wild and crazy gal<\/strong><\/p>\n

By Kay Sluterbeck<\/strong><\/p>\n

(Continued from last week:\u00a0 At an early age, Polish-born Tamara de Lempicka decided she wanted to be rich and famous.\u00a0 Her determination resulted in a career as a well-known portrait painter and socialite in Paris.\u00a0 After going through one husband and numerous affairs, in 1928 she became the mistress of Baron Raoul Kuffner.)<\/p>\n

Throughout the next decade, de Lempicka continued both her heavy workload and wild social life.\u00a0 She slept with anyone and everyone; drank gin fizzes with deposed royals, and threw huge parties where naked girls were hired to be human caviar dishes.\u00a0 De Lempicka worked as hard on her publicity as she did on her art.\u00a0 The Great Depression didn\u2019t bother her; in the early 1930s she was painting the King of Spain and the Queen of Greece.\u00a0 Museums began collecting her works.\u00a0 Meanwhile, the Baron doled out money and asked nothing.<\/p>\n

In 1933 she went to Chicago, where she worked with Georgia O\u2019Keeffe, Santiago Martinez Delgado and Willem de Kooning.\u00a0 That year she also married her lover, Baron Kuffner, whose wife had died the year before.\u00a0 The Baron pulled de Lempicka out of her bohemian life and secured her place in high society again, with a title to boot.\u00a0 De Lempicka, who foresaw the coming of WWII well before most of her contemporaries, repaid the Baron by convincing him to sell estates in Eastern Europe and move his money to Switzerland.\u00a0 Her art also began to change with the times; along with her usual cold nudes and aristocrats she painted a few common people, refugees, and even a Christian saint or two.<\/p>\n

De Lempicka was a colossal liar.\u00a0 For years she pretended that her daughter was her sister so she could lie about her age.\u00a0 Sometimes she denied that she had a child, claiming that her paintings were her children.\u00a0 Her daughter Kizette was ignored, scolded, and slammed by her mother even into middle age.<\/p>\n

In the winter of 1939, Tamara and the Baron started an \u201cextended vacation\u201d in the U.S.\u00a0 They settled into a mansion in Beverly Hills, California, where she became known as \u201cthe baroness with a brush\u201d and was a favorite artist of many Hollywood stars.\u00a0 Like others of the time, she did war relief work.\u00a0 In 1941, using her many connections, she managed to get Kizette out of Nazi-occupied Paris.<\/p>\n

In 1943 the couple relocated to New York City, traveling to Europe frequently so the Baron could attend to Hungarian refugee work.\u00a0 Although de Lempicka continued to live in style and socialized continuously, her popularity as a society painter diminished.\u00a0 Her range of subject matter expanded to include still lifes and abstracts, and she eventually adopted a new style, using palette knives instead of brushes.\u00a0 Unfortunately, her new work was not well-received in a 1962 exhibit.\u00a0 De Lempicka decided never to show her work again, and retired from being an active professional artist.\u00a0 However, she never stopped painting.\u00a0 She stored her canvases, new and old, in a warehouse and an attic.<\/p>\n

Baron Kuffner died in 1962, and de Lempicka sold most of her possessions and made three trips around the world by ship.\u00a0 Eventually she moved to Houston, Texas, to live with Kizette and her family.\u00a0 Kizette had married Harold Foxhall, chief geologist for the Dow Chemical company, and they had two daughters.<\/p>\n

In 1966 the Musee des Arts Decoratifs held a commemorative exhibition in Paris which rekindled interest in Art Deco.\u00a0 The exhibit inspired a young man named Alain Blondel to launch a major retrospective of Tamara de Lempicka\u2019s work in Luxembourg.\u00a0 There was to have been another exhibit in New York City, but de Lempicka made too many demands on how the show was to be presented, and the gallery curator walked away.\u00a0 But gradually, as Art Deco and figurative painting returned to favor, she was rediscovered by the art world.<\/p>\n

De Lempicka\u2019s later years were unpleasant.\u00a0 The longsuffering Kizette served as her business manager and social secretary, and suffered under her mother\u2019s petulant and dominating attitude.\u00a0 De Lempicka constantly complained that artists\u2019 materials were inferior to those available in the \u201cold days,\u201d and said that people in the 1970s didn\u2019t have enough \u201cbreeding\u201d to properly appreciate her art.<\/p>\n

In 1978 de Lempicka moved to Cuernavaca, Mexico, where she surrounded herself with young people to avoid thinking about growing old.\u00a0 She mourned her lost beauty, and was as cantankerous as ever right to the end.\u00a0 In late 1979, Kizette\u2019s husband died of cancer and Kizette moved to Mexico to care for her mother until de Lempicka died in her sleep on March 18, 1980.\u00a0 As she had requested, her ashes were scattered on top of the volcano Popocatepetl.<\/p>\n

At the time of de Lempicka\u2019s death, the wheel of fashion had turned a full circle.\u00a0 Before she died, a new generation enthusiastically discovered her art.\u00a0 Today, her early Art Deco paintings are again being exhibited and purchased.\u00a0 Books have been written about her, and two stage plays have been based on de Lempicka\u2019s life.\u00a0 Singer-songwriter Madonna is a huge fan and collector of de Lempicka\u2019s work, and has featured de Lempicka\u2019s artwork in some of her music videos and on the sets of movies.\u00a0 Jack Nicholson and Barbra Striesand are among other famous collectors.<\/p>\n

De Lempicka\u2019s beautifully composed and controlled paintings, still popular today; show no reflection of her wild and unruly life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Hope Wallace A Line Art Initial class is coming to the Wassenberg Art Center in the form of a one-day class for ages 11-14 on July 16 as part of our summer art camp series. This kind of freeform doodling is an increasingly popular form of art which uses repetitive patterns and is suitable […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wassenberg"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-01 12:53:36","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9707\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}