arts & entertainment

Mixed Media Painting

Linda Sterns textural
works of art are the subject of a one-woman show in Ferndale.

I

Suzanne Chessler

Contributing Writer

T

exture stands out as the newest
feature of Linda Sterns' paintings.
Before reaching for a brush, she
can add texture to the paper itself by matte
medium, gesso, stencils, twine or stamps.
After an application dries, she gives her
attention to the image that rests on the base.
Her latest works will come together in
an exhibit, "Mixed Media Paintings," to be
on view through October at the Lawrence
Street Gallery in Ferndale. The opening
reception runs 6-9 p.m. Thursday, Oct.
2, at the gallery, where there will be hors
d'oeuvres, drinks and music.

"Most of my paintings are done with two
to five different types of media to give them
a feeling of layers:' says Sterns, 72, who
works in her White Lake home in a studio
converted from a porch. "I think that makes
the paintings look much more interesting."
Sterns also has expanded her approach
by including some figures among her floral
and abstract pieces. She will have 18 small
works and 35 medium and larger projects.
"I've also gotten more into experimental
water media; says the artist, whose brother,
Mike Wolfe, has expressed his creative
instincts as an ironsmith. "I continue to
work in watercolor as well as collage.
"When something sparks my imagina-
tion, I go for it. With each painting, I hope

to discover something new: a different tech-
nique, a unique subject or an accident that
works. This process makes painting exciting
and a growing experience."
Sheryl's Event was inspired as Sterns
enjoyed a wedding. Her subject became
turquoise flowers guests were given, and
she developed the piece with texture under-
neath painted blossoms with gold leaf trim.
Tape Me Up started out with tape placed
in different ways on paper. Paint was
applied to achieve color variations along
different angles in a process Sterns found
imaginative and fun.
Incandescent began with spackling paste
for texture and was finished with paint
applied according to abstract instincts.
"Besides showing my work at the
Lawrence Street Gallery, I have had
displays in libraries, hospitals and res-
taurants:' Sterns says. "I've been in juried
shows all over Michigan, including Our
Town in Birmingham."
posed materials, including newspaper
Her work also has appeared in exhib-
articles related to surveillance.
its planned by the Detroit Historical
"The piece is expected to spark conversa-
Museum, the Detroit Society of Women
tion over the current controversy surround-
Painters & Sculptors and Temple Israel,
ing government surveillance," says Schwartz.
where she is a member.
"The globe, made from repurposed circuit
"I help out at the Lawrence Street
boards, further emphasizes the central role
Gallery at least twice a month:' Sterns
of technology in the world, in our com-
says. "I wait on customers, telling them
munications and at the heart of the current
about the artists, and answer phone calls.
surveillance debate."
Lawrence Street is a co-op, where the art-
The sculpture also incorporates a tablet
ists themselves run the gallery."
computer screen running a real-time Twitter
Sterns got serious about artistry after
feed referencing the NSA and surveillance.
retiring from the travel industry.
The piece will be displayed at the
"I worked in travel for 48 years:' she
Fountain Street Church, a nondenomi-
says. "I didn't go into art when I was
national church affiliated with the ACLU
younger because I knew I couldn't make
and one of the main venues in downtown
money."
Grand Rapids.
A graduate of Mumford High School
in Detroit, Sterns studied art with
private teachers and moved on to the
To view Just Listening (voting code
Birmingham Bloomfield Art Center.
56367), and for more information on
Travel has become a fun activity for the
voting rules, visit www.artprize.org .
artist and her husband, Joseph, retired
from the generic drug business. They visit

Linda Sterns: Incandescent.

Art And The NSA

A thought-
provoking collaboration at ArtPrize.

J

ust Listening, created by local
artists Joan Schwartz, Darcel
Deneau and Ruth Tyszka, is a
life-sized, mixed-media mosaic depiction of
Lady Justice, blindfold removed and holding
a large illuminated globe of the world over
her head. It is on view through Oct. 12 in
Grand Rapids as part of ArtPrize, the inter-
national competition for cash prizes, voted
by the public, which runs through Oct. 12.
"The piece is a visual commentary on
American ideals regarding the National
Security Agency's electronic data and col-
lection programs' says Joan Schwartz of
Huntington Woods. "Darcel, Ruth and I also
will be exhibiting a three-woman show at the
Janice Charach Gallery beginning in October
2015, she adds.
As depicted in Just Listening, Lady
Liberty stands on a platform of data server
cases, representing the massive collection
of storage of electronic data; her elaborate
gown is constructed of mixed and repur-

Jews

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Nate Bloom

it

Special to the Jewish News

TV Notes
Madam Secretary premiered on CBS

on Sunday, Sept. 21; new episodes are
scheduled to air at 8 p.m. Sundays.
The series stars Tea Leoni as a former
CIA agent who unexpectedly is named
secretary of state. Co-starring as
the secretary's chief of staff is Bebe
Neuwirth, 55.
Starting at 10 p.m. Thursday, Sept.
25, on ABC is How to Get Away with
Murder. This drama centers on an
African-American law-school profes-
sor (Viola Davis), her two associates

86

September 25 • 2014

Weil

and her students
— and how they get
caught up in a mur-
der case. Playing one
associate is Liza Well
(Paris Geller on The
Gilmore Girls), 37.
Debuting at 9 p.m.
Thursday, Oct. 2, on
NBC is A to Z. It's a
comedy that shows
us a romance — from
start to finish. The
co-stars are Cristin
Milioti and Ben

Feldman (Mad Men),

Feldman

34.

Linda Sterns: Sheryl's Event.

two daughters, one in Hawaii and the other
in Arizona.
"I want to learn as much as I can about
art," says Sterns, also active with ORT and
the Friendship Circle. "I love the learning as
well as the processes.
"I work out three or four times a week,
and I come home and paint. I look out from
what was a porch and see swans and ducks
and just paint what strikes my fancy."

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"Mixed Media Paintings" will be
on view through October at the
Lawrence Street Gallery, 22620
Woodward, in Ferndale. The opening
reception runs 6-9 p.m. Thursday,
Oct. 2, at the gallery. (248) 544-
0394; www.lawrencestreetgallery.
com .

The new season of Dancing with the
Stars began on Sept.15 and airs at 8

At The Movies
The Skeleton Twins, a comedy-drama

p.m. Mondays and Tuesdays (results
show) on ABC. Two of the celeb dancers
have Jewish ties: actor-dancer Antonio
Sabato Jr. and actress Lea Thompson.
Sabato, who wasn't raised Jewish,
had a Czech Jewish maternal grand-
mother who was the only member of
her immediate family to survive the
Holocaust.
Thompson's husband of 25 years is
director Howard Deutch, 64. Their two
daughters, Zoey,19, and Madelyn, 23,
are both actresses with a number of
quality credits. They were raised Jewish,
and both of them had a bat mitzvah.

opening on Friday, Sept. 26, has
received almost uniform raves at film-
festival showings. Basic plot: After
many years of estrangement, twins
Maggie (Kristen Wiig) and Milo (Bill
Hader) lead separate lives on opposite
sides of the country. When both feel
they're at the end of their rope, an
unexpected reunion forces them to con-
front how their lives went so wrong.
Co-stars include Luke Wilson and
Joanna Gleason, 64, as the twins'
mother. By the way, Gleason's real-life
father, Monty Hall (Let's Make a Deal),
is "still in the game" at age 93.

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