The Walter Art Gallery hosted a solo show by Diane Di Bernardino Sanborn, a well-known local artist. Over the many years of creating art, Sanborn has moved in and out of themes, media, and series. Currently, she is engaged in a visual dialogue with her work, exploring how it communicates with her audience. “Observations” demonstrates her expertise in color and composition and focuses on abstract formal concerns while many of the works incorporate figures in a variety of surroundings.

Sanborn holds an M.F.A. in Drawing and Painting from Governors State University IL, a BS in Art Education from Illinois State University, and an Associate of Arts Degree in Art Transfer Studies from Triton College, IL. During her time at ISU, she studied with Professors Emeritus Harold Gregor and Kenneth Holder.

Sanborn has received an Ox-Bow residency through the School of the Art Institute and has been nominated for the AZ Governor Best in Arts Education. In 2018, she was awarded an artist residency at the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Alexandria, VA. Her work has been nationally recognized and has been shown in several university galleries as well as public and private collections.

The Walter Art Gallery was pleased to present a solo exhibition of new works by Phoenix-based artist Charmagne Vasquez. This collection of paintings and sculptures are narrations from the artist’s life in the last few years. They reflect time spent in the natural spaces of the Sonoran Desert, Coconino Forest, and Vashon Island, WA. Vasquez endeavors to understand the web of life, personal human life stories and the constant pulse of evolution. She channels thoughts about nature as a wondrously mysterious hivemind of energy and interconnected species, all of which is in imminent need of our protection. Her spontaneous paintings are diverse close-up and panoramic terrains. She rawly integrates traditional and non-traditional materials: thick impasto, oil pastels, pencil, assemblages, mesquite pods, wool, wire, twine, canna lilies... The artist is also thrilled to present her newest experimental direction in sculpture: these are small, figurative works which embody human vulnerability, and a complex array of emotion and actions. These sculptures are part of a continuation of ideas she has explored in other sculptural forms and drawings. Come see “Hinterlands & Murmurations” to dwell in a place where art transcends words about humanness and our ephemeral planet.