I just wanted to take a moment out to celebrate him. He has been my BFF, my shopping mate, my personal chef, fellow artist, constructive critiquer and great love everyday for the past 6 years. So what better birthday card than a blog post!

People always ask me 'HOW do you get everything you do done?' I usually answer with a cheeky 'no kids' response - but the truth is, Gregg Emery.

If it weren't for my hub, I wouldn't have had the space, time, support or confidence to get done a lot of what I do. I'm not saying I wouldn't be awesome if I wasn't married (cuz I think I'd be just as ;9) but I have to admit he is the Greek architecture and column of my every days.

Gregg makes the best strawberry frozen smoothies on a hot day. He loves his two fur kids to death! He is a wonderful artist that inspires me daily, from technique, process and knowledge. He is without a joke the BEST art history teacher I have ever seen making contemporary connections, motivating and gaining interest from many a distracted student. He is a phenomenal cook able to make Gourmet out of nothing, a loyal friend, the hostess with the mostess. Possibly the most selfless, generous person that I know. I've never seen a dean that students love more. At times he is my sole blog comment. His paintings have the power to help us all feel centered and at peace with this crazy world. Today I am happy to say I thank whatever makes things work in this world, for him being born. He is coming across sounding too good to be true...and perhaps we all have our 'things' but on many a day I do believe HE IS too good to be true.

Gregg at his Solo exhibit at Azucarera this past summerRed Dwarf by Gregg Emery

********I have written about my awesome hub and his drawings and paintings on older blog posts. To see the article of his most recent solo exhibit click here.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY! -Ciao Amarettogirl

Gregg in the packed Gallery

The opening was a great success. Since Gregg Emery is a Dean and instructor at the Dwight-Englewood School, there were many former and current students as well as faculty support.

The postcard circle

A circle was made using the announcement cards by family who attended the opening reception, Devin and Alexandra.

Substratum painting by gregg emery - Sold

This particular painting was worked over several times during the past year. The crackling paint effect was achieved while working in a below freezing studio space.

Gregg and Former student Jerry Igdalev with his girlfriend Nadia

It was great seeing such an amazing turnout in this new alternative exhibit space. The work looked beautiful, the atmosphere was friendly and welcoming and a good time seemed to be had by all.

This Friday night, August 21st, at 7pm Artist Gregg Emery (a.k.a. my husband) will be exhibiting a show entitled The Drawn Line -On Reading The Human Soul. The Azucarera gallery is located at 414 W. 145th St. (basement) between Convent Ave. and St. Nicholas Ave., Harlem - if you're around stop by!!!

Cynosure by Gregg Emery

Some of you may remember when I wrote a blog post on Gregg and his work and I urge any of you curious about him and his process to check out that old post here! As a special treat the exhibit will also have a wall dedicated to his phenomenal gestural figure drawings from his numerous sketchbooks.

figure drawing by artist Gregg Emery

And for an EXTRA special treat for those who follow my work - Gregg and I collaborated on a piece entitled Fleeting Seedling and you can see that complete painting only at the exhibit - but here is a detail shot of my work. Come to the opening to see the whole thing!!!

detail of Fleeting Seedling Collaborative Painting by marisol diaz and Gregg Emery

Unearthed envelope of drawings by Gregg Emerydetail of stack of illos by GE

So while my hub (fellow artist and teacher Gregg Emery) and I have been on Spring Break he unearthed a couple of things from the deepest bowels of the garage (imagine a garage that two artist employ). He had been stretching some new canvases when he stumbled across a large brown envelope that housed a project he did back when he was in the 9th grade.

Mind you we currently teach high-school and we have just assigned a sixty-second digi artistic-animation project to our advanced portfolio development class made up of 10, 11 and 12th graders.

details of 24 yr. old Animation by Gregg Emery

In the past I have made some short test runs of my own animations inspired by artist William Kentridge, who primarily illustrates a single drawing that he animates by erasing and redrawing on the same page. You can see samples of his work on Youtube because much of how Kentridge's work is displayed, is in moving projection form. However, even with our love of Kentridge and my work on animation I had never known that in my husband's past lurked this behemoth of an animation memory.

Today, using programs like IMovie on the Mac or MovieMaker on a PC (and countless other free movie programs) it has become very simple to drop hundreds of photos into a track and speed them up. Now, things like transitions and animated titles often come in prepackaged cookie-cutter forms.

Yet back in the North Country 24 yrs. ago there were no digital cameras, no accessible movie making programs and definitely no prepackaged ways of making animated titles.

hand drawn animated title by Gregg Emery

So here lies my husbands ninth grade self-assigned animation project in which he hand illustrated every single sec of movement and photographed each new page. His art teacher at the time assisted with driving the roll of painstakingly shot 8mm film to get developed. Needless to say the film never returned developed.

