A Virtual Art Exhibit and Q&A with Artist Stephen Galiczynski

Although we're unable to have our monthly art exhibits at the 96th Street Library, we'd like to continue the tradition with a virtual art exhibit. 

Say hello to artist Stephen Galiczynski. Stephen exhibited work at the 96th Street Library last year, and we hope to be able to display his work again in person someday! But for now, we'll present this virtual art exhibit and interview.

Where are you from originally and what brought you to New York City?

I’m from Philadelphia. It’s a city full of great museums and a great town to grow up in. When I was in high school, I drove up to NYC with my girlfriend to visit her sister, who had just graduated college and relocated there. I vividly remember driving down West End Ave and thinking—some day I’m going to live here. So, after living in many different cities, including Fribourg, Switzerland, St. Petersburg, Russia and Washington, DC for school and work, it’s no surprise to me that I landed here. However, it is interesting/kismet that I wound up living and raising my kids a block off  West End Ave. 

You mentioned that your mother was a painter. How much did your family environment influence your future career? And are you encouraging the same love for art in your own children?

My mom being an artist definitely influenced not only me, but my six siblings. In one way or another, we are all artistic. My brother Paul, aka artist, W.P. Galiczynski, is a well-known artist in Philadelphia. My mom always had pencils, crayons, coloring books, Etch A Sketch and other art implements to keep us busy, and probably out of her hair.  : ) She said things like, “There are no mistakes, you can go outside the lines if you want to, and the sky is not always blue" . . . which frees you up to explore and is a great lesson in life, too. Both of my children are artistic, which I definitely encourage. My daughter went to LaGuardia, the High School of Music & Art and the Performing Arts. Her focus was art. She just graduated from Drexel’s Graduate Physician Assistant Program. As a matter of course, we all bike to and/or meet up at art museums when they’re home or in whatever city we happen to be in. Art is a big part of our lives.

I find your facility for languages an interesting contrast to your talent for visual art. Do you find that these talents intersect at all?

Interesting question and something I’ve actually given a lot of thought to over the years. I think of myself as a communicator. When I translated, it was with words and their nuances and as a parent I certainly realize how important word choices are and how being clear with them is. I’ve come to understand that there are things that I can “say” with my artwork that words could never express. My visual language... that’s how I often think of my artwork.

You've been involved in art competitions at two iconic New York City institutions: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Rockefeller Center. How did these come about? 

I always look for (and friends often make me aware of) (free) art Exhibits to show my work. I follow the Met and they announced the international search for their 150th Anniversary Design Contest on their website. Because of the pandemic, their announcement of the winners was pushed back and pared down. It was a pinnacle of my art career to be named a top ten finalist in their juried contest and have my painting, "Modern Madonnas," listed on their website. Here’s an interesting note: I created that design in grade school. The art class assignment was: design a stamp. That design stuck with me. The Met called for designs of things that inspired you at the Met. They have tons of Madonnas, so I merged and updated my childhood design with their pieces and took into consideration current events. 

It was such a coincidence that I was the first person in line for The Metropolitan Museum’s reopening and was introduced to the President, Daniel Weiss, and Director, Max Hollein. 

Next came the Rockefeller Center Flag Project. That, I believe, came up on my Instagram feed. I know that many artists do “variations on a theme.” I felt the basic shapes were strong, but it needed to be rethought to work on a flag. It was amazing to find out my design was a winner and would be made into a flag that would hang, along with the other winners, around the iconic Ice Skating Rink in Rock Center. Because of the great reception it received, the run of the show was extended a week.  

So, both of these contests came to me, which is pretty incredible. I’m extremely proud that I’m the only artist to have placed in both of these prestigious competitions. 

Who and what are your influences?

My influences... that’s actually involved and varied. I love looking at things. I’m an observer, which also helps me in my acting, where I’m known as Steve Glenn. In my youth, The Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Norman Rockwell & Rodin Museums were important, along with my mom’s influence. She painted neighbors' windows with “stained glass “-look themes for the holidays. I always won or placed in the art competitions to paint store front windows in a mall near where we lived during my grade school years. 

I had the wonderful opportunity to study my junior year abroad in Switzerland at the University of Fribourg. That year,  I hitchhiked and used my Eurail pass and visited most of the major museums and many galleries in Western Europe, which was a major eye opener and influenced me greatly. Then, after earning my BA in Russian, I moved to St. Petersburg, Russia. I was in walking distance of the Hermitage Museum. I visited there regularly, but it wasn’t just the paintings and sculptures that I was taking in, the architecture of all these cities also caught my attention. I translated in Washington, D.C. and was often at the National Galleries. I regularly sketch the mascarons that I see while walking around these towns. (In architecture, a mascaron ornament is a face, usually human, sometimes frightening or chimeric whose alleged function was originally to frighten away evil spirits so that they would not enter the building. The concept was subsequently adapted to become a purely decorative element.)

Also, I remember seeing the Ed Harris movie about Jackson Pollack. That was a huge influence. Last year I had a three-month one-man exhibition of my Pollack-inspired painting at the Master Gallery at 103rd St. and Riverside Drive. Coincidentally, that building, The Master Building, was specifically built in 1928 with residences and studios for artists by Russian artist Nicolas Roerich, an influence, who was from St. Petersburg, Russia. The day before the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown happened here in NYC, I got to see the Gerhart Richter exhibit at the Met Breuer, definitely an influencer. So, I think you can see that ALL the things I see around me are incorporated and become my influences to some degree or another.

How has the pandemic affected your work?

That’s a good one. TIME, TIME, TIME... It gave me more time to work on my art... My union (The Screen Actors Guild) and my non-essential painting business, Steve G’s, were SHUT DOWN for months! That was horrible: emotionally and financially draining. So I used that time to do so many creative things. I went into Central Park and sketched, almost daily. I sent those sketches to the Central Park Conservancy. They liked them and asked me to get back in touch in the new year when they'd have time to reassess their needs.

I’ve biked around the city and photographed myself with my mask on in font of all the iconic NYC buildings with absolutely no traffic on the street. 

And, I’ve been painting up a storm, since, for so many months, I couldn’t visit my daughter, who was studying in Philadelphia, or my son, studying in Pittsburgh. He just graduated the University of Pittsburgh with a degree in Finance and immediately got a job there at the Bank of New York/Mellon. 

I sought out the beauty that still exists and photo-documented it. 

I also masked some of my Mascarons.

Any other recent or upcoming projects?

This past January,  I had this piece, Holy Family,  in the Virtual AIDS, Postcards from the Edge Exhibit/Fundraiser, which is normally held in the Bortolami Gallery in TriBeCa, but this year, because of the pandemic, will be a virtual online show.

I’ve written a TV series and have four episodes completed. It's a dramedy called The Fly on the Wall,  that I’m hoping to find a showrunner for and have produced. 

And finally, I’ve written a song, "Wild Ride", which I’m hoping to connect Pink to. Talk about dreaming...

My artwork is represented by the Peg Alston Fine Arts Gallery.