A new restaurant and bar is slated to open in Midtown Harrisburg in the new year, but food and drink won’t be the only focus.
The Millworks, which is slated to open winter 2015, will feature 33 resident artists in 23 studios within the building. It also will have three art galleries that will showcase the in-house artists’ works.
Tara Chickey, art director for The Millworks, selected artists representing a range of styles, from sculptors to photographers.
Bar and restaurant patrons will be able watch the artists work and walk through the art studios to engage with the artists and learn about their process. The studios in the building will function as the primary studios for the artists.
One of the three galleries will be located in the entrance way, while the other two will be in a separate area. One will be dedicated to featuring artists of the month.
Meet the artists of The Millworks:
Click through to read more about each of The Millworks’ artists.
Andrew Guth
A Pennsylvania native, Guth has worked consistently in various mediums throughout his career including painting, printmaking, photography, installation work and film. Guth’s visual works often seek to convey personal narratives through the use of mixed media which include: acrylics, oils, digital film stills, charcoal, graphite, photographs and other ephemera. The intent is to create a layered environment in which the viewer can project personal narrative and experience through the piecing together of visuals and text, relying on personal associations to the arrangements, color and objects to dictate the experience.
Guth’s work has been shown regionally and nationally continuously since 2001. His paintings have been showcased in Philadelphia, New York, Washington DC, Baltimore and Harrisburg, PA. Guth has owned and curated a number of galleries in the city of Harrisburg over the past decade including The Mantis Collective Gallery (with fellow artist Tara Chickey), and North Gallery. He currently organizes and curates ‘pop-up’ exhibits throughout central PA as well as in Philadelphia.
Ann Yeager-Lawson
Ann Yeager-Lawson is a native of Lancaster County, and is representative of a lineage of very accomplished artists. Her Great, Great Uncle was Thomas Hart Benton (an American Regionalist Painter 1889-1975), who taught and mentored Jackson Pollock (an American Abstract Expressionist 1912-1956). Her mother, Linda Benton McCloskey, is an accomplished artist who is certified and has been internationally published several times.
Ann primarily works in acrylic and mixed media elements, including charcoal, pastels, modeling paste, tar gels; anything that can add texture to her canvas. She also dabbles in watercolor well. Ann believes abstract art is endless in its possibilities, and infinite in design.
Caleb Smith
Caleb Smith is a filmmaker/photographer residing in Harrisburg. He teaches Film and Video Production at the Capital Area School for the Arts Charter School in Harrisburg. He also is part of the volunteer operated film and sound organization Moviate, which bring filmmakers and musicians to Harrisburg as well as programs the annual Artsfest Film Festival.
Caroline Owens
Caroline Owens is a self taught artist and craftswoman from Harrisburg, PA. Her lifelong fascination with fiber, color and structure is expressed in tapestries woven of various weights of paper colored with acrylic media. Each complex image begins as two or more separate paintings which Owens slices into strips and then reweaves to form a stable fabric with a rhythmic geometry of exposed edges.
The finished works resemble tile mosaics or pixilated photographs. After many years as a teacher and university educator, Caroline now markets her unique weavings nationally and through her website.
Fennec Design
Fennec Design is the collaborative effort of Joelle and Justin Arawjo, a multi-disciplinary project that includes print making, jewelry design, and textile work. The couple hand prints and crafts their own line of apparel, home goods, and jewelry available online and all over the country in small boutiques. With a combined 15 years of experience in professional screen printing and design they specialize in both fine art and commercial printing and branding.
They pride themselves on using non-toxic, waterbased inks, sweatshop-free apparel and environmentally conscious paper goods as the starting point for all of their work. Most printed pieces are drawn together, with each artist contributing elements to the overall collage design. Over time they have constructed a visual lexicon that draws inspiration from folklore and mythology, medical and scientific illustration, alchemical etchings, sacred geometry and early tattoo art. The compositions of pieces are informed by a penchant for geometry and gridding techniques culled from studying the history of textile design. Similarly jewelry pieces draw on the rich themes of natural form, symmetry, and the careful incorporation of mineral, botanical, and other organic elements.
