Leading Artists

Arthur Secunda

Secunda was educated at New York University, Art Students League, New York; Meschini Institute, Rome; Academie de la Grande Chaumiere, Paris and Instituto Esmeralda , Mexico City. Secunda is a prominent curator, critic, artist-exhibitor, teacher and media personality, whose works have been acquired by over 120 museums in the US, Europe and Japan. Over 150 solo exhibitions, as well as articles and works reproduced worldwide. Extensive background in painting, sculpture, graphics, photography, book illustration, tapestry and artist book publishing. Author of hundreds of articles on all aspects of the arts, including contributions to Arts, Artweek, Artforum, Beverly Hills Times, and Santa Barbara News-Press.

Awards and Recognition:
Tamarind Lithography Institure (two grants); Olimpiadi Culturali, First prize, Florence, Italy;
Centre de Gravure Contemporaine, Geneva, Switzerland; Moulin Richard de Bas, papermaking grant, Ambert, France; Who’s Who in American Art, Who’s Who in Western Art; Krasner Pollock painting grant, New York.

Janet de Berge Lange

Assemblage artist - Janet de Berge Lange - is a third-generation native of Phoenix, and has operated a working studio in the downtown area for the past twenty-one years. As a long-time supporter and pioneer of the city's growing art scene, Janet was a charter artist in Art Link - the organization spearheading the annual Art Detour. Lange has also served as president of the Phoenix Artist's Coalition for three years, was a former MARS Artspace member, and a three-year board member of the Contemporary Forum at the Phoenix Art Museum. She taught art for fourteen years in Phoenix elementary schools, and has presented as an artist-in-resident at schools throughout the valley.

Her medium is the "found object", and her complex assemblages have been exhibited at the Phoenix Art Museum, Scottsdale Center for the Arts, University of Arizona, Mesa Southwest Museum, Tucson Museum of Art, Northern Arizona University, Desert Caballeros Western Museum, Arizona Museum for Youth, and with the Arizona Commission on the Arts Traveling Exhibitions Program. Janet's art is in many private collections throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe. She is currently represented by the Peter Mars Gallery in Chicago.

Robert M. Anderson

While a young fine art student at St. Francis University in Ft. Wayne,IN., Robert worked designing T-shirts for famous rock and roll bands like Niel Diamond, The Mammas and the Pappas, INXS, Bon Jovi and many more until his first solo painting show sold out and he took the leap into fine art and never looked back.

Since then, he has won many awards such as “First Place” and “Best of Show” at the Taos Fall Arts Festival Open and won a feature in the distinguished publication “New American Paintings” in 2002. He won a purchase award from the Scottsdale Cultural Center (The Scottsdale Museum of Fine art) and was invited to the Florence, Italy Biannale in 2002.

And, although he shuns the limelight, he has been in many contemporary publications such as Southwest Art, Art in America, The Collector’s Guide and newspapers across the country.

Rudy M. Fernandez

Fernandez was born September 21, 1948 in Trinidad, Colorado. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts at the University of Colorado in 1974 and his Master of Fine Arts at Washington State University in 1977. Fernandez work can be found in museums, galleries and collections throughout the world.

"FRIDA: from the Modern Heroes Series" from the
collection of Dr. Bruce and Micheline Etkin

His work is represented in many collections—among them:Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, Arizona; Albuquerque Museum, Albuquerque, New Mexico; City and County of San Francisco, Art in Public Places; Los Angeles County Museum, Los Angeles, California; Museum of Fine Arts, Santa Fe, New Mexico; National Gallery of American Art, Renwick Gallery, Washington, D.C; Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, Arizona; Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; University of Arizona Art Museum, Tucson, Arizona.
Latest exhibitions:
2004 Chicano Art for Our Millennium, Mesa Southwest Museum, Mesa, Arizona
2004 Texas Uprising, Blue Star Contemporary Art Space, San Antonio, Texas

Jo-Ann Lowney

Jo-Ann Lowney was born in 1948 in New Bedford, Massachusetts. As a child she lived overseas in Rome and Berlin where she spent many happy days painting and drawing with her artist mother. After attending the Main College of Art in Portland, she spent five years studying classical painting with National Academician Frank Mason, at The Art Student’s League of New York. She met her husband, painter Joel Coplin while attending the League. Lowney has lived and worked in Arizona for fifteen years. In 1995 she was awarded the Visual Art Fellowship in two-dimensional Media by the Arizona Commission on the Arts, and in 1996, an Artists Residency Grant by the Arizona Commission on the Arts for the mural project, A History of Superstition Mountain. Lowney paints, sculpts and maintains an historic artist community near the Superstition Mountains founded in the 1930’s where she and her husband and seven other artists work and live. Her work is in the collection of the Scottsdale Museum for Contemporary Art, Nordstroms of Scottsdale, Universal Picture Studios and private and corporate collections in the U.S., Portugal, Germany, Israel, and Canada.

