A new monthly event called the “ArtBar” will premiere at the Sharon Arts Center Exhibition Gallery, 30 Grove St.,  on Saturday, February 11 from 7 to 9 pm.

“ArtBars are popping up all over the country,” says Gallery Director Camellia Sousa. “We are pleased to host this unique and exciting monthly event at Sharon Arts Center, where in our relaxed and casual setting in the main Exhibition Gallery you can complete your own acrylic painting to take home, based on the ArtBar themes of the month, with creative and timely ideas that anyone can do.”

According to Sousa, ArtBar will provide all the art supplies plus hearty cheese and crackers and seltzer water with wine and beer available for a suggested donation. Ready for participants, supplies will include acrylic paint colors, brushes, small sponges for painting, stencils and pencils, blue tape for hard edges, and 8 x 10 inch canvas boards.

“I was thrilled to be invited to lead the ArtBar,” says instructor Holly Alderman who will guide participants through the process to create their own original paintings. “Since we’re beginning just before Valentine’s Day, the theme for February’s ArtBar will be Love and Chanel No. 5.”

Alderman plans to start each ArtBar with a slide show of inspirations by projecting iconic images on the gallery wall. Her slide show for Feb. 11 includes Andy Warhol’s famous painting “Chanel No 5″ (1956) and more Chanel imagery, symbols, logos and ads old and new. Alderman will also demonstrate the use of sponges, tapes and stencils. As models for the evening, she will provide classic bottles of Chanel No 5, sample photos, sketches and artworks. Participants are welcome to bring their personal favorite small brushes and acrylic colors or watercolors.

An artist and photographer whose decorative arts are inspired by digital innovations and the beauty of local landscapes and weather, Alderman was a mural fellow at the National Academy Museum in New York and a teaching assistant in Design Science at Harvard College. Her art and décor are installed in residences and restaurants from San Francisco to DC to London and have appeared at Sunflowers Café in Jaffrey as well as at the White House, Saint-Gaudens National Historic Site, the Chelsea Flower Show and the Boston Design Center and on TOH, Dream House, Today, and Art.com. She will have an art show of Chanel paintings in March at Aesop’s Table in Peterborough inside the Toadstool Bookshop.

On Feb. 11 Alderman will also introduce a special guest invited to be a teaching assistant, interior designer Cathy Bosworth, who advises celebrity interior designers and world famous cultural institutions on design and decorating trends and is an art consultant with an eye for iconic images. Bosworth is Vice President of Sterling and Knight, international distributors of fine fabrics, wallpapers and lighting to showrooms at design centers throughout the US and Canada, owned with her husband Paul in Keene, NH.

To be held the second Saturday of each month, ArtBar upcoming themes will be: Animal Patterns, March 10; Cherry Blossom Festival, April 14; Words as Art, May 12; Stars and Stripes, June 9; French Kitchen Still Life, July 14; Pink and Green Lilly Fest, Aug. 11; Pop Art/Op Art, Sept.15; Monadnock Landscapes, Oct.13; Duck Decoys, Nov. 10, and Star Bright, Starry Night, Dec. 8.

While ArtBar studio nights are limited to 12 participants, a couple or two friends are welcome to sign up to collaborate together on a single painting. Pre-registration is required. The cost is $25 per person, and the cost for a collaborator is $15. To register and for more information call (603) 924-2787.

Join the ArtBar on 2^nd Saturdays!

With timely themes such as… “LOVE and CHANEL No 5”

At the Sharon Arts Exhibition Gallery.

Paints and 8×10 in. canvas ready for you!

Download the flier here!

ArtBars are popping up all over the country. We are pleased to host this unique and exciting monthly event at Sharon Arts Center.

In our relaxed and casual setting in the main Exhibition Gallery, you can complete your own acrylic painting to take home, based on the ArtBar Themes of the Month (see previews below)!

Art Bar provides all the art supplies plus hearty cheese and crackers, with wine and beer available for a suggested donation. Our knowledgeable instructor, Holly Alderman, will guide you through the process to create your own original painting.

Sign up today to participate in the ArtBar on 2^nd Saturdays!

ArtBar studio nights are limited to 12, and preregistration is required.
Cost is $25/pp.

