Welcome to GIBBIN HOUSE!




When I first started this blog about the misadventures of a nascent author, I had only a small novel under my belt, titled Gibbin House. The building that bears the name is a fictitious postwar era safe-house, as many might have existed, and the London home of my motley crew of exiles. I could not anticipate then the degree to which I would join its ranks of writers and artists, but since publishing my book in 2011, I have had the greatest privilege of opening my own art gallery and of exploring my love of the written word through visual poetry and paper sculptures. Yet much like the girl who first started blogging two years ago, I suspect I don't know what I'm doing half the time. As such, Gibbin House remains a refuge for ramblings...and on occasion a haven for little triumphs.



Tuesday, February 28, 2012

ATELIER 1022 Presents Ellie Perla's 'PolyChromatica'

MARCH 10, 2012

ATELIER 1022 Studio and Fine Art Gallery is pleased to present the first ATELIER 1022 feature show for Romanian-born artist Ellie Perla.  The exhibition PolyChromatica will showcase a comprehensive collection of mixed-media drawings on paper, and debut the completed Garden of Eden series.  PolyChromatica will be open March 10 through April 1, 2012, with a reception for the artist at ATELIER 1022 Gallery on March 10, 2012, 6-8 PM.

The title of the exhibition, PolyChromatica, highlights the luxuriant color and micro-designs that characterize Ellie Perla’s exquisite works, while also hinting at the theme of global diversity the drawings celebrate.  A seasoned traveler and photojournalist, Ellie Perla has traversed the world since leaving Communist-era Romania behind.  Along the way, her observant gaze has seized on both the splendor and the urgency of environments and cultures as varied as the Peruvian Amazon and the Bedouins of Egypt.  Her drawings interpret these images as seeds of hope, ethereal icons, saturated yet delicate, surrounded by a seemingly inexhaustible stream of otherworldly designs.  The effect is heightened by the lattice-like intricacies of Ellie Perla’s polychromatic pencil and ink compositions.  Thereby, she creates her own visual lexicon of optimism and peace that she steadily injects with luminosity, love and a dash of humor. 

Says Ms. Perla, “as I navigate in my life from pain to peace, from black to lavender…I feel responsible to share with the world something positive.  For me, art is a matter of ethics and integrity, a matter of hope…”   The Garden of Eden series is a prime example of Ellie Perla’s creative ethos. By transposing nature subjects into a surreal context, where they metamorphose and exist as ecstatic explosions of color, she reveals them to be dominant forces of life with unlimited possibilities.

PolyChromatica will also exhibit original illustrations from Ellie Perla’s debut children’s book Altavarania. In addition, the opening event marks the launch of the artist’s website: www.ellieperla.com.  It also coincides with Wynwood’s Second Saturday Art Gallery Walk for the month of March.

Ellie Perla studied biology at the Agronomic University of Timisoara, Romania, and holds a degree from the New York Institute of Photography.  Her photographs have appeared in such renowned international publications as National Geographic Traveler Español, Vanidades, Cosas, Expansion, Glamour Español, Quien, El Comercio, and O Estado de Sao Paulo.  She also wrote and illustrated a monthly Miami arts and travel column for the Mexican women’s magazine Kena. Most recently, she participated in the charitable project Art Platform (UK) with her acrylic canvas piece Iluminada. The piece was also featured in the project’s poetry and art publication ‘Inspiration Speaks’.  Ellie Perla currently lives in Miami Beach, Florida, and is a resident artist at ATELIER 1022 Gallery in the Wynwood Arts District.