CURRENT EVENTS
Solo Shows
Two Rivieras: Santa Barbara and France
The Green Room, University Club, Downtown Santa Barbara, ongoing
Winter, 2024
Goleta Valley Art Association
Jurors Choice Award for "Clouds Veil the Mountains"
Winter, 2023: Westmont Ridley-Tree Gallery
Spring 2023-Fall 2023
Sabbatical leave travel; no show
February-March, 2023
Solo show, "Expressive & Abstracted"
Faulkner Gallery 40 East Anapamu Street
Santa Barbara, California
March 2-30, 2023
Solo show
Meg Ricks
'Experimental Paintings: Sensations at the Crack of Dawn'
Goleta Library, West Wall
500 North Fairview Ave,
Goleta, CA 93117
For the last five years, I've taken part in juried group shows with the Abstract Art Collective and Southern California Artists Painting for the Environment at various venues, and with Carpinteria Art Center, 865 Linden Avenue, Carpinteria, CA 9301
Service
Volunteer workshop coordinator for SCAPE, volunteer show chair, organizing all aspects of exhibitions from inception, naming of the show, benefactor (if relevant), venue, to public relations includeing postcards, social media and press releases, to jurying and prizes, for both SCAPE and the AAC (Abstract Art Collective) .
For about 5 years, I've shown at an open studio show with the Mesa Artists Studio Tour, always in November, and with an associated show at the historic Carl Borg gardens in May. The Mesa Artists Studio Tour is free and open to the public. Maps and brochure are available at our website, www.santabarbaramesaartistsstu...
Southern California Artists Painting for the Environment, show to benefit the Gaviota Coast Conservancy, Ritz Carlton Bacara, Spring 2020; 6 of my pieces were juried into the show
Abstract Art Collective Spring Members Show, online, two pieces were juried into the show
Westmont Ridley Tree "Of Time and Memory"
See Meg's work, "Crossroads," juried into the show, now to be held online
ARTIST STATEMENT
I find myself circling around landscapes, with some more realistic, some more abstract pieces, until I feel I have captured the feeling of a place at a particular moment in time. It delights me when other people respond to my work with a sense of recognition, not necessarily of the the view, but of a shared human feeling in nature, whether serene or raw.
Currently, I live mostly in California, but I grew up in the Northeast, and travel a lot. Most recently, I spent three months in the south of France, painting plein air practically every day. With strong ties to Massachusetts, I spend time in and around the marshes and ocean, and the hills, in that rugged state, with its pronounced seasons.
My great-grandfather started the first organization that helped people preserve private land for future generations,the Boston-based Trustees of Reservations, and I have been involved in saving open space much of my life. To live along the beautiful and warm Central Coast of California, where so much open space has been preserved by artists, and where I can almost always paint outside, is a daily joy.
