April 2022 – Karin Dahl – “When Jazz Interprets Abstract Art”

National League of American Pen Women Central Ohio Branch

Karin Dahl,  a nationally acclaimed artist and Professor Emeritus in writing from OSU, will discuss her latest project of jazz paintings (combining art and music music to enhance meaning).

WHEN: Tuesday, April 5, 2022, 1:00-3:00 pm.

WHERE:

  • Columbus Metropolitan Library
  • 96 South Grant Avenue, Columbus, Ohio 43215
  • Meeting Room 1A (first floor near the elevators)
  • Inexpensive parking in underground lot. Take ticket with you. Before leaving, pay at kiosk by the elevators.

As an abstract artist Karin Dahl works to enrich the meaning of each painting. By adding jazz she provides another layer of meaning. Music guides the viewer to linger, to look closely and consider sound and color together.

Dahl’s oil paintings are explorations of color. Her works are painted in layers to convey an idea or mood. She uses color, contrasts and connecting gestural lines to unify her compositions. Sgraffito lines are considered a signature element. These scraped lines reveal underlying colors and build texture.

Dahl’s background is in academia. She is an Emeritus Professor at the Ohio State University and has worked internationally in Uzbekistan and Thailand on critical thinking training. Dahl’s Ph. D. is from Indiana University in Language Studies. Her art background includes more than a decade of private teachers as well as coursework at Denison University.

Dahl’s art has been exhibited in solo shows, and regional juried competitions and can be found in regional collections. She had two solo exhibitions titled Art and Jazz in 2021 and 2022.

Learn more about Karin and her work at https://www.karindahl.com/about

May 2022 – Ann Alaia Woods – How DID I Get Here from There?

National League of American Pen Women Central Ohio Branch

Ann Alaia Woods, a Letters Active AND Art Active member of our chapter, will present at our Tuesday, May 2, 2022 meeting.

WHEN: Tuesday, May 2, 2022, 1:00-3:00 pm

WHERE:

  • Whetstone Library (branch – Columbus Metropolitan Library)
  • 3909 N High St, Columbus, OH 43214
  • Meeting Room – to the right of the entrance doors
  • Free parking in adjacent lot

 

Artist/Creativity Statement

I create because I must. I am never as at peace as when I am lettering, designing, devising. The feel of creating inspired me to leave academe and devote myself to Art. On the way, I found another part of myself – a long-suppressed engineer – driving me to explore where science, art, and philosophy converge in marbling, making paper, building books and 3D structures, devising artists’ tools – and in teaching and writing about all of them.

Biography

Ann is a commission artist whose work encompasses designing hand-lettered prose, poetry, monograms, logos, books and 3-D awards, and even lettering for interior and outdoor settings, as well as classic and contemporary marbling on paper, wood, and fabric.
She also writes and teaches about the history and practice of calligraphy and marbling, occasionally bursting out into personal poetry and social commentary.

After earning her A.B. in History from Barnard College, she spent a year abroad on Tufts University’s L’Anno Classico in Italia. Her Masters and Ph.D. (1972-74), also in History, are from the University of Southern California.

Ann began her first career teaching Classics and History at OSU in the late 70s. Her second—in the Arts—began in 1981, with intensive studies in hand lettering, book arts, and marbling through the international calligraphy guild workshop system—the only means that serious hand-lettering/book artists had then and still have to be classically trained by the best practicing professionals.

Simultaneously, she began teaching–as a GCAC Artist-in-Schools, through various programs (OSU’s CAP, Ripley Arts Center in West Virginia, at the Columbus Cultural Arts Center, Upper Arlington’s Lifelong Learning & Leisure), through demonstrations for the public and, finally, as instructor of hand lettering at CCAD, before opening her own studio for classes and workshops in 1997.