There had been something mysteriously wrong with either the development or the film itself.

Can you imagine the heartbreak that caused a young man who had put in that many hours of self-assigned work?? In the end this entire project never saw the light of day. It was designated into an envelope that was to be moved around and spontaneously unearthed 24 yrs. later.

opening scenes by Gregg Emery

So for my last days of Spring Break, my project is to do some artistic CPR and resurrect this amazing piece of art work from the land of the forgotten.

my sequencing notes

We have already reordered all the sequencing. Since it is so old, it was often difficult for my husband to remember what many of his intentions in specific areas were.

I have also written out his overall story arc vision and we discussed where I might breathe some 'Marisol' life into aspects of the story to boost his overall narrative.

Thankfully, my husband loved all my proposed additions (not changes) and I'm starting today!

Spread from My Arthouse sketchbook click HERE (or scroll down) to see it

The Arthouse Sketchbook Brooklyn event was this past Friday on the last day of school before our Spring break. And what a day that was...but that's another story. It was a beautiful way to end the day as we (my husband fellow artist Gregg Emery and I) accompanied our student Colin (who is also an artist featured in the sketchbook event) to the Brooklyn opening by public transportation from New Jersey. At the last moment, we were joined by two of our other art students, Ji Min and Nicole. What an adventure it was to take the bus, subway and walk through Brooklyn's warehouse district with our students in such a spontaneous, unplanned and informal trip.

All of us at 175th Train StationThe ArtHouse Event was at 3rd Ward in Brooklyn

The Arthouse Event was sponsored by 3rd Ward Creative Space in Brooklyn, NY. 3rd ward is an amazing space with art facilities from wood to computer center available for use by the public. There were over 2500 international participants in the sketchbook event. When we arrived there was already a major crowd spilling out onto the street, music blaring, and sketchbooks galore being perused.

Our three students checking out sketchbooksfolks checking out Colin's sketchbook

As soon as we realized how the sketchbooks were being displayed - simply laid out to be handled and traded we knew finding any of our own would be like finding a needle in a haystack, but we tried anyway. By a stroke of luck, Colin immediately spotted some folks checking out his sketchbook! He was overjoyed as they were commenting on how much they loved it!!

Colin peeking through an uber-creative sketchbookMy sweet cousins, Tai Tai and Kas came to the show too! ready to check out some art!Another amazingly creative sketchbook!We met up with some co-workers and alumni (students of ours from 1999 and 2000!)There were so many varied responses to the Everyone I know theme...it was mesmerizing!Sketchbook spread by artist Duncan Reid - my favorite sketchbook of the night.

So thanks for tagging along to our Art house sketchbook event in Brooklyn! Hope you are as inspired as we were when we left...we were so hungry we got off the subway in Manhattan and had some Gray's Papaya before heading back up to Jersey!

My most recent gallery exhibit is opening this Thursday @ 2:00pm in the 2/20 Gallery in Chelsea, NYC.

Our Opening reception will be this Saturday, Sept. 20th from 6-8 pm. We'll have sangria, finger foods and MUSICA so if you're in the area - swing by!

So what's up with 52? Well fellow artist, Nova Gutierrez was motivated to stir up a mix of artists responses to a deck of 52 cards. Therefore each of the four artist in this show respond and investigate the probability of chance, risk and design that is involved with any kind of playing cards. I for one, really upped the ante and focused on some high risk illustration. Stay tuned to learn more!

My husband is both a professional sketcher and a painter. We work in two completely different ways. He is an extrovert and I am in introvert. That is to say he gathers his energy from external sources and I from interenal. With that said, he can draw in public (and does so frequently) I on the other hand have to be alone in the studio - with no one looking over my shoulder!

So about Gregg Emery, he has over two hundred sketchbooks filled with drawings. These are gesture drawings done with a piece of graphite as pictured here:

There is no eraser, no point, only an edge. Therefore, he never erases. Every line even if done in a not-so proportionate way, remains as part of the overall composition. Much like life, we get no erasers- no do-overs. Instead we have to learn to live with the choices we have made, move-on and resolve them -but we can't really erase them. He draws anywhere - and I mean anywhere, at music performances, at broadway musicals, on the subway, in the cafe, restaurants, really just anywhere. I have even seen him draw while he was walking!

Most of our students know this side of Emery, but what they don't know is the prolific painter he is and his penchant for abstract yet centered art.

Gregg is concerned with discerning an internal balance within and without our human selves. He is concerend with making connections and the deep value involved with human exchange. His paintings and his drawings remind me of Rumi's poetry on being centered.

To see more of Gregg Emery's work click on his name here! His latest Paris/Munich/Berlin sketches will be posted by Sunday!!!