"The Food Forest"
8' x 7' x 5'

My sculpture for the ARTcycle exhibited during Art Basel is called "The Food Forest." It will be exhibited during Art Basel at GAB Studios, 105 NW 23 Street, Wynwood.

Although ARTcycle is bringing awareness to bicycle safety, I wanted to take one step further and bring awareness to the need to plant food in public spaces as well.

Food forests are vertical garden ecosystems planted in layers starting with edible fruit  trees as the top layer down to smaller berry shrubs and herbs in the lower layers. Food Forests are important because they help restore the health and abundance of land by saving energy, soil, water and resources. It is a sustainable approach to the long-term needs of land while providing food and food education to the local community.

Bring your bike or rent one from Deco Bike!

In Wynwood, we will have bicycle tours departing daily at noon from Fountain Art Fair, 2505 N. Miami Ave. that will take touring bicyclists gallery to gallery without having to look for a single parking space! 

ARTcycle was curated by Tachi Llamas and Giselle Delagdo to raise awareness for riders as well as drivers to education the community to make the healthy alternative of cycling safer for everyone. The money raised from the sale of all fifteen of the sculptures will go to Green Mobility Network's Safe Streets Miami educational programs to reduce the number of bike-related accidents and fatalities that occur in our city every year.

Please go to www.facebook.com/artcyclemiami to see the route and map of sculpture locations. 

Thank you to All4Cycling for sponsoring my work and bringing health and bicycle safety to our community.

Save the date!

Thursday, October 25^th from 12noon to 1:00pm at The Artisan Lounge (500 NE 1^st Ave).

For a Brown Bag Break Away... Break away from STRESS!!!

Viewing art dramatically reduces stress! In 2006, Professor Angela Clow from the University of Westminster in the UK studied saliva cortisol levels in participants who viewed art for 40 minutes during lunch and discover a reduction of 32% which would normally take stress levels five hours after work to fall to that extent.

Pack your lunch and hop on the Metro Mover to The Artisan Lounge (College North Station). Enjoy your lunch surrounded by art and studio artists then return to work rejuvenated, relaxed and more productive.

More benefits… It’s free, green and healthy.

Questions? Call Artist, Nancy Martini at 305.401.7726.

Please RSVP to hello@theartisanlounge.com by Tuesday Oct 22 

Go to http://www.nancymartini.com/where-to-find-me/ to view a map and get directions.

New Studio Space at The Artisan Lounge

The only thing we can really count on is change. Although I  love my home studio, I began to feel that I needed to be in a more urban setting.

Because I am so influenced by my surroundings, the first criteria in finding a space was that it had to be architecturally beautiful or at least with the potential to make the space beautiful. Then I need the space to have VENTILATION where I could open the windows. The next thing on my list was that it had to have public transportation (so I wouldn't be waisting a lot of gas getting there) where I could commute using the Metrorail.

Not a lot of options in Miami fit this criteria. With an open mind, I posted notes to everyone I knew asking for any type of space, but I was not finding what I wanted.  I finally found the perfect space in the out building of a 1890's church that just refurbished 9000 square fee of old classrooms into 26 contemporary artist studios, 3 galleries, and 2 artist lounges. Where the Metro Mover drops off directly across the street and it has gated parking with a security guard.

Last week we had our grand opening and it was a hugh success! Here are a few photos of my studio and the gallery and lounge spaces.

Thank you to everyone who donated their old chests to me! Everything in my studio 

was either given to me or found in the trash. The only thing that I had to purchase for 

my studio was one chair and four table legs! 

One of the two artist lounges

Two of the three gallery spaces

Hope to see you at the next exhibit in April. 

The 26 studios are filled, but they do have a waiting list and they are accepting applications to exhibit.

Wynwood Green: A Day of Firsts

Wynwood known for Saturday night art walks now has a new bold green happening taking place the last Sunday of every month to bring people to Wynwood in the daytime by hosting a family friendly monthly outdoor green festival from 12pm to 7pm.