Craig Andrews
I am always thinking about the next painting. I enjoy the one that I have created, but only for a moment. Once it is down on paper and complete, it is gone from my mind and that is when the birth of a new idea takes place. Painting in watercolor does not come easy for me. I have to continuously work at it. I am always practicing techniques or sketching and taking photographs.
I have always had an awareness of nature and what I see around me and this drive to reproduce its beauty with paint and a brush. I grew up exploring the wooded areas and streams of Manchester and Mt. Wolf, PA. I would explore the Susquehanna River around the York Haven area. Now that I am older I have not lost that sense of exploration. I enjoy going back to places that I had explored as a child. Now I discover these places with my camera and a sketch book. I love to research artists that inspire me, such as Winslow Homer, John Singer Sargent, Andrew Wyeth, as well as John Marin. I try to find parallels between what these great masters have experienced and what I experience as an American artist.
Crystal Wagner
Crystal Wagner was born in Baltimore, MD and received her MFA from the University of Tennessee in 2008, her BFA from the Atlanta College of Art in 2004, and her AFA from Keystone College in La Plume PA in 2002 and after five years teaching as a college art professor, she left academia to focus exclusively on her studio practice. Wagner’s interest in combining 2–dimensional and 3–dimensional forms, alternative use of materials, and hybrid approaches to printmaking have led to countless visiting artist invitations and to her artwork being exhibited extensively across the United States.
Her work has been featured by Juxtapoz Magazine, Hi Fructose Contemporary Art Magazine, among many others. Wagner’s exhibition schedule has her actively growing large–scale installations all over the United States and abroad. Her installations have been featured at both the Southern Graphics Council International Conference and the Mid–American Print Council Conference. Most recently she was the sculpture and installation category winner for the See.Me: Art Takes Paris, International Competition.
Doug Tomlinson
I began painting a few years ago. I’ve always enjoyed abstract art and I’m drawn to its random forms of creativity. When I look at a new piece, I tend to have an immediate reaction of like or dislike. Often times, it has less to do with the overall composition and more to do with how it makes me feel when I look at it. If I have a positive reaction, I can look at it in more detail and begin to enjoy the nuances and individuality that went into making it.
I’m intrigued by the history of modern art. Once there were only realistic paintings, and someone had the desire to imagine bigger and create something that hadn’t been seen before. From there, future artists kept adding their own personality until we have the abstract art that is created today. I like to think my paintings are influenced by a great number of artists. I enjoy changing my style and like to imagine pieces that challenge me to move beyond my comfort zone. For me, it keeps painting interesting and exciting as I’m always looking for new ways to create art.
Elaine Brady Smith
Elaine Brady Smith is a Pennsylvania native and a graduate of The Art Institute of Pittsburgh with a degree in Graphic Arts. She has also studied with regional and national mixed media and encaustic artists. Her current focus is nonobjective/abstract art in collage, mixed media and encaustic mediums.
“I create through personal intuition, most often starting a piece with either found collage paper or printed papers made with collagraph printing plates. I enjoy using unconventional items for mark making in both mixed media and encaustic mediums. Key ingredients in my work are paper, repetitive marks, simplistic shapes and transparent layers to build each piece, then adding a pop of color…”
Elaine has had solo art exhibits in several Pennsylvania galleries, as well as at the Art Assoc. of Harrisburg, Susquehanna Art Museum, Whitaker Center, and other venues in the Central PA area. She also enjoys teaching collage, mixed media and encaustic art at several locations in the Harrisburg and Lancaster area.
Jason Lyons
Creations from man made objects discarded as refuse and reinterpreted to form objects found in nature are the inspirations for my art. The simple spoon forms the body of a rainbow trout; a discarded children’s toy becomes the foundation for a moose; oil cans transform into armadillos.
Whose to say every spoon handle is not a bird’s wing waiting to take flight? Ideas grow from a single reclaimed object consisting of primarily wood or metal that create the foundation of its repurpose. Sensing exactly what a certain item is to become just by it’s very shape, material and innate energy sculptures literally grow from that humble beginning. Building on that the reclaimed objects are then transformed from their mechanized human intentions into organic figures found in nature.