Among her greatest honors as an artist, Ann counts being chosen as the first American calligrapher invited to the International Calligraphy Conference in China (1993); being the first 3-time winner of the World Handwriting Contest (2005-2007); serving as Calligrapher to the Logan Elm Press at the Ohio State University (1990 to 2012) and as Designer for the Distinguished Alumni and Community Service Awards for the University of Kentucky College of Fine Arts from 1999 to 2010. Her life as an exhibiting artist has also brought occasional honors: work juried into the Calligraphers Engagement Calendar from 1991 through 2004 (when it ceased publication), winning both 1st Prize and Best of Show in GHALA’s exhibit at Franklin Park Conservatory, being selected to participate in Hand Papermaking Magazine’s Portfolio Project (2007)—a project that led in 2019 to designing and earning a patent for her Asian-style hand-papermaking frame—and even taking first place in the Columbus Asian Festival’s haiku contest! Her work is represented in the permanent holdings of the King of Spain, the Newberry Library, MOMA, and many private collections.

In 1987, as president of the Calligraphy Guild of Columbus, Ann created and directed the quincentenary legacy project, The Public Book: Letters to Our Great, Great, Grandchildren, a conceptual book of large fabric pages made by Central Ohio residents—now housed at
the Columbus Historical Society.

More recently, in 2017-18, she received two grants to further her research and teaching of classical marbling, laying the groundwork for publishing two books on Western marbling techniques in 2020, as the pandemic hit. Her chapbook on Japanese traditional marbling was published last year. Her life coming full circle now, an article on the Trajan Inscription in Rome is now in the works.

For more on the legacy project, go to www.thepublicbook.org and on her work, www.aimiaartworks.com.

June 2022 – Annual Luncheon and “Show and Tell”

National League of American Pen Women Central Ohio Branch

At our annual luncheon each member may bring an example of recent work for our “Show and Tell.”

WHEN: Tuesday, June 7, 2022, 11:30am-2:00 pm (NOTE: different time)

WHERE:

  • Rocky Fork Country Club
  • 5189 Clark State Road, Gahanna, OH 43230
  • Ample parking in adjacent parking lot

 

March 2021 – Dr. MJ Sunny Zank, Professor of Music Emerita, Ohio Northern University

National League of American Pen Women Central Ohio Branch

Dr. Sunny Zank performing a piano duet with Virginia Campbell, then NLAPW National President

On March 7, 2021, Dr. Sunny will share with us her inspiration and methods for composing a recent commissioned “march” for a friend and officer of the Ohio Chapter of the Eastern Star, the women’s branch of the Masons.

Dr. Zank is past chair of the ONU University Council (the Council consists of the ONU President, all ONU Vice-Presidents, all College Deans, and elected representation from each of the five Colleges.). She served on the Board of Directors for Japan Studies Association, National American Schools of Music (NASM) Region 5 secretary, and the ONU Board of Trustees. She served CMS as a site host, program chair, and frequently as speaker and poster session presenter (Japanese music).

Her compositions (orchestral, choral, chamber music) have been performed across the U.S. and Canada. She served as adjudicator for the National American Pen Women music composition scholarship. As an active scholar she has presented papers at meetings of the American Musicological Society, the Sonneck Society, the College Music Society, and the Japan Studies Association. She has published over twenty prefaces to scores, of little known compositions, for Musikproduktion Hoeflich (Germany), and writes book and music reviews for the ASTA Journal.

Her teaching specialties are music theory/composition, music history and ethnomusicology (music of East Asia) and violin/viola and string ensemble. Dr. Zank holds degrees from the University of Oregon (B.A., M.A.) and the University of Northern Colorado (D.A.). She has been the recipient of awards from the Freeman Foundation and the Henry Luce fund, to study the music of East Asia at the East West Center of the University of Hawaii and Tokai University. Following her undergraduate work she did additional studies at the Franz Liszt Academy (Budapest), Mozarteum (Salzburg), and Trossingen Hochschule (Germany).

While “retired” Dr. Sunny accepted an invitation, from Virginia Campbell, to be the National Music Chair for the National League of American Pen Women from 2016-18.   Dr. Sunny runs a small violin/piano studio in the greater Lima Ohio area. This involves writing music for students and creating Musical Recitals/shows. A number of her students are Suzuki Violinists though her college preparation program is more traditional in focus.