French uses oil paints to create pieces like the ones featured above.

David French’s art is best described by the word “abstraction.” But French isn’t just creating abstract pieces, he is using them to question the relevancy of the genre itself. Perhaps a better word to describe French’s style is “contradictory.”

As an artist living in Asbury Park with his 10-year-old daughter, French uses everything from video, to paint, to sculpture to create work that questions the artistic principles he works with everyday.

French received his formal training at Carnegie Mellon University. Outside of the classroom, he studied under Sam Gilliam, another abstract artist.

“[Sam] showed me ways to express my self using aesthetics and theoretical ideas,” French said. Gilliam continues to inspire French.

In 1990, French had his first solo art show in Chicago, which featured large oil paintings and sculptures. But he felt out of place in the Chicago art scene, where he says abstraction was simply “not in.” French eventually returned to the east coast to work in construction, and returned to painting in 2000 after completing cancer treatment. He is currently getting his masters from the Vermont College of Fine Arts.

Since returning to art, French has focused on “repositioning his pieces.”

“It starts with a question,” he says. “Recently, it’s ‘is abstraction relevant?’”

French is working on pieces that answer this question. He also finds inspiration in sensual pleasures like food, cooking, and the joy in his daughter’s eyes.

“Most of my work comes out of the pleasure I have painting in the studio,” he says. “The color of the brush stroke, the weave in the canvas. It’s the same process I have in tasting food, making love, watching a sunrise.”

His current work explores these pleasures and also restrains them. He describes these contradictions as “self cancelling” or “collapsed.” “I’m trying to find interesting ways to make paintings that are sincere and also cynical. They are purposely self cancelling,” he says.

French works in his studio in Colts Neck. Once he has prepared the canvas, a piece can be completed in one or two sessions. After finishing a piece, though, he does not return to it.

“The work becomes a record of that moment, that time I’m in,” he says. “Once you go back into it, the record of the event is now lost.”

David French can be reached by email at french1000@optonline.net. His work can be viewed through October at the Blue Bay Inn in Atlantic Highlands. He can also be found on the MCAC’s Artist Registry.

Photos of "Sea Treasure," "Red Holly Pierced," "Clownin' Around," and Gilpin at the lathe.

Traditionally, the words “software engineer” and “artist” are rarely found together in one sentence, let alone one person. But for Buren Gilpin, the two careers are anything but opposites. In fact, Gilpin finds balance and inspiration from both fields.

Buren Gilpin is a wood-worker living in Wall. He uses wood to create sculptures inspired primarily by nature. After retiring from a career as a software engineer about eight years ago, Gilpin began sculpting from wood. He says his art satisfies two different parts of himself.

“I’m an engineer by training, and something that involves a lot of technical skills is of interest to me,” he says. “But then there’s this creative side where you are just creating something special that nobody’s done before, and something that’s truly yours. Both of those dimensions really appeal to me.”

Throughout his life, Gilpin created furniture, but never found the time to develop his wood working skills. When he discovered the lathe though, he says he “flourished.”

Gilpin describes the lathe as a potter’s wheel for woodwork. It lays wood horizontally and spins it can be sculpted into different vessels. He finds the machine exciting and inspiring.

“As you start with something like that, you tend to be kind of traditional and craft-like in what you do,” he says. “But as I got going with it, it gave me a chance to let my creative side develop a little bit.”

One of Gilpin’s pieces takes about a month to create. After bringing a log into his studio, which is located in his basement, he cuts it down using a chainsaw, works with it on the lathe, and then begins detail work.

Gilpin is inspired by artists like Binh Pho and Dixie Biggs, as well his mentor Bill Stephenson. His wife Christina is helpful in critiquing his pieces. Gilpin’s other inspiration for his pieces comes from nature, especially the nature he encounters living at the shore.

“I love the sea life, sea shells, trees and leaves,” he says. “When you are looking at a shape or the surface of something, it has a texture to it. You are always thinking: ‘how does that relate to what I’m doing?”

Right now, Gilpin is working on vessels with fish pierced through the walls of the pieces. He is constantly developing his ideas.

“You are always thinking, what’s the next evolution of the idea?” He says. “It will just be a matter of getting to the equipment and the wood, and actually making it happen.”

Buren Gilpin can be reached by phone at 908-902-1193 or email bcgilpin@msn.com. His work can be viewed online at www.sunsetcoveartstudios.com. He can also be found on the MCAC’s artist registry.

