About Diana Alva:
Diana was raised by Mexican parents in a home near Tiger Stadium. Her first words were the names of baseball players, learning her numbers by studying the backs of their jerseys. Her artistic father was constantly drawing, sculpting and painting, and teaching her life lessons — such as the perils of crossing the street — using puppets. A potter and painter, she created the Detroit Tile Company in Southwest Detroit with her husband Jim Puntigham. “Becoming a potter and working with clay in so many forms, has really enriched my life. There is so much more to pottery than just making that first pot. … it’s that first piece you fall in love with that takes you into a journey with limitless outcomes. I have come full circle with clay.”
Diana describes her paintings, largely done in acrylics, as “toothy, using a “push-pull” technique, applying paint with brushes, cardboard or sticks, to create a “structural thicket” with textured lines reminiscent of calligraphy. She describes the process like taking a walk in the woods: “you turn around and question how you got through, then you turn around again and don’t know how to get out.”
-------------------------------
About Ramón Guadiana:
Ramón Angel Guadiana, the son of Mexican immigrants, was born in 1938. Schooled in the Detroit School system, attended the Society for Arts and Crafts (Now the Ceneter for Creative Studies) under the tutelage of Guy Palazolla and Sarkis Sarkizian in the late 1950's. He also studied for two years at Michigan State University Outreach Program at Pewabic Pottery.
His mediums of choice are oils, acrylics and watercolors.
Although his paintings may look symbolic, many are expressed metaphorically. He considers it a style he calls fragmented, not cubist.
"I feel that my Hispanic heritage has given me a rich source of inspiration."