News
Smithsonian CraftOptimism April 22 to May 1, 2021
As Blue Skies Workroom, I was invited to participate in the Smithsonian’s special Spring online craft show, CraftOptimism, featuring artists using sustainable practices in studio work, April 22- May 1, 2021. For CraftOptimism, I designed and made several new bags and pillows that I hope to continue to produce in 2021 – and with care and luck, offer at a few in-person events soon. Miss you.
Quirk Gallery Pop Up Sat. May 4
Saturday May 4 10am-5pm Quirk Gallery. I’ll be there as Blue Skies Workroom, debuting comfy screenprinted linen throw pillows. Will have some large totes and handbound books as well.
Upcoming Workshops Spring/Summer 2019
- Make a Pinafore – Saturday & Sunday, May 25 & 26, Visual Arts Center, Richmond VA
- Playing with Books – 6 Tuesday evenings starting Tuesday, June 18 – Visual Arts Center, Richmond VA
- Zip It! (learn to make zippered pouches) – Sunday, July 27 – Visual Arts Center, Richmond VA
- Bookmaking as Narrative – 4 Tuesday evenings starting Tuesday, August 6 – Visual Arts Center, Richmond VA
Creative Mornings & Making Money
“Art of Making Money” in RichmondMagazine.com
Alyssa Salomon, artist-in-residence at the VCU School of Business, ends her tenure with a talk about material exploration
Alyssa Salomon speaking on CRAFT for Creative Mornings RVA
Creative Mornings RVA
Craft – Alyssa Salomon
Trunk Show at Quirk Gallery Friday & Saturday June 8 & 9
Blue Skies Workroom at The Brunch Market Saturday May 5
I’ll be vending as Blue Skies Workroom at The Brunch Market on Saturday, May 5, 11am until 4pm, at Lunch.Supper! in Scott’s Addition on Summit Avenue at West Marshall Street. It’s an indoor market so we’re there rain or shine. There’s food, of course. I’ve been making some dazzling and vibrant new zippered bags. I’ll also have aprons, tote bags, happiness. and a few hand-bound multi-color books remaining from Current Books.
Alyssa is a panelist for VisArts Collectors’ Night Preview Panel Discussion
Collectors’ Night Preview Party Thursday, March 8, 5-8pm at Visual Arts Center of Richmond. Free & open to the public.
Starting about 6:45, Special Panel Discussion about Craft & Photography, moderated by Gordon Stettinius (Candela Books + Gallery). Panelists: Alyssa Salomon, Dr. John Mason (history of photography professor at UVa) & Mike Schewel (philanthropist & photography collector). Expect fun & interesting ideas.
Announcing Blue Skies Workroom at CURRENT Books
Blue Skies Workroom has been selected to be an exhibitor for the inaugural CURRENT Books book fair, March 31, 2018. I’ll be debuting Relative Medium, a project in which I use bookbinding as collecting and as color studies, producing hand-bound books for use as journals, scrapbooks or decorative objects. Relative Medium is inspired in part by Albers’ Interactions of Color (of course), Doris Lessings’ The Golden Notebook, Agnes Martin, Arlene Shechet’s palates, quilts, Alexander Gerard, and even Dieter Roth, not to mention my unabiding love of color and of paper.
CURRENT Books will showcase high-quality works by art book publishers, artists, writers, and artist collectives who produce print media including artists’ books, monographs, and zines. CURRENT Books will highlight regional makers from Maryland, Washington DC, Virginia, and North Carolina, and give them a platform to exhibit and sell their work. The event cultivates awareness of arts-related publishing by featuring the full spectrum of creative production found at the intersection of art and publishing. CURRENT will return to its original neighborhood in Scott’s Addition for the inaugural edition of CURRENT Books on March 31, 2018, in Studio Two Three’s special event space.
Interviewed for the new VCU School of Business podcast
Enjoyed being interviewed by Dr. Kenneth Kahn, Senior Associate Dean, VCU School of Business, in my capacity as Artist in Residence, for the BSchool’s podcast Creativity @Work. Listen
Elin Spring reviews First Look
What Will You Remember? say Look Again at First Look at Panopticon Gallery, Boston
Studio Two Three’s Winter Print Fair
Look for my new Blue Skies Workroom hand printed, hand sewn, linen pouches and aprons plus some small prints at this year’s Winter Print Fair at Studio Two Three, 3300 West Clay Street, RVA.
That’s Saturday, December 9 & Sunday, December 10 11-4.
More information and a list of artists are here on S23’s website
VCU News: School of Business looks forward to another EPIC year with new artist-in-residence
Photographer Alyssa C. Salomon discusses the role of creativity in business in an interview with VCU News
Artist in Residence at St. Mary’s College
I’m spending two weeks working in the Artist House at St. Mary’s College, sponsored by the Department of Art & Art History. I’m giving a talk with pizza on Tuesday 10/24. What an extraordinarily beautiful place – land, water, sky and luminescence. Thanks, Sue Johnson, for the great photo and so much more – looking forward to phase two in Spring 2019.
