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Arts and Entertainment: Spring Arts Festival One Month Away
March 24th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Cedar Key Paint Out
March 20th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Artist Spotlight - Robert Goodlett Cedar Key Poster Winner for Old Florida Celebration of the Arts
March 7th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Cedar Key Arts Center (CKAC) Seeking A Program Administrator
March 7th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Stuff to do at CKAC
March 2nd, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Deception by Design
February 29th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Cedar Key Arts Center - Mural
February 18th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Cedar Key Arts Center - Upcomming Events
January 30th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Cedar Key Arts Center - Exhibit
January 27th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: 2012 Children’s Summer Art Program Benefit Dinner
January 21st, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: SALUTE TO WILDLIFE
January 16th, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: CKAC Youth Art Education
January 2nd, 2012

Arts and Entertainment: Spend a Cozy and Creative January at Cedar Key Arts Center
December 17th, 2011

Arts and Entertainment: Fun at the CKAC
December 13th, 2011

Arts and Entertainment: Empty Bowls
December 1st, 2011

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Enter the World of Connie Nelson

Enter the World of Connie Nelson

By Marsha Schwartz

"Enter the World of Connie Nelson"

April 5 - May 2

Opening Reception Saturday April 5 5 - 7 PM

The April exhibition at the Cedar Key Arts Center features Connie Nelson, a mixed media artist whose extraordinary talent reflects her wisdom and belies her humility.

Next year Connie Nelson will have been living permanently in Cedar Key for 30 years. She was born in Minnesota in the early years of WW II and spent her formative years there. When asked when she first knew she wanted to be an artist she said " I always had the desire to create. I had an enormous admiration for other artists, but initially didn't believe in my own talent."

Connie graduated from college with a BA in Fine Arts. She then migrated to Bennington College in Vermont where she continued to study art. The art community there included , among others, Kenneth Noland, William T. Wiley the California funk artist, Robert Motherwell and Helen Frankenthaler, some of the most famous contemporary artists of the late 20th century. She was surrounded by the "east Coast heavies" and the West Coast loosies" as she puts it. Connie insists that she had an awful lot of luck to be around artists with reputations and ambition and she was deeply influenced by them. After Bennington, she moved to Brown College, where she looked at art constantly and continued to soak up art like a sponge. Connie also taught basic design at Rhode Island School of Design.

Connie eventually moved to Boston, where she met Kevin Hipe. They left Boston together in 1978 and made their way to Florida and Cedar Key by February 1979. They had headed south into the unknown with no plan, "just to find a better way to live" . They needed to follow their own ideas and turn off the noise of ambition. When they found Cedar Key, they knew that this was "it". Soon after arriving in Cedar Key, Connie was awarded a Florida Individual artist Fellowship and began receiving contracts to produce art for book jackets. She also was chosen to produce the art for the t-shirts and posters for the prestigious Winter Part Art Festival. She and Kevin opened the Suwannee Triangle Gallery in 1985 and remained in business for 22 years. They also ran the weekend Children's Art Classes in Cedar Key for 7 years. Connie designates these classes as the most satisfying teaching experience of her career.

Connie's sense of humor and vision of herself and her art are evident in the body of work on display at the Arts Center. As she will tell you herself, the events of 9/11 became a seminal turning point in her life as an artist. There is a serious undertone to even the most seemingly whimsical pieces in this show. Be sure to see this major exhibition of an amazing artist.

Editor`s Note: See an article featuring selected works of Connie Nelson on Cedar Key News --Online.

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