RECENT AWARDS
2022
Southern California Artists Painting for the Environment
Show at the Academy of Music, Montecito
Juror: Marcia Burtt
Juror's Choice, Cliffs at Sunrise
Westmont
Robin Ely, Juror
2nd honorable mention
"Unveiled"
SCAPE show
Music Academy of the West
Juror's Choice Award
Juror: Marcia Burtt
2021
2020
Shows with Concord Art Center, Concord, Massachusetts, in person and online
Truro Center for the Arts, Cape Cod, MA, online
Michael David Gallery, Brooklyn, NY, onine show
May, 2019, Second Prize, Juror: Susan Bush, Curator of Contemporary Art, Sullivan Goss Gallery, Santa Barbara, for "In HF's Studio"
January, 2019
Juror's Award, Juror: Michael Drury, Goleta Valley Art Association, January 2019, for "My Minotaur"
October, 2018
Jurors Purchase Award, "Violet," Juror: Nancy Giffords, Abstract Art Collective Fifth Annual Open Show, Channing Peake Gallery (I was particularly honored that the juror, who generously donated much of her collection to Santa Barbara, took my painting with her when she moved away from California)
November, 2018
Jurors Award, for "Tuscan Cliff." Juror: Garrett Spears, Goleta Valley Art Association
April, 2017
Juror's Choice Award for "Worship" Juror: Rick Stich, SCAPE show to benefit the Gaviota Coast, Bacara Resort
October, 2016
2nd place , Abstract show, Carpinteria Arts Center for
"Carrillo Abstract"
Juror: Hugh Margerum
October, 2016
Juried into SCAPE show to benefit Wildling Museum
"Winter Wave," acrylic and oil, and "Sunrise Cliffs"
both paintings of Leadbetter and Shoreline Park views,
"Sunrise Cliffs" won Honorable Mention
Juror: Eric Merrell
June, 2015, "From Hills to Harbor" won second place at the Artists Guild of Santa Ynez show, "The Road Less Travelled" Juror: Chris Pavlov
May, 2015- Meg's painting, "Campus Point from Hope Ranch," was chosen for all the publicity for Carpinteria Art Center's summer show, "California Dreaming"
November 6, 2014
Juror's Choice Award for "Nojoqui Trickle" Channing Peake Gallery, SCAPE Santa Barbara County Parks Show,
Juror: David Gallup
October 25, 2014
September 19, 2014, Honorable mention for pastel, "Fire in the Canyon" at the SCAPE show celebrating 50 years of the wilderness act at the Arts Foundry, Santa Barbara. Juror: Patty Jaquemain
June 14, 2014 2nd Prize for pastel over monotype, "What Lies Beneath" in the Carpinteria Arts Center Show, " Driven to Abstraction" and Honorable Mention for oil painting, "Hills to Harbor"
Juror: Rick Stich
CURRENT SOLO SHOWS
"Two Rivieras: Santa Barbara and France", University Club of Santa Barbara, Ongoing, with regular changes of paintings
RECENT SOLO SHOWS
CarpinteriaThe Island Brewing Company, 5049 6th St., Carpinteria, December 21, 2017-January 28, 2018
http://www.islandbrewingcompan...
Group shows:
5x5 at Westmont's Ridley-Tree Museum,
Abstract Art Collective
"In with the New"
January 8-February 18, 2018
http://www.abstractartcollecti...
Zooker's, Carpinteria
55404 Carpinteria Ave.
Westmont Museum , January 2018, 5x5 to celebrate Westmont's 80th Anniversary, http://www.westmontmuseum.org/5x5Celebrating80Years.html
"The Local Scene," Distinctive Art Gallery, 1331 State Street, Santa Barbar
Invitationals:
SCAPE show to benefit the Gaviota Coast Conservancy, Spring 2020
Abstract Art Collective Spring Members Show, Faulkner Gallery, moved online, Spring, 2020
Mayor's Office, Fall 2019 to Winter 2020
Mesa Artists Studio Tour, Distinctive Art Gallery, Gallery 113, Fall, 2019
Plein Air Tuscany Open Barn Show, October 29, 2017
Mayor's Office, Santa Barbara, California, October 2014-February 2015
Carpinteria Plein Air Painters, Spring, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, Zooker's, Carpinteria
Westmont Museum , September 2014,September 2019http://www.westmontmuseum.org/5x5CelebratingFiveYears.html,
Santa Barbara Arts Fund, November, 2014
Juried shows:
"Nojoqui Trickle II" was juried into the show, "Nature in Motion" at the Wildling Museum in Solvang, California.
SCAPE-Bacara Show to benefit the Gaviota Coast Conservancy,2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018; Fairview Gardens show, February, 2016, Art Along the Creek, 2013, 2015, 2016; Carpinteria Arts Center, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, Artist Guild of Santa Ynez, 2014, 2015, 2016
PRESS
From Plein Air Magazine:
http://www.pleinaircollector.com/...Near...Plein-Air...County-Parks-/20476836
EXHIBITION: "Near and Far: Plein Air in County Parks," at Channing Peake GalleryBob Bahr Reporting Editor, PleinAir Today SCAPE (Southern California Artists Painting for the Environment) are featured in this exhibition, with sales benefiting the Santa Barbara County Park Foundation. ... 