"The Celebration," "The Face of Vernazza," "The View for Hannah," and "Canopy of Shade and Light"

For some people, a love for art can be traced back to a wing of a museum, or a classroom at school. For Harvey Rogosin, though, a love for art began in a studio apartment in Paramus. The apartment belonged to Rogosin’s cousin who was just beginning art school. At the age of 12, it was the place where Harvey became inspired to try painting.

“I smelled the oil paints, I saw the easel,” he says. The rest is history.

Currently, Rogosin is a realist artist living in East Brunswick, New Jersey. He uses pastels to create landscapes, seascapes, and cityscapes inspired by his surroundings.

After leaving the Paramus apartment, Harvey began using oil paints and sketching. Growing up in Brooklyn, he surrounded himself with art and learned to stretch canvases until his fingers were blistered. But eventually, he put his artwork on to hold to have children and study architecture at the New York Institute of Technology. About eight years ago, Rogosin revisited his artwork using pastels instead of oil paints.

“I see the depths of the tree,” he says “the colors, the shades.” He uses the pastels to build these colors and to achieve a style he calls “photo realism,” although he dreams of being an impressionist painter.

Rogosin’s work requires patience. Each piece requires about three weeks to complete. He works in his living room to music from the Allman Brothers and the Grateful Dead. Photographs inspire most of his pieces. “I always carry a camera with me,” he says.

He often pulls over while driving or cycling to take pictures. “Whatever I see that’s beautiful, why change it?” Rogosin says. He is not just inspired by his surroundings though. Rogosin also finds joy when others appreciate his work. Selling his piece entitled “Canopy of Shade and Light” was particularly gratifying.

The woman who purchased it sent him a letter saying she appreciated the work. “She was staring at it for about two hours,” Rogosin remembers. ”That was pretty cool.”

He hopes to have a similar feeling when he sells his other pieces. “I want to sell this because, I want to make someone really happy,” Harvey says. “That’s the ultimate for me.”

Harvey Rogosin can be reached by phone at 732-887-0189 or by email at Rogue1127@aol.com. His work can viewed online at www.harvey-rogosin.fineartamerica.com. He can also be found on the MCAC’s artist registry.

One of O’Connell’s latest pieces is inspired by a cornfield she passed while driving through Holmdel. She was drawn to the yellow of the corn, the sunlight filtering through the leaves and a line of crows sitting throughout the field. She pulled over and began sketching the scene on an old paper cup in the front seat.  For O’Connell, art is a constant process that occurs beyond the borders of a canvas or a studio.

“I paint out of necessity and it’s not out of necessity of paying my bills,” she says. “You need to breathe, you need to eat, and I need to paint.”

O’Connell is a visual artist living in Monmouth Beach. She uses oil paints and black ink to create paintings and hand drawn cards.

Growing up, O’Connell knew she had the mind of an artist. She observed things differently than others, focusing on the light and composition of her surroundings. She studied illustration and graphic design at the School of Visual Arts before working for a silkscreen company in New York.

Eventually, the corporation closed and O’Connell shifted her focus to free lancing and doing illustrations.

“I really just thought I would be a painter, I never really looked ahead,” she says. “I was always in the moment. It was just so romantic”

Now, she works for the Monmouth County Arts Council. She has recently started making personalized, hand drawn cards for weddings and special occasions, and she is working to grow the business.

In the mean time, O’Connell is focused on painting as much as she can. She tries to paint for at least a few minutes each day.

“I literally try to do it everyday even if it’s just five minutes because it’s healing,” she says. “No matter what mood I enter an art space in, I always leave feeling better”

She describes her art as painterly and layered. She works with different finishes to create paintings that are rich with stories and balanced in composition.

About six years ago, O’Connell became infatuated with crows. Crows embody flight and movement, and in times when O’Connell has felt smothered or stuck, crows have offered a release.

“Sometimes I feel like I can’t figure people out at all, but when I look at these birds, I see so much passion and interaction,” she says. “I think they are magnificent.”

Though crows are often evocative of darkness or despair, O’Connell positions them into her pieces with a sense of elegance and optimism; she captures the contradiction on a single canvas.

“I believe in people’s goodness and people’s light so I always try to bring some sort of positive aura,” she says. “There’s always an edge of hope, no matter how dark things may seem.”

Lisa Marie O’Connell can be contacted through email at lm@monmoutharts.org. She is also featured on the MCAC’s Artist Registry.

"Arabic Stars and "Toledo" are two of Appleton's individual pieces. The mosaic and murals are segments of community art projects Appleton has been involved in.

Amy Appleton’s art is a product of her context. In her own work, she captures skylines from her trip to Morocco or mosaic tiles from a summer in Spain.

