P.A.St.A. Art Gallery elects new board

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The Professional Artists of St. Augustine (P.A.St.A.) Fine Art Gallery have announced the results of the elections for a new board of directors. The art co-op, founded in 1982 on 214 Charlotte St. is starting the new year with an extensive goal of enhancing the gallery’s brand and mission for local and regional artists.

Valarie Pothier-Forrester was elected the P.A.St.A. Art Gallery’s new president. She received a bachelors degree in art education and a master of arts degree from the University of Florida. She took course work at Penland and John C. Campbell.

She worked several years at the Florida Museum of Natural History and wrote curriculum for the Harn Museum of Art during her years as an art teacher for the School Board of Alachua County. Her love of painting outdoors has led her to become an avid plein air painter, participating in all of the St. Augustine Art Association plein air events over the years. She exhibits her St. Augustine plein air paintings, her vivid alcohol ink paintings and scarves at the gallery.

Ginny LeJeune, the new vice president, served as the P.A.St.A. secretary on the previous board. With a passion for art, she studied art and graphic design. She founded Creative Design and Upholstery, a furniture and soft surrounding design company in the 1990s. Combining her love of art and interiors, and influenced by the late Jeremiah Goodman, an artist known for his paintings of famous interiors in an impressionist style, she began to paint interior paintings and selling her artwork. She shows her unique impressionist style of interiors, and has added a series of tonal landscapes to her work featured at the gallery.

Tina Minahan, the new gallery treasurer, can be found working a variety of local wood and turning it into beautiful bowls, plates and vessels. Her passion had always been woodworking, but it became serious in 2006 when she began working on a lathe. Sourcing her wood from local tree trimmers, neighbors, friends and lumber salvagers, she finds the beauty in the individual wood piece and highlights it in the end result of a perfectly turned-out wood work of art. She continues to expand her skill and knowledge of woodcraft through workshops and woodturning symposiums.

Sheryl Sherwood has been elected as the new secretary for the gallery. She has worked with visually impaired students at the Florida School for the Deaf and the  Blind in St. Augustine. Combining her experience teaching and her love of scripture, she has turned to clay as a way to express her artistic ambitions. Every pot is built one coil at a time, a conscious and meditative method. She fires using Raku or pit firing methods. Each pot expresses a message of faith, hope and love in its organic form, including movement, texture and carvings for visual and tactical appeal. All of her work includes a print/Braille card with an inspirational scripture.

The new board’s agenda includes increasing community outreach and awareness through its growing roster of artists.

“We are in the planning stages of creating a destination art gallery for tourists and locals alike, with planned events, workshops and working artists in the gallery,” said Pothier-Forrester.

Learn more at pastagalleryart.com.