Alex Dzigurski II
Land and Sea Exhibition,
Sept 5-30

Alex says, "Regardless the art form, the joy of creating something out of nothing is tremendously rewarding and intoxicating" This is the underlying sentiment which throbs through the mighty heart of Alex Dzigurski. He goes on to say, "In a way, the art you create is something tangible, it says you were here."

benefits far outweigh any negatives. He went on saying, "I'm honored that people compare my work to his." When asked to define how his father's work differs from his own, Alex thought for a moment and then characterized the difference saying. "My work is brighter while his is more subtle and more natural."

When speaking of the difficulties artists face today, Alex discussed how bad the current economic realities are, but then paused and expressed how his father, as a young artist, endured the great depression in his native Slovenia and the extreme hardships and dangers of World War II.

For both him and his dad, their paintings go beyond the times in which they were created. More than anything else, their art is saturated with optimism. It is in response to the glory and beauty to be found in nature all around them.

Exhibition in Pasadena. His work is represented in numerous prestigious private collections and by scores of people all across the country who just really like his work. Aside from Bodega Bay Heritage Gallery, Alex exhibits his work through galleries in Dallas, Carmel, and Lahaina as well as his own website, AlexDzigurski.com

Alex is justifiably proud of his accomplishments in art, but his pride extends beyond far beyond his painting. His wife Michelle is an art teacher - all bright eyes and and a blur of active loving energy nurturing the artistic side of the next generation.

And Michelle and Alex have two great kids, a son Nicholas who is attending Academy of Art University in San Francisco majoring in industrial design, and a daughter Haley, beginning her senior year in high school and busy submitting college applications.

Make plans to visit Bodega Bay during September and see this amazing exhibition of Alex's work, and add an Alex Dzigurski II to your collection.

A PBS Documentary...
The Albert Barnes Collection
and its new Philadelphia Campus

If have never had a reason to visit the city of Brotherly Love, you have one now.

Philadelphia's newest museum contains the Barnes Collection, the most expansive and impressive collection of impressionist, post-impressionist and modernist paintings on the American continent.

Its dazzling new Philadelphia campus boasts of 181 works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, 69 by Paul Cézanne, 59 by Henre Matisse, 46 by Pablo Picasso, 21 by Chaim Soutine, 18 by Henri Rousseau, 16 by Amedeo Modigliani, 11 by Edgar Degas, 7 by Vincent Van Gogh, and 6 by Georges Seurat.

How is it that such a collection comes to a new home in downtown Philadelphia?

The answer lies in the life story of Dr. Albert Barnes, a 19th century pharmaceutical entrepreneur who garnered a fortune creating Argyrol, an antiseptic silver compound used in the prevention of infant blindness. He had a life long appreciation of art and was influenced by one of his mates from his youth, New York ashcan painter, William Glackens.

On a trip to Paris, Albert was introduced around the Parisian art scene by none other than Leo Stein. Once back home, Albert bankrolled his friend William Glackens, entrusting him to go to Paris and purchase art.

PBS Arts has created a documentary film of The Barnes Collection, and we recommend you view it. Based in the philosophy and philanthropy of Albert Barnes, the film centers of how he acquired this art and how he wished it to be used in perpetuity. Since Dr. Barnes death due to an auto accident in 1951, circumstances have changed and a new plan has been conceived and put forth. The result is that the collection has now been moved to its new campus in Philadelphia, and is located on a beautifully landscaped four and a half acre site on Benjamin Franklin Parkway in the center of Philadelphia's cultural corridor. Now these masterworks can inspire art lovers across the globe. So, here's one to add to your "bucket list." Enjoy!

The PBS Arts documentary to the right is loaded with fascinating images of art, views of the new Barnes Collection campus in Philadelphia, and quotations from Albert Barnes himself about the joy of viewing paintings. In an article entitled "How to Judge a Painting," Barnes addresses the issue of why a person should consider owning art.