Robert J. Miley

In 1974 Robert J. Miley entered the Hussian School of Art, a prestigious four-year art school in Philadelphia. After graduating in 1978 he moved to Phoenix and opened a full service advertising agency. His clients included Swenson’s International Ice Cream, Loews Resorts, Villa Vera Resorts in Acapulco, Mexico, and Trice Communications, in Japan.

Robert has received a Clio Award, a Rocky Mountain Emmy and several Addy Awards for excellence in advertising and design. In 1985 Robert decided to dedicate himself to his fine art full time. He has since become internationally recognized for his painting and sculpture.

His many works constitute a body on display in corporate and municipal government offices, health care facilities, and city parks. In October of 2002 he installed a monumental sculpture “Imagine” for the Westin/Kierland Resort and Spa in Phoenix.

Robert’s work can be found in prestigious collections both public and private, some of which are, Prince von Furstenburg of Austria and Major Ferguson of the Royal British Family, and many Hospital and Healing Centers around the country. In Arizona his work is represented by Vanier Galleries.

John Armstrong

John Armstrong is a master printer, fine art framer, artist, and exhibition designer. He holds an M.F.A. from the University of Montana and has extensive experience in the arts, including printmaking, curation, and instruction. Some of the positions he has held include:

• Director - Yellowstone Art Center
• Curator - Arizona Commission on the Arts
• Visual Art Manager - Scottsdale Center for the Arts
• Instructor - University of Montana and South Dakota State University

John has been very active in the community and has participated on the Board of Directors - for institutions such as the Western Museums Association, Phoenix Arts Commission, and the Arizona State University Art Museum.

Shahrokh Rezvani

Shahrokh Rezvani - is an internationally known artist and printmaker. He attended Ball State University in Indiana from 1965 to 1972, where he received his BS and MA degrees in printmaking. He then attended Wayne State University in Michigan, where he was awarded a teaching fellowship and received his Master of Fine Arts degree in 1974.

In 1977 Rezvani moved to Scottsdale, Arizona, in order to establish the Rezvani Workshop, where he collaborated in the creation of monotypes and prints by internationally known artists—among them, Dale Chihuly, Paul Jenkins, Fritz Scholder, and James Havard.

In 1978, Rezvani was one of twenty artists selected by the Phoenix Art Museum for their traveling exhibition, "20 Arizona Artists," which toured through 1980. In 1988, he was one of three artists from Arizona selected by the Arizona Commission on the Arts for a solo traveling exhibition sponsored by the commission. Rezvani was also one of the five finalists from the state of Arizona nominated in 1988 for the Arizona Arts Award by the Tucson Community Foundation. He has been included in the prestigious publication "Who’s Who in International Art," Lausann, Switzerland since 1987.

His work is represented in many collections—among them: The Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, Michigan; Bibliothéque Nationale De France, Paris, France; California Palace of Legion of Honor, San Francisco, California; Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, Arizona; Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, Arizona; and Scottsdale Center for the Arts (Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Arts), Scottsdale, Arizona.

Joel Coplin

Joel Coplin was born in 1954 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He hitched a ride in the back of a horse van heading to NYC in 1977 to study at The Art Students’ League of New York. After completion of his eight years of training by Frank Mason in the classical arts, including the methods, materials and techniques of the old masters, he and his wife Jo-Ann Lowney moved in the early-80’s to an historic artist colony near the Superstition Mountains in Arizona. Joel’s work has appeared in many solo exhibitions including Real and Imagined at The Cultural Exchange Gallery in Scottsdale Arizona, 2004, and in group exhibitions at The Tucson Museum of Art in the Arizona Biennial 2003, as well as Southwest 96; Museum of Fine Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico. His work also appears in the collections of the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, the Arizona State University Art Museum, The Tucson Art Museum and the Phoenix City Hall, where his 6’ x 25’ mural, Metroasis, is permanently installed. Coplin now spends his time creating his art and restoring the historic art colony where he and nine other painters, writers and crafts people live and work.

Beatrice Moore

Moore was born in Dallas, Texas in 1950. As a young adult she took random art classes at several colleges/universities in Dallas and worked part time as an artist's model. Moore moved to Austin in the late 1960's where she continued to take classes, but her time there confirmed she was not interested in pursuing a degree.

While in Austin, Moore became interested in weaving as an art form. Moore’s artwork eventually expanded to include sculpture and mixed media. In 1984 Moore boarded a Polish freighter for Europe where she lived for two years, traveling throughout Europe and settling in Berlin for nine months and on a Spanish finca for nine months. Moore established a studio at each residence and continued to work, primarily creating works on paper.

