2012 Artists in Residence

About the Artists — Shira Walinsky, Eric Okdeh & David Goldberg

Shira Walinsky

With an MFA in painting from the University of Pennsylvania, Shira Walinsky is a painter, printmaker and muralist who has been a featured artist with the City of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program since 2000. Her interdisciplinary work explores cultures and subcultures of distinct urban areas that use personal narratives to reflect larger issues, transform public spaces, and develop a visual language using typography, portraits and textiles. She serves as co-teacher with Jane Golden, Director and pioneer of the Mural Arts Program, at the University of Pennsylvania, University of the Arts, Princeton University, Bryn Mawr College and Drexel University.

Eric Okdeh

Eric Okdeh is a Philadelphia-based muralist, who has been creating public art since 1998. Since receiving his BFA in painting from Tyler School of Art, Eric has balanced his work as a studio-artist with teaching mural making classes to youth and inmates at SCI Graterford Prison. He was the lead muralist of the Mural Corps Program in its first 6 years, exhibits widely in NY and PA, and has over 65 commissions throughout the city of Philadelphia and Seville, Spain. He has participated in mural projects in Tucson, Arizona and Los Angeles. His work is featured in four books about public and Mural art.

David Goldberg

With a BS from Howard University’s School of Engineering, David Goldberg is a HI-based teacher, programmer and digital artist specializing in designing creative connections between liberal arts and hard science. He writes, teaches, designs and develops interactive media projects independently and with the institutional support of State funding agencies, the UH, Kapiolani Community College, the Maui Economic Development Board, the Honolulu Museum of Art, and the DOE.

About the 2012 Residency

Hui No‘eau Visual Arts Center proudly presents 2012 Artists in Residence: mural artists Shira Walinsky and Eric Okdeh from Philadelphia, PA and Oahu-based media artist David Goldberg.

Walinksy and Okdeh visited us from the internationally acclaimed City of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program, which unites artists and communities through a collaborative process to create art that transforms public spaces and individual lives. Each of these pioneering artists carry 12+ years of experience leading community-based works of public art at a massive scale. As a programmer, digital artist and professor of Popular Culture at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa’s Department of American Studies, Goldberg specializes in designing creative connections between liberal arts and hard science. Walinsky and Okdeh collaborated with our Maui population to create two large-scale public art murals that reflect, inspire and represent our community while Goldberg designed a fun & interactive social media experience remotely connecting artists and off-site visitors to the entire process.

2012 ARTIST IN RESIDENCE ACTIVITIES: