Marti’s kicks off seventh season of showcasing art

Photos by Tom Rivers
ALBION – Marti’s on Main kicked off its seventh season of hosting art shows in Albion on Friday evening, featuring unusual sculptures and paintings.

Jim Fiegel, pictured in top photo, creates abstract paintings using a combination of acrylic, enamel, and water-based paint. He paints on Plexiglass and his paintings are curved. He also creates his own wooden frames and has LED lights behind the Plexiglass.

“The light has a calming effect,” said Fiegel, who is semi-retired after a career selling industrial supplies.

He also has worked in carpentry and housing rehabs, taking on 12 housing renovations.

Fiegel lives in Albion and attended a Marti’s art show about six years ago. He didn’t consider himself an artist, but he went home and experimented. He has now created about 400 of his unusual paintings, and has sold more than 30 to Artisan Works in Rochester. He has 24 pieces on display in the show at Marti’s.

“It helps me keep my sanity,” he said about creating the paintings.

He likes to use bright colors and create a feeling of outer space.

“I like to include planets in my paintings for my hero, Albert Einstein,” Fiegel said.

He varies the thickness of the paint in his abstract work.

“His stuff is awesome,” said Kim Martillotta Muscarella, owner of the gallery.

She has watched Fiegel from his early efforts to his more dramatic work these days.

He paints on the reverse side of the Plexiglass, and puts the top layer on first instead of last.

Martillotta Muscarella also is a featured artist in this month’s show. She has about 30 works of assemblage sculpture on display. She takes pieces of musical instruments, kitchen utensils, guitar necks, antlers, furs, animal bones, shells, drift wood and “old stuff that would be trashed.”

She combines them in many interesting pieces.

“People have commented that I have quite the imagination,” Martillotta Muscarella said.

In this assemblage sculpture, Martillotta Muscarella took doll heads of George and Martha Washington and glued them into candle holders.

Martillotta Muscarella used to create more assemblage sculptures but took a break from it for more than a decade. She took it up again this winter and had fun using odd items that likely would have been discarded anyway.

Her husband, Neal Muscarella, said he is impressed by his wife’s creativity.

“This stuff all comes from boxes of junk, and it got sorted out,” Mr. Muscarella said.

Martillotta Muscarella has sold 52 of the sculptures to Artisan Works in Rochester.

She has new shows at Marti’s each month with a reception the first Friday from 5:30 to 9 p.m. There are usually about 60 people that attend the receptions, which are free but donations are accepted.

Marti’s is located at 229 North Main St. To visit the gallery, give Martillotta Muscarella a call at (585) 589-6715.