Artistic Consultant

"Art is beauty. Art is communication. Art is in the eye of the beholder; Art is magic!"

Writes West Palm Beach artist Jack Barry who's first fascination with art came in the late 1950's as a boy in an Irish, blue-collar neighborhood on the Hudson in Yonkers, New York. Barry works in fresco. Popular with the old masters, frescoes are created by applying thick layers of plaster to a surface and painting directly into them before they dry. Michelangelo used this technique to paint the Sistine Chapel. Influenced by Joseph Campbell's theories of archetypes and hero myths, Barry's art explores his predisposition to mysticism and esoteric teachings. Barry's panels combine fields of color with abstract shapes and archaic symbols in order to form a visual language that belong only to him.

(Click on an image above for a closer look at Jack's work)

Sacred Space
Copyright Jack Barry 2000

We build and design homes and facilities that remind us of a past or different culture. Legacy to the grandeur of another age or place: Renditions of Tudor, Victorian, Colonial, Southwest, French, Italian, Moorish, Asian only to mention a few. As with all exterior designs and floor plans the natural progression of our culture that hungers for a link to another is to fill the spaces with art and furniture that either directly or eclectically ties.

The one missing link in this chain of development seems to be the walls. We line our floors with Italian marble and hang coffered ceilings of cypress. Only a high-lighted contrast to the pristine dry wall and slick veneer surfaced walls of the 21st century. In all the structures that I have visited there and abroad one thing that seems to lend power and warmth to the rooms of a by-gone time is the perfect imperfection of its walls. There seems to be a tactile tie of richness that spans the computer screen images of the virtual reality of our times.

We live in an age when more and more of our lives are spent in the environment of our homes. We no longer have to shop for necessities daily, go to the movies or a concert to see the latest entertainment, buy a newspaper to be informed or even leave the house to make a living. Communication on a global level is at our finger tips to a world that is moving so fast that it's always just beyond our grasp.

What I propose is a stretch beyond the traditional faux finishes of our trendy times. Bring the artistic feel and energy of your environment of choice to the "smart" home of the future. A Hi-Tech cave that gives you a sense of permanence in the mille-second world of the computer screens - walls that are art in themselves. Natures own palette in balance and shadings reproduced in layers of natural pigments. That can either be enhanced by your collectables or stand alone in a Spartanistic statement. Each room itself a work of art.

So pick a time, a symbol - your own Petra glyph. Create a personal coat of arms! Work with an artist to design your world!