"What are some of the pleasures (of owning a painting)? The least is the mere possession. The best, the joy that one can feel but not express to others. Between these two extremes are pleasures that can be compared to the notes of a piano, limited in what can be produced only by the performer's skill and knowledge.

Watch The Barnes Collection on PBS. See more from PBS Arts.( 54 Minutes 45 Seconds)
For best viewing, use the expand screen option. After the first 20 minutes, click on "continue viewing."

Good paintings are more satisfying companions than the best of books, and infinitely moreso than very nice people. I can talk without speaking, to Cézanne, Prendergast, Daumier, Renoir, and they talk to me in kind. I can criticize them, and take without offense the refutation which comes silently but powerfully, when I learn months later what they mean, and not what I thought they meant.

A man with a house full of good paintings needs no subterfuge of excessive heat or cold to drive him north or south to get away from his own wearying self. Golf, dances, theater, dinners, traveling get a setback as worthy diversions when the rabies of pursuit of quality and painting and its enjoyment gets into a man's system. And when he has surrounded himself with that quality, bought with his blood, he is a king.” 

Robert Hughes wrote, "I have always tended to take art contextually. If I have any merits as a critic, they have to do with my ability as a storyteller ... and above all I wanted to tell a story." For Hughes, teaching his audience about the artist's story was a necessary element to explaining the art. He believed it was basic that one must know about an artist and the times in which he lived before being able to understand the richness contained in the art.

He was born in Sydney, Australia, the son and grandson of prominent attorneys. Well educated, Robert associated with "the Sydney Push," a group of artists, writers, intellectuals and drinkers, Australia's 1960 version of New York's "Algonquin Round Table." Before leaving Australia, he authored an authoritative history entitled The Art of Australia, published in 1966.

His wit, sarcasm, and ability to relate truth with a minimum of words is a skill best honed in Australia. He once compared the histories of America with Australia. He said, "I think the biggest single difference between Australians and Americans is that you were founded as a religious experiment, and we were founded as a jail."

He left Australia in 1964, living briefly in Italy and then settling in London. There he wrote of art for numerous publications including The Spectator, The Daily Telegraph, The Times and The Observer. In 1970, he accepted a position as art critic for Time Magazine in New York.

Hughes was always controversial, never treating art as a precious and untouchable relic. To Hughes, art was alive, and its expression was from its inception, bold and confrontational.

Robert Hughes reported on artists, telling their stories, delving into their thoughts and the throbbing pulse of their creations. He then translated that original energy through his own extensive verbal palette, creating for his audience a sense of art which was full of the vibrancy of the life in which it was created.

In 1978, Roone Aldrege of ABC recruited Robert Hughes and Harold Hayes to host a new magazine show called 20/20. The first broadcast took place on June 6, 1978 and was the one and only episode featuring Robert Hughes. Roone Aldrege found Robert Hughes so controversial, he severed the contracts of both Hughes and Hayes, and replaced them with the milder TV veteran, Hugh Downs.

But Robert Hughes was to meet with success in television. In 1980, the BBC broadcast his series, The Shock of the New, which explored the development of modern art since the impressionists. Done in Hughes' bold style, the series is praised for its combination of critical insight while making the world of art accessible and enlightening for the masses.

Perhaps the best way to define Robert Hughes is how he defined himself, "I am, after all, a cultural critic, and my main job is to distinguish the good from the second-rate, pretentious, sentimental, and boring stuff that saturates culture today, more (perhaps) than it ever has."

• Above are a couple of videos, one from the Charlie Rose show broadcast in in 2006, and a clip we posted within an article from the Bodega Bay Heritage Gallery Monthly about New York's Ashcan School of painters in our March, 2010 issue
• Below are the first two episodes of The Shock of the New, a PBS series developed by Robert Hayes.

Robert Hayes passed away on August 6, 2012 at the age of 74. His legacy for us all is to view art as it lives, learning of it in the context of the times and people who created it, learning of ourselves in the process.