My formal education, as well as much of my daily life, revolves around art. I excel in areas that focus on sculpting from reclaimed objects consisting of primarily wood and metal, augmented with, well, whatever else I can find. To me, it is the organic nature of many of these man-made objects that serves as a natural inspiration for me and lend themselves to the organic figures I produce.
Johnson & Griffiths Studio
Johnson & Griffiths Studio is a full service art conservation, architectural restoration, & decorative arts studio. Our experienced team of artists, artisans & conservators develops tailored solutions to unique decorative arts challenges of all shapes, ages & sizes.
Whether restoring an object, painting a room or an entire building interior, our guiding ethos is grounded in aesthetic sensitivity, respect for historical context and our passion for the decorative arts. We combine more than 25 years of technical experience and knowledge of the materials and methods used in the restoration arts to work in partnership with clients, architects and general contractors. Some of our more notable restoration projects include: The U. S. Department of the Treasury Building, Pennsylvania State Capitol Building, Penn State University’s Old Main, Historic St. Mary’s Church in Lancaster and the historic Rittenhouse Plaza in Center City Philadelphia.
Jeffrey B. Johnson
Jeff is an artist, conservator, designer, furniture maker and the owner of the art conservation and architectural restoration firm, Johnson & Griffiths Studio, based in Harrisburg, PA. Jeff studied studio art at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and Millersville University. He moved to Harrisburg in 1987 to intern with the art and architectural conservation firm Albert Michaels Conservation (AMC). The internship grew into a full-time position and later Johnson became a part owner of AMC. In 2007, Jeff and his wife Norah Griffiths Johnson started Johnson & Griffiths Studio (J&G). Through it all, Jeff has continued creating his own artwork and exhibiting in solo and group gallery shows, including locally at the Mantis Gallery, Doshi Gallery, Harrisburg Art Association and the State Museum’s annual Art of the State, among others.
Through the years, Jeff’s creative energy also has focused on designing interiors and furniture for spaces such as Mangia Qui, Rubicon, Savannah’s on Hanna, Gabriella’s Restaurant in Harrisburg and the Gas Station Kitchen and Bar in Hummelstown.
Joan Maguire
Dabbling in arts all my life, I began concentrating on what always made me happy… watercolor and painting. I have developed a wonderful following of collectors, awards and one-woman shows. I feel fortunate to be able to bring pleasure to people with my art. I have a diverse collection of subjects that I paint ranging from stone barns to tropical palms, sea turtles and hibiscus. I like to try different surfaces, depending on the subject matter. Along with 300 lb. Arches paper, I like to paint on Yupo and Masa paper.
Watercolor painting parties are part of my repertoire. These will be available at the Millworks, at local venues and in private homes. High quality artist watercolor paint supplies are used – the same I use in my own paintings – with a variety of themes available. Watercolor painting group lessons will also be available at the Millworks.
John C. Davis
John Davis is a native of Central PA. As an artist, he has found his inspirations from traveling the world, being most inspired by unique architecture and landscapes. He works in numerous mediums, including oils, acrylics, ink studies, ceramics, mosaics, and eclectic found-object art. His works hang in private residence and organizations throughout, including two Embassies in Washington, DC. He has had several one-person and group shows in recent years.
Davis is part-president of the Hershey Area Art Association; served on the Board of Directors of the Art Association of Harrisburg, and is an active member of the global-based Association of Managers of Innovation. He is employed full-time by Milton Hershey School as Art and Gallery Educator / Coordinator of Visual Arts.
Yachiyo Beck
My passion for art has been an enduring force in my life. I attempt to create an atmosphere that offers the viewer a temporary diversion from life’s adversities. My sources of inspiration include personal experiences, nature, and my own artistic imagination. A distinct Asian influence is present in many of my paintings. I have worked in a variety of media including pencil, charcoal, and pastels.My current focus is on painting with oils and watercolors. I have studied watercolor techniques with Lavonne Tarbox-Crone and other artists.
My desire for a creative outlet has influenced many of my life decisions. Originally from Japan, I achieved a position as general manager of an international modeling agency. After 16 years in the fashion industry, I retired and moved to the United States where I began my career as a professional artist.
