46 | MAY 9 • 2024 
J
N

ARTS&LIFE
ART

A

n image from Naomi 
Hart’s artistic works, 
made using beeswax 
with drawing and print skills 
falling into the category of 
encaustics, has been chosen to 
go on promotional materials 
for this year’s Art Birmingham. 
The event, held May 11-12 
in surrounding areas of Shain 
Park and originally known 
as the Birmingham Fine Art 
Festival, is early in this year’s out-
door art fair season. With Mother’s 
Day being celebrated on May 12, 
children are encouraged to attend 
a fair workshop to show them how 
to make gifts for moms relevant to 
their special day.
Hart, who lives in Illinois and 
has learned about Judaism through 
her father’s heritage, said she always 
seemed to draw, with artistry 
becoming a way of dealing with 
trauma faced early in life. After 
her children advanced in age, she 
learned new artistic methods and 
began attending the summer fairs. 
“I use beeswax in a super unique 
manner,
” said Hart, whose images 
often show natural environments 
and who holds a printmaking 
master’s degree from the Rochester 
Institute of Technology in upstate 
New York. 
“I use layers and layers of draw-
ings and prints mixed into beeswax. 
It’s really interesting.
”
Hart, who lived in Michigan’s 
Upper Peninsula when she was 
young, has shown her work in the 
Ann Arbor and East Lansing art 
fairs, but this will be her first time 
in Birmingham, which is in its 43rd 

year. The one image to be featured, 
“The Quorum,
” is focused on yel-
low water lilies and water animals 
and insects attracted to the flowers.
“I come from a family of teach-
ers, and my goal had been to teach,
” 
said Hart, 65, who works in a home 
studio and continues her interest in 
the environment with a plant gar-
den on the property of her brother’s 
farm. “When I graduated, I was in 
my 40s and just was too old to be 
a considered candidate for a new 
hire.
“Since 2005, I’ve been focused 
on a professional career as an artist. 
I began focusing on encaustics in 
2013. It feeds my desire to commu-
nicate artistically. I’m really fulfilled 
with this medium.
”
Although Hart maintains a web-
site (naomi4art.com) from which 
she sells some work, most of her cli-
entele reach her at 15 or 20 annual 
fairs. She travels across the United 
States to participate as do many of 
the artists showing their works. 
“I like the face-to-face contacts,
” 
said Hart, who will also show her 
work in East Lansing this season. 
“
Art fairs are galleries without barri-
ers, and everybody is welcome.
” 

The season gets underway this 
weekend in Birmingham.

SUZANNE CHESSLER CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Works by Naomi Hart, 
clockwise from bottom: 
“The Pull Of A Memory,” 
“The Quorum,” “She Held 
The Moment.”