Wellington Art Society To Meet May 14

The Wellington Art Society will meet Wednesday, May 14 at the Wellington Community Center (12165 W. Forest Hill Blvd.).

The group’s final meeting of the season will feature the Wellington Art Society Scholarship Awards Presentation, along with a presentation and demonstration by en plein air artist Ralph Papa.

The meeting’s social time starts at 6:30 p.m., with time to meet the scholarship recipients, their parents and siblings during the award reception, which begins at 7 p.m.

The Wellington Art Society will award five $1,000 scholarships to local high school students. The students will show examples of their work and talk with art society members about their art and future plans.

The winners are: Raymond Burks from Suncoast High School, and Isabella Pezzulo, Arnauld Sylvain, Laura Gordon and Oliver Pennanen from the Alexander W. Dreyfoos School of the Arts.

Following the awards will be the member spotlight, raffle and announcements, followed by Papa’s presentation from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m.

Papa was born and raised in Manhattan and studied art and architecture in New York at Queens College and the City College of New York, and also at the Art Students League. His paintings range from studio works composed of real and imagined themes to figurative art, portraits and en plein air paintings.

Many of his studio works are larger-than-life faces creating pensive moods with feelings of isolation and loneliness. Beginning in the mid-1980s, he painted on location in New York’s Hudson Valley and Long Island’s Hamptons, and later in Palm Beach County. The subjects of his paintings are often from nature, life experiences, and personal reflections of family and friends. Most recent works are en plein air landscapes and studio paintings of imaginative compositions that visually link him with artists he much admires.

Papa teaches drawing and painting at his Delray Beach studio and at the Delray Beach Center for the Arts. He is a member of the Garrison Art Center, the Delray Art League, past president of the Artists’ Guild of the Boca Museum and co-founder of “Plein Air Painters of Palm Beach.” His works are in public and private collections in the U.S. and Canada, and can be seen in galleries in Boynton Beach and in Delray Beach at his studio, the Artists’ Guild Gallery and on his web site at www.papagallery.com.

He will also be presenting “The Joy of Plein Air Painting” at the Cultural Council of Palm Beach at 601 Lake Ave in Lake Worth on May 6 at 3 p.m. More information is available at www.palmbeachculture.com/current-exhibitions.

Founded in 1981, the Wellington Art Society is open to artists of all mediums and patrons of the arts. For more information, visit www.wellingtonartsociety.org.