Stash Collective
Since they opened Stash’s doors in April of 2013, the four artists behind the quaint shop have carefully curated a dynamic selection of vintage, handmade, repurposed and hand-altered merchandise ranging from clothing and accessories to housewares and small furniture pieces.
Haley Harned is a freelance editorial, portrait and architectural photographer. Jessica Flynn, a Harrisburg native, is an artist and seamstress who believes solidly in sustainability and that a little mending goes a long way. Anela Bence Selkowitz is a freelance photographer as well as an art director, assistant producer and photographer for Cowboy Bear Ninja. Jen Merrill, who was born and raised in Central Pennsylvania, works as a freelance writer and contributing editor at Harrisburg Magazine and Lehigh Valley Magazine. The Stash ladies use their Millworks space to help expand their online store and work on their own personal projects.
Jessica Flynn
Jessica Flynn is a Harrisburg native. After graduating HACC with her associates in performing arts, she moved to Philadelphia to attend Temple University and graduated with a BA in theatre and a minor in English. In 2007, she left Philadelphia and moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in film and experience life without winter. Out west she fell out of love with her drive for acting while discovering a new passion for fashion and textiles. She primarily works with old fabrics and t-shirts to repurpose into other garments or household items. She is passionate about artist collaboration and has paired up with local graffiti artist SR81 to combine hand cut stencils into a variety of items from clothing to interior decorative pieces. She believes that the Millworks will be a space for creativity and inspiration that will help the drive of revitalizing this city.
Anela Bence Selkowitz
Anela was born in California and currently resides in Harrisburg, PA. Photography started early in high school, inspired by young artist friends, riot grrrl & Harper’s Bazaar, and she soon began documenting social-misfit colleagues as they would skip school, often breaking into abandoned buildings and exploring other out-of-bounds areas. Since then Anela’s been working as a photographer with a focus in portraiture and photo journalism. In 2010, she relocated to Harrisburg and opened a studio and art gallery, known as Studio A, where she shoots for clients and hosts gallery openings for local artists. For the past 3 years she’s concentrated more on her own personal photo projects but still shoots for private and commercial clients across the country. When not shooting, she can be found at Stash Collective, the vintage boutique she and three other local ladies opened in downtown Harrisburg in April of 2013.
Haley Harned
Haley Harned graduated with a BFA from The Savannah College of Art and Design. She is co-owner of the vintage boutique Stash Collective and a freelance architectural and editorial photographer. Her personal work includes fine art photography and mixed media.
Judy Kelly
Judy Kelly is a mixed media artist. She has explored mediums such as collage, abstract painting, oil and wax, jewelry, assemblage, and photography. Judy is known for her found object assemblage which she refers to as “ROBOTS.” She states that each ROBOT has its own name and personality. She finds that the Robots represent history and tell a story of the past. Through this art form she became known as “ Robot Girl.” Judy was published in the March issue of Harrisburg Magazine in 2013. Some of the places she has exhibited are the Governor’s Mansion “Art In The Garden,” Gallery Walk, Arts on Union, Haverstick, Hive, Harrisburg Magazine, May 3rd In The Burg, and the Five Artists Invitational at AAH. Photography is a new art form she is currently exploring.
Julie Iaria
Julie Iaria is a native of Harrisburg who grew up close to the river. As a visual and performing artist, she is inspired by the harmony, discord, texture, and palettes of her environs, near and far.
Julie works in a variety of mediums, including oil, encaustic, acrylic, and ink. As a continuous learner, she enjoys acquiring new skills and incorporating them into her artwork.
Kira Frech
Kira Frech was born in Pottstown Pennsylvania in 1987. She studied painting and graduated with a BFA in 2009 from Kutztown University. Upon graduating Kira interned with Charis Lindrooth, an herbalist, and worked at her farm. It was during this time that Kira developed an interest in natural fibers and natural dyes. She taught herself how to spin and used the weeds in her back yard to dye her yarn. With the desire to learn more about fiber production and dyeing Kira spent 3 months interning at Steam Valley Fiber Farm. Under the mentorship of Phylleri Ball, Kira raised angora goats and sheep. After the internship Kira started working at Gurdy Run Woolen Mill. While working at Gurdy Run Woolen Mill Kira was responsible for washing fiber and running machinery to process wool into yarn, felt, and roving. During the winter of 2014, Kira restored her first floor loom and began the process of learning to weave. Kira utilizes her farm raised, hand or Gurdy Run spun, and natural dyed yarn to weave fabrics to use in home or fashion.
