For immediate release contact: Carol O’Sullivan

May 7, 2009 412-681-5449

Pittsburgh Filmmakers/Pittsburgh Center for the Arts Announce

Two Photography Shows for Summer:

Organic Cosmic Mandalas and Leaf in the Water

(Pittsburgh, PA) – Filmmakers Galleries will present two photography exhibitions this summer featuring local artists, Philomena O’Dea and Malgorzata Mosiek, both of whom explore the mysteries of nature in their work. The shows are on view from June 4 through August 16, 2009. An opening reception will be held on Thursday,

June 4 from 6:00 – 9:00pm. It is free and open to the public.

Organic Cosmic Mandalas by Philomena O’Dea is a photographic print series featuring extreme close-ups of dandelions. From such a vantage point, O’Dea explains, they morph into images that resemble mandalas. A Sanskrit word, “mandala” loosely translated means circle. This familiar design is a geometric/circular pattern that symbolizes the universe, among other things.

O’Dea, an artist member at PF/PCA, is perhaps best known in Pittsburgh for her documentation of the local peace movement. She is also drawn to nature photography, she says, “for its capacity to slow the senses as well as to fill them.” Besides studying at the University of Pittsburgh and at Johns Hopkins University, she has studied, worked and lived around the world, including time in the Sudan, on the Thai-Cambodian border, in the Peruvian Amazon, and in England, India, Nepal and Kenya.

Leaf in the Water by Malgorzata Mosiek is a series of digital images taken from a nature study of leaves in a lake. Mosiek captures the seasonal changes that occur throughout the course of a year. “Young leaves grow up above the water, then die and fall into it – floating, and finally submerging,” she says. “I began to contemplate the life metaphor implied therein.”

Mosiek was born and educated in Poland. She earned her masters degree in Fine Arts at the Nicolas Copernicus University in Torun. Before moving to Pittsburgh, she was a staff photographer at the Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton, New Jersey. Mosiek has exhibited her work, which includes landscape and wildlife studies, in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Filmmakers Galleries are located at 477 Melwood Avenue, North Oakland. Gallery hours are Monday through Friday, noon to 5:00, and during evening film screenings. Free and open to the public. For more information call 412-681-5449, or visit: www.pghfilmmakers.org

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