Derek McCrea

Derek McCrea
Derek McCrea (b. 1969) is the October 2007 Artist of the Month. Derek was born in Albany, Georgia. He paints in a whimsical impressionistic style in plein air settings. He first started painting with oils in the summer of 1984. From 1985 to 1986 he painted under the instruction of Jimmy Peterson, a well known artist from Georgia. In 1986 he won first place in the Georgia Arts Exhibition. Derek's works can be found in galleries in North Carolina, Georgia, Spain, France and Austria, frame and arts and craft shops in the Southeastern United States and numerous online galleries.

Derek has completed over 20 commissions in the past couple of years. His art was selected for the cover of The Eclipse. The Eclipse is a publication where poets write about the artwork of a selected artist once per quarter. Derek McCrea is a US Army Infantry Combat Soldier with two tours in Iraq with the 3rd Infantry Division. http://renownedart.com/digitalcolor/

Southern California Art Walks and Studio Tours
Digital Consciousness has launched a calendar listing the dates of art walks, studio tours, and other art-related events in southern California. http://DigitalConsciousness.net/directory/artcalendar.php Links are provided for more information about each event. These events are so good it is worth a trip to Southern California if you live out of the region. At the Laguna Beach artwalk, one gallery had etchings and other works by many renowned artists including Renoir, Dali, Chagall, Miro, Matisse and Rembrandt. There were also etchings by Camille Pissarro as well as paintings by his grandson H. Claude Pissarro.

New Artwork in the Galleries
Kevin Barr, Nirvana Blues, Lisa Putman, Nicholas Caputi, Jan Kolling and Jonathan Eoyang have added new artwork to their galleries. http://DigitalConsciousness.com/gallerylist.phtml

New Contemporary Artists
The following artists registered since August 23. To view the work of an artist enter the artist's name at http://DigitalConsciousness.com To see these most recent artists go to http://DigitalConsciousness.com/new/

1. Mirko Sevic. Surrealistic drawings from Croatia.
2. Jarig Straatsma. Landscapes from the Netherlands.
3. Juan Herrera. Digital photography from Argentina.
4. Michelle Frost. Ceramics from Canada.
5. Ilr Berhami. Geometric and futurist shapes from Albania.
6. Rita Slotteroy. Light, color and flower abstracts.
7. Marie Hermance. Abstracts from France.
8. Alberto Thirion. Mystical and spiritual romantic subjects from Mexico.
9. L Day. Landscape and nature photography.
10. Jason Howard. Abstracts and Perspex art from the U.K.
11. Colin Tresadern. Elemental geometric forms in a non-representational abstract space.
12. Donna Mae Montgomery. Visionary portraits and interiors.
13. Jan Kölling. Spiritual portraits from the Netherlands.
14. Shefqet Avdush Emini. Expressionistic oils from the Netherlands.
15. Craig Perry-Ollila. Abstract and quirky photography.
16. Tara Amodini. Mystical watercolors.
17. Didier Hirsch. Digital collage from France.
18. Harlan Gruber. Burning Man art installation.
19. Henk Klinkhamer. Figurative paintings from the Netherlands.
20. Angelina Dellner. Sensuous mysterious deep enigmatic painting from Norway.
21. Rob Collins. Oil, marble and linen; amalgamation of painting and sculpture.
22. Farnoosh Ahmadi Shirazi. Abstract landscapes from Iran.
23. Martin Am. Hand painted famous icons.
24. Ilgvars Zalans. Expressionistic cityscapes from Latvia.

Orange County Museum of Art. Currently exhibited is Art Since The 1960s: California Experiments

* Large blueprints which the artist had constructed of Gilligan's Island, the Addams Family mansion, and Rob and Laura Petrie's home. They were wonderfully nostalgic pieces, and also worked as art.
* Several pieces executed in the medium of smog. Silk or Plexiglas canvases had stencils placed over them and they were exposed to the air. Then the stencils were removed, and smog images remained. A few of the images were relevant to the medium, such as lungs or a gas mask.
* Vija Celmins. An extremely realistic oversized acrylic on wood sculpture of an eraser.
* A 32 minute long film of artist John Baldessari repeatedly writing "I will not make any more boring art."
* A few slices of plaster "wedding cake" created by Claes Oldenburg. Imagine attending a wedding and going home with a work of art by a famous artist!
* An Ed Ruscha piece entitled "Every Building on the Sunset Strip."