The collaborative artwork she organizes tells the story of a community and the individuals who comprise it. She has organized murals in Mexico, installations in Baltimore, and, most recently, a collaborative piece in Asbury Park.

Appleton is a visual artist who graduated from Muhlenberg College and earned her masters from Mary Institute College of Art. She focuses on painting, mosaics and community artwork.

In her individual artwork, Appleton is inspired by travel. After spending four months in Spain during her junior year, she was moved by the exotic designs. Her work features rich color and detailed layers of texture and pattern. After earning her masters, she shifted her focus to group projects.

“One of my big loves is public art,” she says. “[I love] seeing the community get transformed by these large projects.”

Community artwork can be an intergenerational process, according to Appleton. It incorporates ideas and skills from different people and molds them into a single project like a mural.

While collaborations like these are common in large cities, Appleton is now working to bring the practice to the Asbury Park transportation center. The art project will incorporate children as well as arts professionals. It is scheduled to begin next summer.

Projects like these make the arts attainable to different communities. The concept of accessibility is becoming increasingly valuable with the loss of arts programming in schools.

“It’s important for the young kids because arts are important,” she says. “In art there aren’t any wrong answers. It helps their decision making, problem solving, cooperation, team work.”

The kids and community members aren’t the only ones who benefit from these experiences. In fact, Appleton often learns a lot through the collaborations as well.

“The teacher learns as much as the kids are learning if not more. To see them work together and see people realize that kids are capable of a lot more than you think, that’s fun,” she says.

For now, Appleton is focused on broadening her own experiences by trying new mediums like photography and video, and bringing art work to new areas. Her goals are large in scale and complicated in terms of preparation, but Appleton’s focus is simple.

“It’s about having fun,” she says. “Art’s about fun, that’s the way it should be.”

Amy Appleton’s art can be viewed online at www.amappleton.com. She can be reached by email at amapple13@yahoo.com. Appleton is also featured on the MCAC’s Artist Registry.

"On the Navesink," "Space Travel," "Starry Night," "City Life" and "Mary Poppins"

Medy Quiroz’s reemergence into the art world began with the click of a camera in Sicily. She avoided taking photos during her trip to Europe after learning in a philosophy class that photos signify attachment, and attachment is unhealthy. At that moment, though, she ignored what she knew and captured the beauty of her surroundings.

The click of the camera drew Quiroz into the Monmouth County arts scene. The photograph she took was featured in a local art show in 2002, and she has been exploring different aspects of the art world ever since.

Quiroz is an artist, photographer and sculptor. Over the last year, she was involved in the Shore Women’s Abstract Gallery in Asbury Park, which strived to make abstract art less intimidating before closing its doors on November 1, 2010.

Quiroz began her career far from the art world. She has a Masters Degree in Computer Science, a field her father considered more practical than art. But despite her science-minded background, Quiroz has always had a love for the arts.

When she moved from the Philippines to the US, she continued to foster her artistic interests by taking classes at George Washington University and Brookdale Community College and transitioned into a more creative field.

Transformation seems to be a common theme within Quiroz’s life. She is constantly evolving her passions and her processes.

“My philosophy is you should improve on what you have no matter if it’s very different from what you have,” she says. “You’ll benefit from doing anything,”

Originally, Quiroz worked in a realistic style. While her work was representative of the objects she painted, she always had a flair for abstraction. She remembers painting apples that were large in scale and skewed in shape instead of true to form.

It wasn’t until she took an abstract art and expressionism class that she found her passion for the genre.

Quiroz’s paintings are colorful an expressive. She layers shapes, colors and textures to achieve a sense of motion and a controlled chaos within her pieces. Part of this sense of motion could be a result of her painting process.

“The way I paint is I turn the canvas many times, I paint one orientation and rotate 90 degrees,” she says. “I know that by turning it, you’re putting your mark on it.”

The entire process can take anywhere from a few hours to a few months.

Quiroz’s work also features bold lines, which her teacher describes as “calligraphy.” Within her acrylic paintings, the lines add a sense of life and continuity. She creates pieces on white paper with lines in black ink. These lines have also inspired her wire sculptures, which consist of stainless steel wire, which is shaped and placed on a block of wood.

Right now, Quiroz seems comfortable in this style; she continues to push the boundaries within the genre of abstract expressionism. She is not afraid of diving into something new, though.

“In the beginning, I loved abstract art and stuff like that. I think I may go back a little to representation art but not abandon abstract,” she says. “You can’t stay doing the same thing all the time.”