Linda Benton McCloskey
A new work is begun without a preconceived outcome in mind. I simply begin painting and then intuition, love, desire, and experience take over In this dream-like state, I give way to the process – eventually seeing and responding to shapes, forms, and movements and they are developed further…regardless of the result, the painting takes me to a new and unexpected destination.
My art is influenced by the impulsive approach of the abstract impressionists de Kooning, Motherwell, Kline, Mitchell, and Hofmann. Discovering creative ways of expression and keeping traditional rules of painting out of the picture are priorities. While varying my palette of colors and approaches, recent non-objective works are mostly water-media, encaustic, cold wax, and oil with lots of texture and color. Diversity, with all its fascinating choices, is intriguing and evident in my work. I have won numerous national and international awards and have been published in several international publications.
Robert J. McCloskey
Since I have such a great love for my country and its history, I am inspired by the symbols of America and its many heroes. The more I paint, the more dedicated I become. Since retiring, I am able to spend more time in developing ideas and putting them on paper, canvas or parchment. I have won many regional awards and have exhibited in many local venues.
Mary Gelenser
Mary Kandray Gelenser is a collage, mixed media and assemblage artist who delights in making something from nothing. Junk, found objects and upcycled materials have always been central to the crafts and artistic expressions that she has created. While she has no formal training in art, collage and mixed media classes from local artists introduced her to techniques, tools, materials and principles of design and composition that have taken her art to a more focused and professional level. Color, found objects, recycled papers and hardware, old and new are all staples of her mixed media and assemblage pieces. Finding inspiration from nature and from the found and recycled materials themselves, she creates semi-abstract pieces with reference to the natural world and living creatures. She looks forward to working among and gaining inspiration from The Millworks’ artists and to sharing her work with a new audience.
Paul Vasiliades
In just a few short years, Paul Vasiliades has developed a reputation as one of Central PA’s premier wedding photographers. Through a friend, in 2011, Paul stumbled across his first opportunity to photograph a wedding as an informal second shooter. The moments, the atmosphere and overall energy of the wedding helped drive his desire to make a career change into a Full-Time Professional Wedding Photographer.
Anyone that knows Paul or is familiar with his work, understands this to be true; You’re not only hiring someone that will capture all the necessary moments of your event, but is dedicated to coordinating the organization every step along the way. His energy and technical skill is to be desired and the images reflect this. Paul’s latest work includes an array of travel photography, Jamaica for a Destination Wedding, Chicago for an Engagement Shoot, and cities such as New York, Brooklyn and D.C for landscape and fine art imagery.
Gianna Veno
Born in the U.S., Gianna Veno is an emerging artist who considers herself an Infusion Artist. This type of detailed art includes mixing molding paste, sand, gel, with acrylics and oils to create a 3D work on canvas; along with different origins from her worldly travels. Veno is a purist when it comes to art, brush to canvas, no electricity required.
Marsha Souders
I am a retired teacher and artist working in the medium of clay monoprinting. By using colored clay slips and a variety of application techniques, thin layers of clay slip are applied to newsprint paper then rolled onto a thin clay slab. After building up an image on this clay slab, a print is lifted. Two prints at most can be produced, with the second print always being slightly different, thus the term monoprint (one print) because no two will ever be the same. Many times these prints can be enhanced through the use of colored pencils, fine markers, and various collage techniques. This adds another creative aspect to the process.
My love of color infuses the compositions I create, a nod to the contemporary world and the manufactured tints which color my porcelain slips. More importantly, the clay monoprinting process encourages the serendipity quality of “playful creation” each time a print is begun and ensures a new exploration of the theme. This joy in creation (through references to primitive man and nature) is what I hope is apparent in my work.
Richard Souders
Richard Souders is a retired art teacher, having taught in the Harrisburg School District (Riverside Arts Magnet Program and Harrisburg High School) and the Pennsylvania Governor’s School for the Arts when it presided at Bucknell University. Art endeavors have been in clay and fiber and now photography; the exploration of street photography has been the most recent interest. He has BS and MED degrees in Art Education from Kutztown State College, now Kutztown University.
