It was a most enjoyable day working with eager young artists during school vacation break on April 21. Miss Kristin read from My Mosaic Alphabet Book to a group of 23 youngsters at the Centerville Library. Afterwards, I  lead a mini-mosaic workshop for all the kids. Parents joined in to assist in the gluing of little pieces of construction paper onto the cartoons from the book. One of Jim's former students from Cape Cod Community College showed up with her two children, too! It was such a pleasure to see her and her kids again. You can see more photos from this event here. I am looking forward to more of these events as we criss-cross the libraries and museums throughout Cape Cod and beyond.
Jim

It's official...My Mosaic Alphabet Book is a hit! Self -publishing a book is an uphill climb. Gathering your team together takes diligence, hard work and a wink from the universe that draws the right people into your life. Once your team puts the book together the journey really begins all over again. Marketing and promoting your little beauty is a task that never seems to end. If you do it well and are fortunate that your contacts in the media - both social and print - love your story, you will reap your rewards.
We have been blessed with good fortune quicker than we ever imagined. We launched in Mid-July and by Mid- November we sold out of our first printing- 1,000 books! <Cue trumpets and angel choirs>
We are still out there working the room and planning new products to extend our brand. For example, we now sell canvas prints of each mosaic letter on Etsy. www.etsy.com/shop/MyMosaicAlphabetBook?ref=hdr_shop_menu
We are also looking into greeting cards and book marks. In the meantime, you can find us ay numerous book signings and holiday fairs. Follow us on Facebook or sign up for our mailing list to keep posted.
Bye for now!

It's been many years since I have displayed any new mosaic work. Some folks in our tight knit mosaic community have wondered what I've been up to. Well, here goes.
Five years ago when my granddaughter Pilar was born, I decided that I would create a mosaic alphabet book for her. Little did I know that it would be an all consuming project. I threw myself into it. Now, that the book is complete we are publishing it for the world to see.
My Mosaic Alphabet Book has been a labor of love. We went through a long learning process once the work was done.( I will describe the process of creating each mosaic panel in future blogs) My wife Debbie who is quite a poet, put words to the pictures and that I had made. When that process was complete, we found  an excellent photographer named Tom Kleindinst who photographed the book magnificently. The stars were in line when I spoke to a lovely lady named Linda Readerman who guided me through the next steps. Linda was so kind and helpful, sharing as much information as she could and steering me in the right direction. Next, we hired a book designer from New York City who is a true artist himself. His name, Richard Oriolo. With Tom and Richard controlling the final view of the book, we were in good hands.
I'm happy to say that the book is now sent off to a printer in Ohio. It will be printed in the USA and we are very proud of that. 
I will continue to post updates on our Facebook page and this blog. 

​I found this article online today and feel like I have to share this information to all of the mosaic enthusiasts living on the west coast. Enjoy!

"Although, to date, the time machine is unfortunately just a sci-fi device, everybody can travel back to the past era of Roman Empire, simply by driving to the Getty Villa, in Malibu.
 
The new, exciting and comprehensive exhibition, Roman Mosaics across the Empire (March 30 – September 12), displays a range of exquisite mosaics, spanning from the 2nd through the 6th centuries A.D. Most of them, belong to the J. Paul Getty museum’s permanent collection, but they are now viewable to the public, for the first time. 
 
It’s not going to be solely a time travel, but a geographical one, as well. In fact, the magnificent artworks, which used to adorn floors and walls of both private and public buildings, come from the major provinces of the Roman Empire: Gaul - in this case, the southern part, called “Gallia Narbonensis”; North Africa - in particular, “Africa Proconsularis”, coincident with present-day northern Tunisia, northeastern Algeria, and western Libya - and Syria - present-day Turkey and modern Syria.
 
Probably, the most incredible piece of art is a majestic floor mosaic, found in a vineyard near Lago di Lucrino in Baiae (just west of Naples), in 1901. 
 