To register call 603-924-2787.
For more information: Camellia Sousa, Gallery and Store Director
(603) 924-7676, Camellia@sharonarts.org

• Love and Chanel No 5 – Feb. 11
• Animal Patterns – Mar. 10
• Cherry Blossom Festival – Apr. 14
• Words as Art – May 12
• Stars and Stripes – June 9
• French Kitchen Still Life – July 14
• Pink + Green Lilly Fest – Aug 11
• Pop Art / Op Art – Sept. 15
• Monadnock Landscapes – Oct. 13
• Duck Decoys – Nov. 10
• Star Bright, Starry Night – Dec. 8

THE EXHIBITION GALLERY
30 GROVE STREET, PETERBOROUGH, NH 03458

Winter Session classes begin the week of Jan. 16 and continue to open through the beginning of February. The classes run once a week for either 6 or 8 weeks and one-day workshops are available as well. New class sessions begin in March and April.

“Offering classes in our Peterborough Gallery is a new effort to provide an accessible and convenient arts experience for our community while at the same time introducing more people to the wider range of classes offered at our state-of-the-arts facility at Sharon,” says Executive Director Keri Wiederspahn.

Also new for the Winter Session, according to Wiederspahn, is online registration at http://www.sharonarts.org/education/classes-workshops, where a full lineup of classes can be found.

Children as young as 2 1/2 can enjoy offerings in the Young Artist Foundation, where first-time artists just learning to express themselves with their creativity will be given the guidance needed to understand not only how to use certain techniques, tools, and mediums, but how to have fun while learning to observe and work from both life and imagination to create beautiful works of art.

In the Young Artist Foundation, there are “Mommy and Me” classes for ages 2 1/2 to 4 1/2 as well as “Just Me” classes for ages 4 to 5. Ages 4 and up can participate in a morning Youth Drawing Club, which is ideal for young children or homeschoolers who want an exploratory, project-driven class. For ages 6 and older, afterschool clay classes are being offered, as well as painting classes for ages 7 and older. A class in “Illustrating a Story” is offered for ages 8 to 12, along with “Paper-making and Papercrafts” for ages 8 and older and “The Young Pastel Artist” for age 10 and older.

Teenagers can join “Teen Torch,” to be held in 8-week afternoon sessions that will allow students to explore “melting madness” on the torch to create everything from beads and buttons to small vases and sculptures. Teens are also welcome to enter into adult classes that fit their schedule.

Classes and workshops for adults will be offered in morning, afternoon, and evening classes in painting and drawing, clay, mixed media and printmaking, fiber, glass, jewelry and metal, and photography and digital media.

“Our Winter adult classes include newer programs such as Encaustic Painting,” says School director Alexandra Wall, “and we’re happy to be expanding our youth programs. Available as well are our known favorites such as drawing, weaving, watercolor, Creating a Series with Mary Iselin, and a lineup of clay offerings that now entail advanced classes for the more practiced ceramic student.”

• For more information and to register see http://www.sharonarts.org/education/classes-workshops , email register@sharonarts.org, or call (603) 924-7256.

A free Open House at the School of Art and Craft in Sharon will be held on Saturday, Jan. 14 from 10 am to 3 pm. During the Open House interested students will have an opportunity to visit the School, learn about Sharon Arts, meet faculty and staff, and even try out a class. A full Open House schedule can be viewed here.

“Sharon Arts wants to strengthen our mission to build a viable community in the arts,” says Executive Director Keri Wiederspahn, “and to expand the plane of what is possible in art-making as we contemplate the notion of creativity itself, attempting to answer the question ‘What is Art?’ ”

Poetry, film, dance, and music events will rotate between the designated dates on a monthly basis, she says. “We hope our neighbors in the community will come out and participate in these programs so we can get to know one another while we learn more about these other art forms from artists accomplished in their field.”

The first Good Neighbor Series event on Jan. 21 will feature two poets from Northampton, Mass–Heather Christle and Christopher DeWeese. According to Gallery Assistant Zachary Green, “The Good Neighbor Series: Poetry edition is dedicated to bringing good people and good poems together. The hope is that contemporary poets will help create a contemporary readership as the landscape of poetry starts to look more like a vertical swimming pool and less like a Greek lyre. If you are into that, come out and be part of the good neighborhood. If you don’t like to swim, bring a towel and lie down for some sun.”