Trunk Show at Quirk Gallery Saturday, October 28 – debuting new textile work
Aprons and zippered pouches hand sewn from hand screen printed linen, plus drawings. Things I’ve made this fall in my S23 studio and at St. Mary’s College as artist in residence. Come see what I’ve been up to & come say “hi”.
“Animal Land” Invites Viewers to See a Hidden World at Candela Gallery
Karen Newton, Style Weekly, June 6, 2017
“It’s a photography show, except the photographer didn’t take the pictures.
“Serving as artist-in-residence at Virginia Commonwealth University Rice Rivers Center over the last year, Alyssa Salomon collaborated with Rice’s director of environmental outreach, biologist Anne Wright, to capture the diversity of the ecosystems of the Central Virginia section of the James River watershed.” Read the rest of the review
Richmond Magazine 6/2/17
Out of the Dark(room) by Harry Kollatz Jr.
The photographs of Jared Ragland and Alyssa Salomon, on view at Candela Books + Gallery through June 24, present more than meets the eye. Ragland uses for a jumping-off point Walker Percy’s 1962 debut, New Orleans-set novel “The Moviegoer,” and the films “Stagecoach” and “The Third Man.” Ragland appropriates stills from those movies, along with distinctive aspects of the Crescent City. Salomon edited stills from motion-activated video cameras, capturing urban wildlife in the James River Park System.
Candela’s Gordon Stettinius explains how both artists are “masterful printers who have elected to bounce from positive imagery to negative imagery in their respective projects,” creating vibrations between the two bodies of work.
ANIMAL LAND opens Thursday, May 4, 5-8pm, at Candela Gallery
Artist Talk about 6:15.
A Chicken in Every Plot on Google Arts & Culture
The Valentine Museum has been partnering with Google Cultural Institute which has put full exhibition content and images from our exhibition A Chicken in Every Plot on its Google Arts & Culture site.
ANIMAL LAND at Candela Gallery
Solo exhibition opens Thursday, May 4, 2017 5-8pm with a public reception & artist talk at Candela Gallery.
Come say hello.
Rustic Roost – that’s definitely my studio!
Thanks Richmond Home, Marissa Hermanson & Sarah Walor for making us (me, studio, house, & chickens) look so good in this breezy but comprehensive feature in this month’s R-Home Magazine.
And thanks for the shout out for the upcoming ANIMAL LAND exhibition at Candela Gallery – opening in just a few weeks on Thursday, May 4.
Collectors’ Night benefits Visual Arts Center of Richmond
Don’t miss it – March 18, 2017. Dazzling showcase of creativity and important funding source for Richmond’s keystone Visual Arts Center. Guest Curator Scott Nolley is selecting a very special piece from my studio for this year’s auction. Info & tickets – you want ’em.
Love Potion No. 23 at Studio Two Three Saturday & Sunday February 11 & 12
Feel the love. Spread the love.
Alyssa as Blue Skies Workroom will have affordable and adorable Valentines and small prints, as well as a few romantically colorful tea towels and napkins at Studio Two Three‘s Valentine’s Day extravaganza Love Potion No. 23, Saturday and Sunday, February 11th and 12th. The weekend will be LOVEly with an irresistible array of artists’ artwork and live action photo portrait studio. More info here!
ANIMAL LAND to be featured at Candela Gallery, opening May 4, 2017
Candela Gallery will feature ANIMAL LAND, Alyssa’s collaboration with scientist and educator Anne Wright and VCU Rice Rivers Center, in solo exhibition during May & June 2017. Recent work, brand new work, big pieces and intimate ones. Details soon.
Studio Visitors
Writer Marissa Hermanson Moomaw came in December, & today Sarah Walor, to see & talk about some of my favorite things in studio & home – there’s an article in the works for R-Home. You know Chickahominy Lake was in the mix, as were Blue Skies Workroom napkins & towels.
CHICKEN PHILOSOPHY: The Art of Alyssa Salomon
January 6 through February 24, 2017 at Off-the Square Gallery, Yellow Door Art Studios, Leonardtown, Maryland. Screen print workshop Saturday, February 4 – contact Yellow Door for more information and registration. Alyssa will be at the Friday, February 3 evening reception during Leonardtown’s First Friday event. Come say hello and tell me about Leonardtown.
ANIMAL LAND is part of InLight 2016
The video projection NIGHT LIFE will be part of 1708 Gallery’s one night exhibition InLight Richmond, November 11, 2016.
NIGHT LIFE is a part of the collaborative project ANIMAL LAND by Alyssa Salomon and Anne Wright, and has been created for InLight. The deer shown in NIGHT LIFE were filmed within Richmond’s James River Park, less than four miles from Scott’s Addition where this year’s InLight extravaganza will be installed. We may think of ourselves as urban creatures, but we all live in ANIMAL LAND.
today begins a glorious adventure
For the next twelve months, Alyssa is Rice Rivers Center Artist in Residence, working with Director of Outreach Education Anne Wright, Science in the Park, and who knows what other aspects of Virginia Commonwealth University’s biological field station. The residency has grown out of our work with the amazing and beautiful game camera images Anne’s collected in the James River Park.