Medy Quiroz can be reached by phone at (732) 741-7921 and by email at MedyQuiroz@gmail.com. Her work can be viewed online at MedyQuiroz.com and in person at the Arts Coalition of Asbury Park. She is also featured on the MCAC’s Artist’s registry.

"Covenant," "Living Water," and "Splintered Cedar"

Gerda Liebmann’s work crafts connections. She brings artists from around the world together and links audiences with spiritual themes. Her pieces are meaningful beyond a visual level.

One could say Liebmann’s work has purpose.

Liebmann is a visual artist originally from Switzerland. After working as a graphic designer, she moved to the US and began a community church with her husband. She works in a wide variety of mediums including large-scale installations, acrylics, photos and prints.

Liebmann’s art is interactive. Her installations invite viewers to engage in the themes of the pieces, whether they be spiritual, biblical, or restorative.

“My art can act as a utilitarian agent,” she says. “I want a viewer to come in to investigate and be confronted with something he hasn’t seen.”

Liebmann’s style can be described as both restorative and redemptive. Her abstract pieces range in size and scale, and, often times, the pieces are accompanied by a story.

“Art of Encouragement” was a community art project she developed. Liebmann supported pastors in underground churches in China and received a collection of cards from different artists around the world to form the piece.

“I brought together the artist community internationally as well as a group of pastors,” she said.

Liebmann completed another restorative work based on soldiers that opened on September 11. The piece, entitled “Reflections of Generosity,” involves a series of about 500 cards pertaining to wounded soldiers.

“I want [people] to be confronted with spiritual things,” she says. “I want them to have a healing and a restoration of their own problems.”

While Liebmann varies her medium and method with every piece, an emphasis on storytelling runs through her work. On November 5, she will be featured in an exhibit at the Oyster Point which tells the story of the Navesink River.

The series will feature photos of the Navesink taken from the same location throughout the year. The pieces will create connections and make a visual timeline of the area.

The idea of connection is critical to Liebmann. She fosters connections through her process as an artist and the work that she does everyday.

“[Art] is the perfect way to connect people worldwide. I don’t want to have just my voice, I want to have a united voice, and that’s what I’ve been trying to do.”

Gerda Liebmann’s work can be viewed online at www.gerdaliebmann.com, www.gliebman.blogspot.com, www.redbankchurch.com, www.reflectionsofgenerosity.com. Her work will be featured at the Oyster Point Hotel in Red Bank, NJ with an opening on November 5 from 7-9pm. Liebmann is also featured on the MCAC’s Artist Registry.

"After the Storm," "And the Sun Was Rising," "En Tree Way," "Green Acres," "Over the Dunes," and "Through the Trees"

Hillary Binder-Klein’s paintings invite viewers to experience the scene. The rustling of the leaves in her spring forests becomes audible; the sunlight seeping through the trees feels blinding.

It is easy to become involved in her paintings.

Binder-Klein is a visual artist who works with acrylics. Her pieces capture scenes from nature with an emphasis on recreating different seasons.

Originally, Binder-Klein worked in an abstract style. She achieved texture by layering paint and viewed her surroundings with a different perspective. Her style changed one afternoon in her backyard.

“One day I saw something,” she remembers. “The light was coming through the trees, and I just felt like I wanted to paint it. I didn’t think I would be able to do it in my usual style of painting, so I decided I would try to interpret it in a new way.”

Now, her style is more realistic. Binder-Klein works in vibrant colors – she uses fresh greens in spring pieces, red ashes to depict fall scenes, and she builds texture by achieving a realistic appearance.

She is drawn to nature. Her work features landscapes and seascapes in saturated hues. She tries to recreate specific moments within her pieces.

“I stay still,” she says. “I just absorb a moment and then I carry those images with me in my mind and think about them. Then it comes a time when I feel the need to pick up a paint brush.”

Binder-Klein tries to transport her viewers to these moments with her work, she strives to expose them to an idea or setting they might not have seen before.

“I hope that when people see my work, they saw something that made them say ‘ah,’” she says.

Recently, Binder-Klein completed a piece with a cabin structure. The project stemmed from the idea of a barn and small details like color blue. Usually, she collects ideas in her mind and waits for the right moment to bring them to a canvas.

Ultimately, though, the final product doesn’t seem to be as important as the process of painting when it comes to Binder-Klein’s work.

“It’s a matter of enjoying the moment, to stop what you’re doing and just look,” she says. “We are all so busy in our lives that we very rarely do that.”

Hillary Binder-Klein can be reached by email at hbkorig@hotmail.com. She is also featured on the MCAC’s artist registry.

