A Deeper Love: New Paintings Inspired by Coral Reefs
A Deeper Love: New Paintings Inspired by Coral Reefs
featuring Nansi Bielanski Gallup & David Gallup
September 14, 2024 - February 24, 2025
Nansi Bielanski Gallup and David Gallup, Coral Gardens, Rangiroa Lagoon, 2023, Courtesy the Artists.
The California Nature Art Museum is pleased to announce its forthcoming exhibition, A Deeper Love: New Paintings Inspired by Coral Reefs, coming September 2024, featuring new work by artists Nansi Bielanski Gallup and David Gallup.
A Deeper Love will offer a thoughtful artistic examination of the life, sub-marine landscape, and human interaction with coral reef ecosystems. While deepwater corals may be found in virtually every part of every ocean in the world, tropical coral reefs have the most powerful impact on human existence. It is estimated that up to one billion people rely on tropical coral reefs for food and income.
Many of these reef-reliant cultures are among the world’s poorest, and they are among the first to suffer from climate degradation by industrialized nations. Already, rising sea levels and intensified hurricanes are reducing the inhabitable land of many island nations.
Artists Nansi Bielanski Gallup and David Gallup are motivated by these challenges, working collaboratively and individually as artists to highlight the beauty and importance of coral reefs and their need for protection.
About the Artists
Nansi Bielanski Gallup, Fiji Shark Diver (Nansi's Dive)
David Gallup, Blue Octopus, Fiji
Nansi Bielanski Gallup holds a Masters of Fine Arts Degree from Loyola Marymount University. Before becoming a professional artist, she was a television director and producer of many award-winning television commercials. She lived in Budapest, Hungary for three years, producing over one hundred commercials and several documentaries. In 2003, she left television to dedicate herself full-time to sculpting and painting. Nansi was selected to be Artist in Residence at the Carnegie Art Museum in 2016 and held a solo exhibition there in 2017.
David Gallup is a graduate of the Otis Art Institute of Parsons School of Design. In his early career, he was the Chief Studio Assistant for pop art legend Hiro Yamagata, supervising a staff of 30 artists on the "Earthly Paradise" project. Gallup then spent 15 years as Vice President of the California Art Club, and has had three solo museum exhibitions; "California's Channel Islands" at the Frederick R. Weisman Museum in Malibu, "Channel Islands Marine Sanctuary" at the Aquarium of the Pacific, and "Beneath the Surface" at the Carnegie Art Museum in Oxnard. In 2018 he realized his dream of marrying Nansi.
Deepening the shared vision, both artists find their greatest inspiration in scuba diving. The coral reefs of our planet sustain us all, and they are as imperiled as they are beautiful. Bielanski and Gallup continue to travel the globe to observe life beneath the surface and have recently purchased a small island in the Coral Sea which they use as a second studio. Their personal observations of the reef system have demonstrated the validity of the concerned voices of ecologists and marine biologists. We (humans) save what we love, and love what we understand. For this reason, the couple have chosen to dedicate their art to furthering the public's love and understanding of our oceans and coral reef systems.
Learn more about Nansi Bielanski Gallup and David Gallup and their work at www.GallupContemporary.com, or on Instagram @nansibielanskigallup_artist and @davidcgallup_artist.