Tami Bitner
My artistic style is primarily non-objective. I enjoy creating works on canvas, board, and paper using a variety of watermedia, textural, and collage techniques. I am also passionate about working with cold wax and encaustic on both wood and paper. Encaustic involves layering beeswax infused with oil paint and damar resin, and incorporates unique textures and shapes to create a two-dimensional piece that is impossible to duplicate. Whether I’m using paint or wax, my goal is to develop a rich surface that suggests a mysterious interplay between transparency, opacity, layering, and subtle textures. When creating art, I try to establish a creative use of composition, rhythm, line, and color so the piece will stir the thoughts, feelings, and visual excitement in the minds of viewers. My art work is strongly influenced by nature, music, texture, shapes, and spirituality and I strive to create pieces that remove the objective walls around us to reveal the excitement from within the work itself. When you view my work, I ask that you open your mind and experience the emotion, energy, and movement captured.
Susan Bailey
Susan Bailey is a mixed media artist living in Harrisburg, PA. After a 30 year career in logistics, budgeting and accounting she finds the freedom in color, and texture exhilarating! Putting down the federal regulations and picking up the color wheel, the rules of composition and experimenting with various papers is life changing! When Susan is not creating, teaching or learning about art, you can find her engaged in her 2nd passion … traveling. Susan’s favorite quote is by Andy Warhol “Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding make even more art.”
Tara Chickey
Like most art, even the most literal or figurative, mine is a mixture of memory and actual experience, an alloy of residues of what has transpired in my life with the various ways my mind remembers these incidents. Hence false cognates, hallucinated moments and misinterpretations exist in flagrant innocence by the side of hard documentation and transparent portrayal. In this context, even untruths exhibit the spirit of sincerity.
Most significantly, my travels and displacements foster personal growth and by extension feed my paintings. Specifically, my travels to Iceland, where I encountered nature at its most glacial, vegetation at its sparsest, have taken my aesthetic in unpredicted directions. While there, I traveled through terrains and vistas which motivated me to adjust my painterly gaze. These experiences have been a continued source of inspiration to me in my work ever since.
Tina Berrier
Tina Berrier is a self taught mixed media artist, painter and assemblage creator. As a child her favorite Christmas presents were the boxes from the Jewel tea man that contained art supplies. Through her explorations she has dabbled in pen and ink, pastels, charcoal, oils and now has settled on acrylics. All of these revelations have lead her to the art form now known as Mixed Media. This art form allows for creative expression through various mediums and includes adding collage, stencils and stamping, photography or any other tools available to the artist. Once an outsider form of expression; mixed media, graffiti, up cycling and all forms of self expression are now readily accepted.
Tina feels that her art is a continuing struggle between meaning and beauty. As a Middle Eastern dance performer and teacher her work is also influenced by the colors and mythos of other cultures.
Christine Goldbeck
As an art photographer, I work mostly with nature. Other favorite subjects include industrial and farm ruins and windows. I also like to use my technical skills with cameras and my creative abilities as an artist to produce abstract, painterly photographs. I paint with light, in other words. I work to capture or to create motion through natural means, such as wind or moving water, and through my own action, such as panning or swiping. The goal is to express movement, reflection, texture and vivid color in photographs using an overall style similar to the Impressionist painters.
My paintings are explorations of craft and self. My favorite way to work with traditional paints is to put aside brushes and reality to make layered and textured stories. I build both visual and dimensional texture into most of my paintings. Lately, I am enjoying working with encaustic and oil and with cold wax and oil. I exhibit widely and my art is in stateside and in international corporate and private collections. I am a Juried Member of the Pennsylvania Guild of Craftsmen and the Daily Painters of Pennsylvania.
James Arnold
James T. Arnold was born and raised in Lebanon, Pennsylvania. He received a Bachelor’s degree in Illustration from The University of the Arts in Philadelphia in 2008. His work is created using a mixed media process. The work varies from larger abstract paintings to imaginative Illustrations for publications and private commissions. He lives and works in Annville, Pennsylvania.