Mary Keel of 305 Green invited me to display my eco art and talk about upcycling and art as eco activism. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I thought it was a wonderful idea, so off I went.

Yesterday, after I unloaded and set up all of my art, my daughter and I were hungry. As vegetarians, it is usually hard to find food that we can eat. We met Ryan and Mike from Bocaditos who noticed us struggling with their menu and asked if they could help. When we told them that we were vegetarians they announced that anything on the menu could be made vegetarian without our food touching any pans that were touched by the meat that they were preparing. Wow! I was so impressed. They were happy to accommodate us. Not only that, when we ordered one order of fries they paid attention to the argument my daughter and I were having. I wanted spicy fries and she wanted plain. Because I was only going to have a few, I ordered the plain. When I went to pick up my order they split my single order in half, one spicy and one plain without even asking me!

To my delight, my whole day continued on the same happy path. Everyone I met was kind, gracious and willing to share their love of environment. Wynwood Green is definitely a place to check out next month.

I wish Wynwood Green continued success. Taking charge of our neighborhoods and making them healthy, green and safe takes a community of caring people. I hope you join Wynwood Green next month to be part of the solution. It starts with one voice and one single action.

Nancy Martini

Here are a few of the amazing people I met yesterday...

Ryan and Mike from Bocaditos Food Truck

Meadow and her daughter

Daniel Wills from The Armory Miami who shared
his fabulous studio and space for the event. Thanks Daniel!

Jeff Lillie (center) with his team from Marathon Bio-Diesel

Me with Mary Keel on the right

Art Friedrich (center) of Urban Oasis Project

Contenti Cupcakes

Cooking Classes for kids

Dean on the Right (one of the organizers)

Rafael Calvo of Calvo Design

Saira Jacobs from Vintaj Mahal

Onsite installation of a skateboard ramp

Cool balloon artist. 

Demonstration on how to correctly position
 your body while gardening yoga style.

Speaking Sunday at 2:00

New GREEN event coming to Wynwood, Sunday, January 29th from 12 to 7pm

I am so excited about Wynwood Green! I will be speaking at 2:00 about upcycling and will be exhibiting a few of my paintings in a workshop, conversation setting.

Please join me on the green adjacent to Armory Studios in the heart of Wynwood (572 NW 23rd Street, Miami) for  music, demonstrations, workshops, food and fitness.

Bike, pet and recycle-friendly!

For more information visit wynwoodgreen.org

My work

The ocean and the coral reef have been the focus of the few paintings below. I have chosen two techniques to create the work. Both techniques use encaustics (beeswax, damar crystals and pigment.) However, one technique uses the wax applied directly on wood and the other is where wax is manipulated on a heated surface and then a paper print is taken from the image and reworked with pencil.

The Largo Release

34" x 48" Encaustic on Wood

December 10, 2011 I watched by best friend’s son release his parents ashes into the sea just off Key Largo. He walked proudly down the dock, wearing his father’s hat. I decided to think of that day as a beginning, not an ending. That life is forever renewing and reinventing itself just waiting for us to live it.

Seafood or Sea Life?

34" x 48" Encaustic on 

Wood

Seafood is printed proudly on most menus. I wish it would read sea life instead of seafood. By choosing plant base dinners we can make a difference in the depletion of our oceans one plate at a time.

Worth Restoring

23” x 17” beeswax, pigment and pencil on paper

I am sure car dealerships would love to see everyone purchase a new car this year. We look at old cars and see all the work that is involved in keeping them in good working condition. My son, Alex, drives an old, very used, 1979 Firebird. It needs a lot of work, but he loves his car and doesn’t see all of its imperfections. 

The day when he went to get his car painted after weeks of sanding and preparing the surface, I realized that in order to restore anything first, you have to love what you are restoring whether it is an old car, a relationship or the Coral Reef.