When Moore returned from Europe in 1986, she located to Phoenix, Arizona where she immediately became immersed in the fledgling downtown art scene. In 1989 Moore and her partner rented studio space in the historic warehouse district and through the desire to create a situation where artists could promote their own work, Moore founded the annual Phoenix art walk (Art Detour) and the non-profit entity that produces that event (Artlink, Inc.). She was the Director/President of Artlink for four years.

In 1992, Moore and her partner purchased their first warehouse building just west of downtown and began renovations that created their live/work space and a unique storefront gallery called "Stop n' Look: A Visual Community Resource" which was designed to display thought provoking, 'edutaining' installations by area artists in large storefront windows. From 1994 - present Moore has created many installations for the Stop n' Look windows as well as providing the opportunity to other artists with financial stipends each year.

Joan Baron

Joan received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri and her Master of Fine Art from the Art Institute of Chicago. She maintains a studio in Scottsdale, Arizona - Baron Studio - providing design solutions using natural materials in a variety of design challenges. Working with architects, builders, municipalities, and home owners, a special collaboration is immediately formed. Long respected in the industry for designing and fabricating all sizes & shapes of hand-made ceramic tiles, mosaics, and mixed media installations, principal artist Joan Baron provides insight and vision, delivering specific aesthetic details to each project. Earth plasters, clay paint, metals, glass and rammed earth are often incorporated when exploring renewable materials. Baron Studio looks to re-invent, re-define and recycle much of our industrial excess into aesthetic contributions that enhance and contribute to the principles of Green Design and Sustainable Communities. For more information visit www.artistsregister.com/artists/az535 or www.scottsdaleaz.gov/greenbuilding.

Rachel Bess

Bess graduated with a B.F.A. in Painting from the Barrett Honors College at Arizona State University in 2001. She is a painter and Life Drawing Instructor at New School for the Arts in Tempe, Arizona.

Latest Exhibitions:
Herberger Theater Center, Phoenix Arizona April-June 2004; Respite, Juried International show, Shade Gallery, March 2004; 5+1, selected female artists, Monorchid, February 2004; Isn’t it Grand, selected Downtown Phoenix Artists, 3 car pileup, January 2004; and Modified Gallery, Phoenix, Arizona May 2003

Distinguished Casts

Patti Hannon

Patti Hannon has played the role of Sister to rave reviews for 8 years in Late Nite Catechism. She’s played this role on stages in Boston, New York, Chicago and Scottsdale. Late Nite Catechism is a hilarious, interactive show that turns the theatre into an adult catechism class where the sharp-witted Sister runs a tight ship. She's there to help her students bone up on their Roman Catholic doctrine, and doesn't put up with any nonsense. Latecomers to the "class" are fined; gum-chewers get a glare and a tissue; everyone is ordered to stand when called on and to begin every response with "Sister!" It's a reminder of a time before Vatican II, when nuns were a familiar symbol of authority to Catholic schoolchildren.

A Chicago actor, Ms. Hannon has a background in improvisational comedy; originating, creating and performing with Hit and Run and Bit Players. Some of her favorite Chicago roles include Yuba in The Cherry Orchard, Mrs. Pugh and others in Under Milkwood, herself and others in the original production of Road to Graceland, Mrs. Hardcastle in She Stoops to Conquer, Mama in I Remember Mama and Miss Prism in The Importance of Being Earnest. At Theatre de la Jeune Lune in Minneapolis she was seen as LaMaeude in Germinal. She is the recipient of two Joseph Jefferson citations for her roles as Lil in Ask for the Moon and Lorette in Between Daylight & Booneville.

MRS. MOO

Merriel Starrett, aka “Mrs. Moo,” is the longest survivor of breast cancer in Arizona. Diagnosed in 1977 she underwent a radical mastectomy. She attributes her good health and vitality to “…no chemotherapy, no radiation, lots of vitamins, minerals and herbs and, once in a while, scotch and water.”

As her nickname indicates, Mrs. Moo is also an avid collector of cow paraphernalia. Her cow obsession began in 1983. Mrs. Moo recounts, “In 1983 I was in a shop in Scottsdale and I saw a cow magnet, the cow was smiling at me. I decided right there and then, that I would start collecting cows. Soon, the refrigerator had 100 cow magnets on it. Then, I started putting cows on the kitchen counter, on the walls and in the dining room. Eventually I moved to Cow Palace where I now have 5,322 cows.”

Mrs. Moo and her collection has been featured on television five times and covered in Phoenix Magazine, Sun Life Magazine, Real People Magazine, and several international publications.