"Meditation," "Mothership," "Imago," and "Proceed With an Open Heart"

Karen Starrett Belfer seems to capture a sense of purpose and freeness in her artwork. This unlikely collision between planning and spontaneity  best describes Starrett Belfer’s work.

Starrett Belfer is a visual artist and a recent inductee of the National Association of Women Artists. She is a graduate of Rutgers University and an alumnus of the School of Visual Arts. For the last seven years, she has painted at the Monmouth County Painting Workshop, run by Grace Graupe-Pillard, where she finds guidance and inspiration.

Though she began her career as a visual artist, Starrett Belfer immersed herself in painting and found a love for the process.

“I love it. I paint in oils, I paint intuitively, it’s very spiritual,” she says. “Forms come out, colors come out, once I capture it, I unwind the energy of what the painting is going to be eventually.”

Starrett Belfer’s love for painting evolved in part when she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Her recovery process has been very influential in her art; she is currently working to spread awareness about the Ovarian Cancer.

Throughout her recovery, she was attracted to the organic quality of painting.

“I found painting to be body centered,” she says. “I don’t have to look for material, it’s just what comes out of my hands. I find that very fulfilling.”

Starrett Belfer’s pieces are abstract. She works with white surfaces and makes bold marks without feeling intimated by the canvas. She finds the process to be much more intuitive than her process as graphic designer, because it’s not premeditated.

“I keep [making marks] until I feel comfortable with those marks that are on the surface,” she says. “I go in with reason, consciousness, and purpose.”

Starrett Belfer’s pieces are figurative and “expressionistic,” she works in color and plays with different forms.  She describes the sense of movement and emotion apparent in her work as “spiritual.”

The purpose of each varies. Karen often finds herself tackling opposing themes in a series. She has explored birth and death, loss and gain, as well as happiness and numbness. Despite the diverse themes of each series, she says each one relates to one another.

“There are common elements, and evolution of style. I see where I have been in that moment when I’ve painted it. I see forms, all my paintings have circles.”

Starrett Belfer consistenly uses round forms. After researching the meaning behind the circle, she learned it was a perfect shape and has importance in Kabala and Eastern Religions. She says it is a metaphor for her heart, a connection that seems to define Starrett Belfer’s goals as an artist.

“It’s coming from my heart,” she says. “I’m a visual communicator, and I just paint and keep painting until I’m done.”

Karen Starett Belfer can by reached by email at Karen@starrettbelfer.com. Her work can be viewed online at www.starrettbelfer.com, jerseyarts.com, and healingthroughart.org, which features the artwork that chronicles her ovarian cancer journey. Karen is also featured on the MCAC’s Artists Registry.

"Late Afternoon, North Beach, Sandy Hook" and "Weeping Cherries, Holmdel Park" Portrait by Vicky DeVico

Laury A. Egan tries to capture silence in her work. Through her striking photography and her graceful writing, she creates a sense of calm in each of her pieces.

Egan is a photographer and writer living near Sandy Hook.  Her photos have appeared in numerous galleries and she has published short stories as well a poetry book entitled: “Snow, Shadows, a Stranger.”

When she was younger, Egan focused on the visual arts. She studied at Carnegie Mellon where she earned a degree in graphic design. After college, though, she shifted her focus to work in both writing and photography.

Egan’s photos depict landscapes. She is inspired by the beaches in Sandy Hook and she tries to capture the sense of calm that comes after a storm

“These photos are taken right after blizzard, there is still a sense of peacefulness and solitude that I try to capture,” she says

Egan’s writing style is similar; she says it is lyrical and natural. She tries to capture nature as well as psychological issues in her writing.

While she works in two mediums, Egan says both genres of her work inspire one another.

“The two areas inform each other. Sometimes one comes first, and sometimes the other. There have been times when I go to take photographs and then write poems,” she says.

Working in two mediums has improved Egan’s instincts. Her photography has helped to make her writing clearer and more descriptive.

“I’m very good at setting a stage in terms of capturing the lighting, the color, the smells. I’m heightened in that area because of my photographic background” she says.

Egan’s list of accomplishments in the arts is long and impressive. Her successes in the art world stem from her sense of drive and the obligation she feels towards her talent.

“I was very self motivated from a very early age,” she says. “I feel like I’ve been very fortunate in my career opportunities, and I’ve hopefully been responsible to my ability. This is where I put my attention.”

Laury A. Egan can be reached by email at laury5@verizon.net. Her work can be viewed online at http://www.lauryaegan.com/. She is also featured on the MCAC’s Artist Registry.