"Nojoqui Trickle," by Margaret Ricks, 2014, oil on linen, 8 x 10 in. Juror's Choice ... David Gallup juried the show. |
Filed Under : |
Scene Magazine, January 2, 2015, Joseph Woodard,
ART REVIEW: Art for parks' sake
Members of the SCAPE group of plein air painters show work done in, and about, Santa Barbara County Parks and Beaches
January 2, 2015 10:37 AM "Near and Far: Plein Air in County Parks" When: through February 12 |
From the article "Near and Far Plein Air in County Parks" in the Santa Barbara News Press, December 4, 2014
"The juror for this exhibition was David Gallup, a nationally known Plein Air artist and teacher, who has won numerous local and international awards, and is represented in museum exhibitions and collections nationwide.
Juror’s Choice Award was given to Meg Ricks for Nojoqui Trickle; 1st Place to Nancy Freeman for Goleta Beach: Shank of the Day, and Honorable Mentions to Marsha Burtt for From the Bridge II, Larry Iwerks for Along the Coast, Daniel Linz for Shacks at the Beach and Jerry Martin for Rocky Nook – Canyon Light.
In addition, three paintings from the exhibition were selected for Percent for Art Program purchase by the County Parks Department offices: Shacks on the Beach by Daniel Linz, Sage Oak Cloud by Filiberto Lomeli and In the Shade by Leigh Sparks.
SCAPE has designated that 40% of all their sales will benefit the Santa Barbara County Park Foundation. "
The entire article, with a list of all artists whose work was selected for the show, is here:
http://www.independent.com/releases/2014/dec/03/near-and-far-plein-air-in-county-parks/
Scene Magazine, July 4-10, 2014
ART REVIEW: Liquid Visions, Left of Reality - A GROUP SHOW, OF ABSTRACTION, THAT REVEALS EXPRESSIVE POSSIBILITIES IN THAT ZONE
By Josef Woodard
July 4, 2014 7:43 AM 'Driven to Abstraction' When: through July 21 Where: Carpinteria Arts Center, 855 Linden Ave. in Carpinteria Gallery hours: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thurs. through Mon. Information: 684-7789,artscarp.org Sometimes in the case of a group art show juried by a well-known artist, the observing eye can't help but loop back in contemplation to the juror's own aesthetic, and play mix-and-match in the viewing process. Such a phenomenon could be in effect for visitors to the Carpinteria Arts Center at present, where the show "Driven to Abstraction" seems to bear some proximity to the approach of its juror, the respected Santa Barbara-based artist Rick Stich. Or maybe our imagination is getting the better of us. In the inherently fluid perspective in much of painter — and avid surfer — Mr. Stich's work, going back decades and including a memorable tribute to Handel's "Water Music" at the old Ruth Shaffner Gallery, watery qualities and essences are imbued in the very form and content of the art. Similarly, many of the artworks culled for the Arts Center show tap into aspects of fluidity — in terms of suggested references or art-making process. At the same time, though, Mr. Stich's selections in the gallery also take detours around and away from the realm of the liquid. So much for neatly workable juror/artist relationship theories. As also seen in the current Abstract Art Collective exhibition at the Jewish Community Center, variations on the naturally diverse and personal theme of abstraction begin to state their cases from the outset, in the entryway of the Art Center space. (It is essentially a nicely-retooled old house, nestled on a large property currently expanding and spreading its wings into a larger Art Center in this idyllic beach town). Freely considered expression and an intuitively, colorfully outfitted ambience come to bear in Mary Dee Thompson's painting, which comes from another artistic place and attitude from Jo Merritt's more strictly geometric structure. Dalayna Grace Christenson's "Rising from the Ashes" projects a subtly thematic underscoring, with its crinkly surface and sense of metamorphosing materials, while Dougall Christenson's "Abstruse" lives up to its evocative title with its dark, insinuating abstract markings over a foggy warm backdrop. In Beth Schmohr's "Contemplation" (the show's first place