About the artist Lennie Jones

Lennie Jones’ lifetime has been an inspiration for his art. His father, from South Louisiana, instilled in him a love of blues music, drawing pictures, and the swampy wilderness. These things have carried with him throughout his childhood and remain as powerful motivators for him today. Once a traveling blues musician, Lennie toured for many years playing and listening to the music that moved his soul like no other. He decided that the life he led as a professional musician, however, was not the one he wanted. He began to focus instead on his visual art. He now lives, happy and healthy, in the mysterious and primitive Florida Everglades, blessed with a timeless source of spiritual inspiration for his art, music and soul.

You may contact Lennie Jones at: lenniejones@folkartblues.com
Or visit his web sites, www.folkartblues and www.myspace/folkartbluesman.

Mary began her studies and work as an artist in 1977 at the Laguna Beach School of Art, but has spent most of her career in the San Francisco area, principally in Mill Valley. Mary says of her style, "the figures I draw embrace the action, so as to capture the essence of the moment; to create a spontaneous dialogue of motion and emotion. Each piece is a statement of my personal seduction by the subject, and my desire to enter into its’ magic, mystery and grace". When I first spoke with Mary about the Blues Cuvee artist series, she immediately knew that she wanted to do a piece for it. With blues music vibrating the walls of her studio, Mary produced our first Blues Cuvee painting and it is stunning! She has captured the motion and emotion of the true blues singer and guitarist. I look at the image and I can almost hear Muddy Waters singing the blues!

I saw Robert’s work for the first time at the KCBX Wine Classic art show and I felt that his work was by far the most exciting and of a higher level than anything else in the show. Naturally I had to ask him if he would paint a work for the Blues Cuvee series and he was delighted to do so. Robert’s star has certainly risen since he provided us with his art. He has been recently acclaimed by the Los Angeles Time as "one of the top ten emerging artists in California." His 1997 serigraphs have won gold medal awards at International Printing competitions and his first giclee print, the popular "Cuban & Friends," has appeared in recent issues of Arts & Antiques, Cigar Aficinado, Smoke Magazine, and the Robb Report. His latest serigraph painting, "Afternoon Recital" was selected and included in the 1998 Grammy Awards Auction honoring Luciano Pavarotti. Robert’s art has graced coffee cups and been sold as prints in the Starbucks Coffee chain of stores and also for the Williams-Sonoma chain. He is the recent recipient of The Philadelphia WaterColor Club’s Crest Medal award for Achievement in the Arts. You can check out his latest works at www.RobertBurridge.com

Joshua lives and works most of the year in New Orleans. But he does spend some time in Michigan where he began his artistic studies at the Center for Creative Studies in Detroit. He followed that with studies at the University of Nebraska and at various studios in Europe. He augmented his studies with an apprenticeship under Reinhold Marrxhausen. Joshua not only paints but also sculpts the human figure in life-size pieces. A favorite subject is blues and jazz musicians. Living in Detroit and in New Orleans has provided him with alot of exposure to the exciting subject material. For our Blues Cuvee, Joshua captures a blues guitarist in a somber almost weary mood. Enveloped by dark shadow, the soft light highlights the features of the man’s face and hands. In contrast to the black and blue shadows around the figure the earthy red color of the guitar stands out. This painting was done with oils on canvas.

The fourth artist to provide us with original artwork for our Blues Cuvee series is J.C. Jaress from Los Angeles, California. J.C. actually found us, during a weekend visit to our valley. While visiting our tasting room, he saw our previous Blues Cuvee art, and he felt his work would fit right in. He then sent us samples of his portfolio and we really liked what we saw. He later brought up actual pieces for us to see first hand and we were impressed enough to decide to have him paint our fourth artwork

About his work, J.C. says, "I’m basically a figurative painter who is most interested in capturing the mood and feel of the moment, of exposing something about the subject. My work style is expressionistic in use of color and application of paint."

Much of J.C.’s subject matter has been portraits of musicians. J.C. admits, "I’m a big fan of jazz and blues, and I use music to create a mood in my mind; the mood that I am hoping to incorporated into my work. The best paintings are the ones where I listen to the painting, when I remove my ego from the process and allow the painting to become what it is intended to be."

J.C. has been recently appointed to the Board of Directors for the Los Angeles Art Association, which besides enabling him to further develop his own art career, also allows him to get involved in a movement that seeks to sponsor and encourage other emerging artist within the Los Angeles area.

We have enjoyed our collaboration with this fine person and rising artist and we are tremendously pleased to present J.C.’s work, entitled "Blowin’ the Blues."
You may contact J.C. at: jjaress@mindspring.com

So many of our Wine Club members and visitors to our tasting room have seen our Blues Cuvee labels and said that we should contact Susan Dysinger whose art they felt would be a perfect addition to our collection. We checked out Susan’s website, gave her a call, and met her at her studio. There she showed us many of her pieces and described in detail the process of etching in aquatint. We were quite impressed and chose “Barrelhouse” for our 2001 & 2002 Blues Cuvee wines.

Susan studied drawing and painting at the University of California, Santa Barbara and the State College in Plattsburg, New York. In 1973, she began printmaking at the Laguna Beach School of Art where, combined with her love of music, she created a unique style of etching in aquatint and mono-type that today represents a vivid portrait of American Blues and Jazz musicians.

Susan works in her own printmaking studio in Laguna Beach, California. This allows her to maintain complete control over the many steps involved to produce her work. Susan is a long time exhibitor at the annual summer Laguna Beach Festival of Arts and also at the Sawdust Festival.

Please visit her website at: www.susandysinger.com

About the Artist:  Seco

Born in 1958 near Mexico City, Seco came from a family of teachers, and he grew up cultivating a deep passion for the classics in literature and music.  At age 20, in spite of his successful initiation as one of Mexico's promising young writers, Seco did not really find himself until he started drawing.  After three years of drawing devotedly, he painted his first canvases and found the real vocation of his life.

In 1996 he left his native Mexico, came to the United States, and his recognition as a painter of classical musicians emerged.  As guest of both the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra and the New West Symphony, Seco sketches the orchestras in pursuit of the challenge of life-drawing the musician.  His subsequent paintings, based on these sketches, engage the viewer with bold composition and fearless technique.  Seco's gestural brush stroke captures all the movement and energy of his subject, revealing the artist's deep knowledge of the human form and his sensitivity to all the dynamic that it contains.  Seco's website is under construction, but interested viewers can go to www.artmine.com and select "S" (for Seco).

You may also email him at joyseco@sbc.global.net