Heather Christle is the author of “The Trees The Trees (Octopus Books, 2011), “The Difficult Farm” (Octopus Books, 2009), and a chapbook, “The Seaside!” (Minutes Books, 2010). Wesleyan University Press will be publishing her third full-length poetry collection, “What Is Amazing,” in the spring of 2012. Her poems have appeared in publications including The Believer, Boston Review, Gulf Coast, and The New Yorker. She has taught at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and at Emory University, where she was the 2009-2011 Creative Writing Fellow. She is the web editor for Jubilat and frequently a writer in residence at the Juniper Summer Writing Institute. A native of Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, she lives in Western Massachusetts.

Christopher DeWeese’s first book, “The Black Forest,” will be published by Octopus Books in early 2012. His poems have appeared in Boston Review, Crazyhorse, and Tin House. Currently, he lives in Northampton, Massachusetts and works as a lecturer at Smith College and the University of Massachusetts.

A music event will follow on Feb. 4 and a Mardi Gras celebration and fundraising concert on Feb. 18. All Good Neighbor series events will be held from 7 to 9:30 pm; the doors open at 7 pm and those attending can get their seats and have a chance to mingle until the presentations begin at 7:30 pm. Each event will last until about 9 pm, and afterwards there will be time to meet the artists and ask questions. Wine and light refreshments will be available. The Good Neighbor series is open to the public, but donations are encouraged. For more information, call (603) 924-7676.

“Sharon Arts is proud to celebrate the 65th anniversary of our Members Exhibition,” says Gallery Director Camellia Sousa. “This is a show that highlights our community of artists and our history.”

The Opening Reception for the exhibit will be held on Friday, Jan. 13 from 5 to 7 pm. A series of artist demonstrations on Saturday afternoons throughout the show has also been planned to be held on Saturdays in January and February from noon to 3 pm.

In January the demonstrations will be: Joan Tierney on acrylic painting Jan. 14; Mary Iselin on oil painting Jan. 21; and Ella Rank on needle felting Jan. 28. The February demonstrations will be: Shana Brautigaum on ceramics (handbuilding) Feb. 4; Holly Alderman on mixed media Feb. 11; Phil Bean on oil painting Feb. 18; and Ken Fiery on oil painting Feb. 25.

Admission is free to all events and ample parking is available. The Exhibition Gallery is open Monday through Saturday from 10 am to 6 pm and Sunday from 11 am to 5 pm. For more information, call (603) 924-7676.

Still Life w Copper Pot and Orange by Ramona Johnson, Oil.

All events will take place on the first and third Saturday of each month. Poetry, film, and music events will rotate between the designated dates on a monthly basis. We hope to see our good neighbors there.

More developments to come!

Donations are encouraged and wine as well as light refreshments will be available.

Location: Sharon Arts Center downtown Exhibition Gallery, 30 Grove St., Peterborough, N.H.; 7-9:30pm

Our first event of the Good Neighbor Series will be featuring a poet power duo of Northampton, Mass., Heather Christle and Christopher DeWeese on Jan. 21^st, 2012. The Good Neighbor Series: Poetry edition is dedicated to bringing good people and good poems together. The hope is that contemporary poets will help create a contemporary readership as the landscape of poetry starts to look more like a vertical swimming pool and less like a Greek lyre. If you are into that, come out and be part of the good neighborhood. If you don’t like to swim, bring a towel and lie down for some sun.

Heather Christle is the author of The Trees The Trees (Octopus Books, 2011), The Difficult Farm (Octopus Books, 2009), and a chapbook, The Seaside! (Minutes Books, 2010). Wesleyan University Press will be publishing her third full-length poetry collection, What Is Amazing, in the spring of 2012. Her poems have appeared in publications including The Believer, Boston Review, Gulf Coast, and The New Yorker. She has taught at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and at Emory University, where she was the 2009-2011 Creative Writing Fellow. She is the Web Editor for jubilat and frequently a writer in residence at the Juniper Summer Writing Institute. A native of Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, she lives in Western Massachusetts.

Christopher DeWeese‘s first book, The Black Forest, will be published by Octopus Books in early 2012. His poems have appeared in Boston Review, Crazyhorse, and Tin House. Currently, he lives in Northampton, Massachusetts and works as a Lecturer at Smith College and The University of Massachusetts.