James Maria

Today is the opening reception of “The Art of Watercolor” at The Rotunda Gallery at the Bethlehem city town hall.

I’ll be showing some brand new works alongside some previously shown paintings for the next month. I’m honored to be showing alongside four other tremendous painters, each exploring the unique nuances of water media in their own awesome way.

I’d love to see you at the reception!

Finally Finished this piece that I started back at the beginning of the shutdown. This is one of my favorite subjects (sites) that is no longer standing. The Old St Nicholas Coal Breaker in Mahanoy City was a truly magical place when the light hit it just right.

Still soul searching a bit for a title.

Excited to submit it for one of my favorite big international shows this year!

Finally finished this painting! Just in time to have submitted it for consideration for AWS's 155th anniversary juried show.

Hoping to finish this beast by the 17th to submit in AWS. Trying to employ some more expressive use of color in the underpainting passages before I introduce local color and texture.

Hey there everybody!

I'm excited to announce that "Breaking Glass" opens tomorrow at The Painting Center in Chelsea!

I've been up to some new and different things in the past couple months as I prepared for this show-most notably, varnishing a body of my watercolor paintings. This exhibition showcases a handful of my friends who are experimenting with new ways of presenting works on paper without glazing. We hope that this new method offers new ways for a viewer to engage with watercolor paintings and brings a new perspective to the conversations surrounding the discipline.

"Breaking Glass" is sponsored by Golden Artist Colors, Inc., and curated by Laurin McCracken with support from The Painting Center. It features 10 watercolor artists who are recognized through their memberships in national watercolor societies and multiple awards for their work, as well as being represented in significant public and private collections.

This should be a show that is uniquely important and rewarding to see in person, even for those of you familiar with my work as I've traditionally shown it.

Featuring artists: Matthew Bird , Laurin McCracken, Thomas Bucci, Michael Holter, Rance Jones Art, Lynn D. Pratt Paintings, Frank Spino,Iain Stewart, and David L Stickel

Exhibition Dates: September 7 – October 2, 2021
Reception: Thursday, September 9, 5:30pm - 8pm

The Painting Center The Painting Center is pleased to announce Breaking Glass, a group exhibition opening on September 7, 2021 and running through October 2, 2021. The exhibition showcases watercolor artists on the forefront of developing modern techniques to present their watercolor artwork in a permanent fashion, wit...

Excited to have finished this commission last week for two of my amazing clients from Cross Keys Tattoo Studio who chose to support my painting business too!

Super thankful for this amazing local business. I’ve always had difficulties shipping paintings from FedEx and UPS retail locations-they’re either exorbitantly expensive, overly reliant on digital systems and inevitably always give me guff about shipping and insuring artwork...or literally about anything. I have really simple needs, but those big box companies can’t seem to meet those needs. The folks at Mail N Ship 4U in Wyomissing have my back every time and are always able to work with me to find the perfect intersection of safe, inexpensive and timely shipping options for my paintings that travel all over the country. Happy to have this painting back from a juried show in Fort Worth, TX, safely.

I’ve been working on something new for the past couple days! 4x6” image Printed with speedball professional relief ink on 5x7” 140lb fabriano artistico hot press paper. Open editions. $25 each, $40 for a pair. MTO next day, mailed or delivered as soon as it’s dry (few more days). More designs soon!

Over here knocking out paintings left and right from the home studio! Excited to put each of these paintings down for a couple days before finishing touches and titles. I’m gonna have to get out exploring asap to get some new reference material!

Some progress from the home studio! Off for a little bike ride before I get back to work this afternoon.

Putting this piece down for a bit. It’s always good to put a nearly finished piece aside and come back to look with fresh eyes down the line. In the meantime, I’m excited to start a new (but admittedly, less ambitiously composed) quarter sheet that I’m excited to share with you all this evening. Stay tuned for details!

Little progress update from the home studio. I’m missing my space in the Goggleworks Center for the Arts and definitely missing all of the creative energy of my fellow studio artists and arts partners there. It can be hard to muster the motivation to “go to work” when working from home, but I’m taking steps to establish a routine as much as possible.