In 1971, the Getty Museum purchased twenty-tree panels of the mosaic, portraying a bear hunt. During the Roman Empire, aside from being a common figurative theme, “venationes” - the staged hunts of wild animals - were a popular form of entertainment, not unlike modern day’s bullfights in Spain.  
 
I’ve had the opportunity to hear from the curator of this much anticipated exhibition, Alexis Belis, who, since a very early age, has always loved digging in the dirt, with the hope of unearthing some precious artefact. 
 
A Princeton graduate and PhD in classical archaeology, Alexis’ dream came true, as she took part to several excavations in Greece and on Cyprus" more....http.://www.italoamericano.org/story/2016-4-1/roman-mosaics

Amy Marks who hails from the Boston area,  has signed on as one of our mosaic teachers this season. This will be Amy's first teaching experience with us and we are so excited! We met Amy as one of the participants of the National Mosaic Exhibition on Cape Cod which we co-curated in 2011.
She will be teaching mixed media mosaics. Students will create a mixed media mosaic art panel using a variety of media including glass tiles, polymer clay tiles, jewelry, fabric, and beads. Amy has taught all over the USA and just last year she taught a workshop in Barcelona, Spain - home of the fabulous Parc Guell and other historic mosaic sites.
Amy Marks is the President of the New England Mosaic Society (NEMS), a recently formed organization dedicated to encouraging and promoting excellence in contemporary mosaic art. She creates functional and decorative mosaics from her studio in Waltham, MA. Amy uses a rich color palette and a variety of materials —polymer clay and glass tiles, stained glass, pottery, millefiori, beads, shells and rocks—to create mixed media mosaics that are visually attractive and tactile. Amy’s work has been juried into exhibitions including Mosaics at the Mill I & II, and shows at the Sharon Arts Center, Danforth Museum of Art, and the Somerville Museum. She co-curated the Mosaics at the Mill Exhibition with Mosaic Oasis and teaches mosaic workshops at studios throughout Massachusetts.

IT was, as Roger Gale, eminent member of the Society of Antiquaries of London so eloquently and tantalisingly put it in 1728 “the finest pavement that the sun ever shone upon in England.”
Such was its significance, so exquisite its craftsmanship, that no sooner had it been found after well over a millennium beneath the Wiltshire soil than an engraving was scrupulously made by a leading artist of the day to convey its splendour to the outside world.
It was George Vertue’s finely detailed image, along with Gale’s mouth-watering eulogy that cast an enduring spell over Swindon archaeologists Bryn Walters and Bernard Phillips some 250 years later.
Surely the magnificent Orpheus Mosaic that was again lost to the world during the 18th Century so soon after its rediscovery, could once more be located, they hoped.
Read on...

http://www.swindonadvertiser.co.uk/news/14249725.Barry_Leighton_looks_at_the_not_so_lost_crusade/

 Hard to believe that we are already planning for the summer here on Cape Cod. But, the daffodils are popping up through the last remnants of snow and the birds are chirping. After last winter, this easy one has been a welcome relief. 
So, have you been thinking about your summer vacation? If you haven't been here before you will want to start planning now. We have a well-rounded schedule of workshops planned at the Falmouth Art Center and are excited to use the new workshop space which just opened up last week. It's full of light with plenty of elbow room for everyone. We are blessed in our little seaside town to have such a active artist community that would support such a fine building.

  Lisa Houck returns for a second year. Lisa, who hails from Boston is always a pleasure to work with. Her happy-go-lucky spirt fills a room and is contagious. Be sure to check out her web site, http://www.lisahouck.com and see her designs. Jim Bowen, returns every year to introduce mosaics to budding artists. His joy is seeing that "ahha" moment when the new student proudly discovers their own innate talent. His favorite thing is involving members of a community to help out with a public art project.  Susan Weschler is back again, too. She taught a couple years ago with us. Susan will be on a world- teaching tour from Mexico, Arizona, Italy, Massachusetts and California. We are lucky to be one of her final stops. Her mosaic style is like no other. Baubles and beads and piece of memories fill her palette. Be sure to follow this link to her web site to see what I mean.

  Check out the entire schedule here and let us know which classes you are interested in.