Each year six member artists are selected from the annual all-member show for a group show: Five by juror, one by popular vote.
The 2012 Merit Artists:
Mary Downing, Pete Fischer*, Pamela Fulcher, Deborah Males, Les McDonald, and Ken Reese
*people's choice Merit Artist
Celeste the chicken tours the world through the creative eyes of American artist Mary Downing. Celeste began her life on a historical farm in Austin, Texas. She was moved to her new digs near San Antonio where she lived out her life as an artist model. She visualized Celeste in her work first as pottery and then later in a series of paintings titled Urban Chicks. Downing has focused her work on the anthropomorphic lives of her animals including cats and dogs she has known and love.
Pete Fischer 's works in oil reflect the balance of realism and attention to detail that is characteristic of his unique background.University trained in fine arts and pre-medicine, Pete deviated from a future in medical illustration to pursue a career in engineering and construction.Forty years later, in 2001, his move to Rockport reignited his love for painting. Many of Pete’s paintings reflect his desire as an artist to create authentic portrayals that few are fortunate enough to experience first hand.
Pamela Fulcher is an award winning photographer, graphic artist and lover of all things expressed through art and is currently based in Rockport Texas. As the medium has evolved from film to digital files and image post production has moved out of the darkroom and onto the computer, Pam has evolved with it, looking for new opportunities to create her unique images. http://www.pamelafulcherphotography.com
Deborah Males is a painter and architect. Deborah’s work can be found in numerous private and public collections, including the permanent collection of the City of Corpus Christi and South Texas Institute for the Arts. The recipient of many awards, she has conducted seminars on process painting and taught classes at Del Mar College. She maintains a studio in Corpus Christi where she paints commissioned pieces as well as work for gallery exhibition. http://www.deborahmales.com/
Les McDonald, Jr. believes that nature presents us with a never-ending source of memorable images. He captures these moments and freezes them in time. Les has lived in Houston, Texas since 1967. He grew up on the Texas gulf coast, where he was surrounded by wildlife. With a BS degree in Commercial Art from Sam Houston State College in Huntsville, Texas, Les worked in advertising for nineteen years. In 1986, Les became a full-time artist working in his favorite medium, watercolor. http://www.lesmcdonald.com/
Ken Reese retired from an engineering/manager career of 30+ years in 1992. He has been involved in art of one form or another for about 16 years. His best friend and wife of 50+ years, Sandy, started him in watercolors. Changing from the straight lines and square corners of engineering was and is a real challenge that will take as long to unlearn as it did to learn them. For the past several years Ken has taught pottery in Rockport during the winter months. He has done demonstrations and shown his work for several art organizations in the Dallas area, the South Texas Pottery Show, the Bountiful Bowl Pottery Fair, Winter Texan Days in Rockport and the East Texas Art Society, among many others.