winner, incidentally), bursts of color activity lurk and wriggle amidst murky gray-ish wash areas, with a kind of restless, disrupted quasi-pictorial logic. Yet the pictorial logic is clean and neatly laid-out in Karen Luckett's "Venice Beach by Day and by Night," a horizontal composition divided by light and darkened halves, with calligraphic gestures scrawled on the surface, as if representing the kinetic and human action in that specified topography, while left to the imaginative machinations of the abstractionist milieu. Odes to bodies of water do crop up in the flux and flow of the show, as in Meg Ricks' "What Lies Below," a refreshingly muted and subtle pastel piece in the company of visually louder works, with vague allusions to the art and misty feel of seascapes. The sinuously organized and joyously-hued "Ode to Swan Lake," by Ann Fraser, is less a water vision than it is an example of the power of music as inspiration and reference point for abstract painters, going back to Kandinsky, and, yes, including Mr. Stich's own work. Speaking of art echoing art historicist precedents, CK Lord's distinctive and slightly mystical "One," with a monolithic stone-like form and patch of earthy brown floating above a sludgy gray zone as a base, triggers memories of such classic abstractionists as Philip Guston and Mark Rothko. Roxanne Aquiline's sense of abstraction veers in yet a different direction, with the deceptively tidy but essentially irrational construction of forms and numbers and in her seductive piece "Space and Time." In the final rub, a potential point of commonality is hinted at in the title of Marie Arnold's piece, "Inner Landscape II." Through the pleasant visual haze of her expressive scheme, again with calligraphic markings meandering over hazy warm color zones below, the artist seems to be aiming at giving form and semi-improvisational verve to inner urges, where the abstract muse is best suited to articulate the artistic landscape in need of external, and ultimately public, statement. Ditto, most of the pieces in this show, with or without links to fluidity in the mix. |
MEMBERSHIPS
Arts: Southern California Artists Painting for the Environment (www.s-c-a-p-e.org/ ) , Goleta Valley Art Association ( www.tgvaa.org/ ), California Art Club associate member, (www.californiaartclub.org), Carpinteria Arts Center ( www.carpinteriaartscenter.org), Concord Art Association (www.concordart.org, Concord, Massachusetts)
Conservation: Trustees of Reservations, The Trust for Public Land
TRAINING
I've been very lucky to have great art teachers all my life, starting with my mother and grandmother, who loved to paint and create things. My 8th grade art teacher gave me my first individual show. Dr. Burkey and Mr. Dale, in high school, were unforgettable and encouraging. In college, my art mentor was Joe Stefanelli, an abstract expressionist who had studied with Hans Hoffman and with whom I studied figure painting. Art Student League instructors were friends and mentors as well. As an adult, I have learned from wonderful, generous, friends, from workshops and critiques with Wyllis Heaton, Mike Hernandez, Randall Sexton, Gaye Adams, Hank Pitcher, Karl Dempwolf, Larry Iwerks, James Armstrong, Tony Askew, Deborah Breedon, Chris Chapman, Michael Drury, Tom Henderson, John Iwerks, Catherine Kehoe, Marilee Krauss, Rick Stich, Thomas Van Stein and William Wray. In New England, I've enjoyed studying under the tutelage of Craig Taylor (RISD), Catherine Kehoe (Mass College of Art, David Campbell (PAFA, William and Mary) and others.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Are prints available?
High quality archival giclees, by Letitia Haynes, of Distinctive Art Gallery, are available for almost all work.
Are paintings sold framed?
Prices are given for unframed work.
How do I buy a painting?
Please contact the artist.
How do I arrange to have a painting shipped to me?
Contact the artist at mricks1@cox.net, or telephone 805 729 4620, or contact the artist on Facebook at Meg Ricks Art
What does NFS mean?
NFS = Not For Sale. The piece has already been spoken for or is going to be kept in the artist's collection permanently.