Abstracts & Mixed Media
by Ruth Kramedjian
January 3, 2010 - February 28, 2010

Ruth is a graduate of the University of Georgia with degrees in drawing and painting and art history. She has worked with fabric, designing and making original quilts; she has worked in metal, designing jewelry in silver and gold; her photographic work is represented in this show with a series of black and white infrared prints; and in recent years she has returned to abstract painting and the art of collage or mixed media.

In her artist's statement, Ruth says:

Rhythmic cycles chart the course of our days. Both mundane and magnificent, they present themselves in the powerful circle of community life, the changing of the seasons, the movement from dawn to dusk and back again to light. Ethereal, concrete, and universal, they frame our lives and they give direction to my spiritual quest to find meaning in my world through art making. The grid and its counterpart, the circle, often serve as a frame for these cycles, and my emotional response to the inherent rhythms finds expression in my mark making. The short view, the long view, the universal view - from these, I examine my world.

Ruth is an avid gardener and lives with her husband, Armand, on the Chattahoochee River in Vinings. Ruth can be contacted at 770-384-1122 or via e-mail at rrpk2@yahoo.com.

Doll Collection
by Renée Coleman
January 3, 2010 - February 28, 2010

Renée Coleman is originally from Rocky Mount N.C., and has resided in the Smyrna/Marietta area for the past 17 years.

She received her Bachelors of Science Degree in Art Education from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, in 1989. She taught Art for a few years and quickly realized that teaching is a calling and "it's NOT calling me".

She has always been a creative person and an admirer of beauty. She loved dolls as a child, but unlike most little girls that loose interest in them around age twelve, she didn't. At age 16, her grandmother would ask "Aren't you too old to play with dolls?"

She started collecting dolls about 15 years ago, and in the past five years more seriously. She would buy dolls and store them under her bed. (closet collector). One Saturday morning while driving past the Cobb County Civic Center, she read the marquee that said "Doll Show". She went in to find hundreds of other collectors that shared the same passion for doll collecting as she did.

Finally she could take herdolls out and display them...it's okay. Since then she has enjoyed learning more about doll collecting. Some of her favorites are the Dolls of the World Series, Treasures of Africa Series, Lucille Ball, and the Coat Collection.