On Sunday, May 19, the Loma Linda Cultural Arts Association celebrates the success of our 2019 Fine Arts Festival (co-sponsored by Loma Linda University) with an artist demonstration, a reception and the presentation of awards. Entries can be seen in the Loma Linda Civic Center building and Drayson Center through Monday, May 20. Don’t miss the show! Our featured artist, Durre Waseem, is a “transplant”: from her native Pakistan to Corona, California. Waseem holds a Master of Fine Arts from Punjab University. Soon after her graduation, she was hired to teach art at her alma mater and did so for 7 years. Thereafter, our artist spent three years teaching at a women’s college in Pakistan.
In 2001, she moved to the United States, to full-time painting, and to participate in many national and international exhibitions. True to the adage that “one learns best by teaching others," Ms. Waseem states, “It was during my teaching years that I explored myself as an artist, with better understanding of seeing and omitting.” During the next 30 years, the exposure to different cultures in different locales, influenced her developing color preference and technique. At this point in her career, “I select the subject and the painting itself seems to lead me through the process.”
This versatile artist works in the studio or plain air, employing watercolor, ink, oils, pastels, and acrylics. What subjects does Durre Waseem paint? She captures the culture around her: ordinary objects, the daily lives of working people, buildings, landscapes; en fin, the local color.
With bold and colorful brushwork in a loose, almost impressionistic style, she invites us to give attention to the unexpected beauty of the mundane, the intrigue of other “worlds."
Find “Durre Waseem, artist” online, and enjoy her rendition of “Urban Bustle”: the old bazaars and street scenes of Asia. Or see “Landscapes," where Southern California spring paints a hillside with “poppy gold” while a black Jaguar (the motorized kind) lurks in a shaded wilderness.
As the May 19 meeting is a celebratory event, it will be held in the LLU Drayson Activities Center, located at 25040 Stewart Street, Loma Linda, from 2 to 4 pm. There is no admission fee; the public is welcome.