Accepted Artists
Christine Alfery, WI
Robert Arbogast, FL
Jeanie Auseon, OH
Barbara Balzer, FL
Jennifer Bateman, IL
Miles Batt 2, FL
Elise Beattie, WA
Dan Borden, RI
Judi Bradford, FL
Karen Braverman, FL
Richlin Burnett-Ryan, FL
Robert Burridge, CA
Beth Bynum, MI
Diane Cannon, PA
Doris Charest, Canada
Linda Chipperfield, FL
Mindy Colton, FL
Cheryl Correll, MI
Daniel Cosentino, NJ
Samantha Crohn, NY
Linda Daniels Cermak, MD
Sandy Day Selbert, CO
Diana de Avila, FL
Kerry Didday, FL
Janine Dunn Wade, PA
Roberta Dyer, CA
Marylu Dykstra, MI
Kathy Elliott, TX
Jane Ewing, MI
Wendy Fee, Canada
Teresa Foster, TX
Todd K Fox, FL
Lee Ann Frame, MI
Nina Allen Freeman, FL
Xia Gao, MI
Lora Garcelon, MI
Lisa Iagulli Geren, MI
Muffy Clark Gill, FL
Susan Greenbaum, OR
Ann Greene, NJ
Susan Hart, NE
Pamela Haunschild, OR
Judith Hummer, NJ
Keri Ippolito, FL
Renee Kahn, SC
Kim Klabe, DE
Karen Knutson, MN
Ed Labadie, OR
Louise Lachance, Canada
Candace Law, MI
Cynthia Lee, IL
Eunji Li, CT
Richard Lund, SC
Isaac McCaslin, GA
Nancy McElroy, FL
Doreen McGunagle, FL
Maristela Miller, FL
Joye Moon, WI
Alina Obukhova, CA
Kathy O'Meara, FL
Christine Peloquin, FL
Jody Peters, Canada
Darlene Podpolucki, MI
Kendra Postma, MI
Audrey Powles, NE
Nancy Priest, CO
Steven Purtee, NY
Sudie Rakusin, NC
Natasha Ramras, WA
Debra Reid Jenkins, MI
Linda Reymore, FL
April Rimpo, MD
Anne Rivers, MI
Debora Rosental, FL
Carol Schinkel, CO
Heidi Schlichter, FL
Patti Sevensma, MI
Debra Shaffer, MI
Robert Shirk, FL
Barbara Shore, Canada
Mike Silverman, FL
Kim Smith, OR
Carolyn Sommer, IL
Patricia Spear, SC
Joan Tarbell-Plato, MD
Aida Tejada, FL
Patsy Tidwell-Painton, SC
Patricia Tieman, NJ
Lillian (LC) Tobey, FL
Cindy Triplett, OR
Amy Vulfovich, MA
Liz Walker, OR
Beau Wild, FL
Deidre Wingelaar, MI
Kelly Zeng, IL
Collaboration, FL:
Robert Shirk & Lillian Verkins
Outside the Line Collective, NY:
Deb Forbes, Lynn Muniz, Hallie Coletta, Steve Purtee, Laurie Schrader, Emily Gaunt, Joe Forbes, Dana Kenn, and Ryan Dantuono
R&D Collaborative, MI:
Haley Joseph and Kendra Postma
You're Invited!
Exhibit Reception & Awards
Thursday, Sept. 18 | 5:30 - 8:00pm
Join us to celebrate the opening of this premier exhibition! Mingle with ISEA artists, hear artist talks, and enjoy light refreshments and music. A cash bar will be available for beer and wine. This FREE event is open to the public.
Celebration Dinner
Friday, Sept. 19 | 6:00 - 9:00pm
Our final evening of the International Society of Experimental Artists Symposium will be one of celebration and entertainment, with a delicious meal and fellowship. What a spectacular way to celebrate a wonderful week of art making and camaraderie with all our artist friends and guests. Tickets are $65 each. Seats are limited. Register at iseaartexhibit.org/Symposium2025.
International Society of Experimental Artists
Innovations 2025
34th Annual International Open Juried Exhibition
September 17 – November 30, 2025
This juried exhibit features 96 works — paintings, photography, sculptures, assemblages, and more — all of an experimental nature from artists across the globe.
Many of the pieces in this exhibition are available for purchase. Click HERE to view the official price list.
About the ISEA
The International Society of Experimental Artists was founded in 1991 with the idea that artists working in an experimental manner need a society where they can share ideas and techniques - both old and new and encourage the development of new talents and skills. There is a need to connect, encourage, inform and promote artists who create art by experimentation and exploration. The Society offers members three opportunities a year to exhibit their work, with the annual INNOVATIONS Symposium as an opportunity to exhibit in a public space. The International Society of Experimental Artists' mission is to enthusiastically embrace creative thinking, imagination and experimentation. We promote public interest in experimental art, and encourage and support artists' creative journeys through exhibition, education and communication. ISEA has had about 500 members In the USA and around the world.
2025 Awards
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Best of Show
Amy Vulfovich
Massachusetts
Plant Based Burger
9" x 9.75" x 0.625"
Pressed autumn leaves and birch bark on a tree trunk slab
"Over the past few years, I have given myself a challenge to create art with materials found in nature such as tree bark, driftwood, leaves, pinecones and acorns. I discovered that the thin, paper like bark of river birch trees could be used to create monochromatic collages. I wanted to take this a step further and find a way to include color without straying from my medium of choice. I realized that the beautiful autumn leaves of New England were the perfect solution. I collected leaves of all colors before deciding on what to create. I left my inventory of reds, purples, greens, yellows, browns and oranges sit for a few months to see how the colors would settle. While eating out with a friend who is vegan and ordered a plant based burger, I laughed to myself that I could use my nature to create a real "plant based" burger. And so my experiment began."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $2,000
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Max & Gracie Founders Award
Amy Vulfovich
Plant Based Burger
Pressed autumn leaves and birch bark on a tree trunk slab
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2nd Place
Outside the Line Collective
New York: Deb Forbes, Lynn Muniz, Hallie Coletta, Steve Purtee, Mikey Munson, Laurie Schrader, Emily Gaunt, Joe Forbes, Dana Kenn, and Ryan Dantuono.
Zion National Park
29" x 35" x 1"
Mixed Medium
"Today more than ever alternative facts, tribalism, mainstream media, and the internet try to shape our collective narrative. Reconciling these often conflicting, ever changing messages to form a truth, is an on going process. Through our collaborative paintings we explore the issue of how differing points of view can contribute to or conflict with shaping our collective understanding. Each section is developed independently by a different artist in their choice of style and medium. By its nature it is an experiment in what will develop. These differing approaches are brought together to form a single image, expressing the possibilities of shared points of view forming a communal vision and understanding."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $3,800
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3rd Place
Jane Ewing
Michigan
Trees
9.5" x 30" x .5"
300&90 lb Fabriano paper, India & Chinese ink, watercolor epoxy
"Constructing a sculptural book is intuitive. Its inventive form offers creative possibilities for book configuration. I deconstructed a traditional book structure. The binding is simple but the architecture is complex. Pages in the 3 signatures fold out & overlap others in multiple ways. Hand lettering is a powerful means of expression, a gesture with deep meaning. It is not only to simply give the message that it carries. My quest is to merge calligraphically written words with abstract images -- a mindful visual way to capture one's thoughts, be poetic,& feel good. TREES merges writing, calligraphy & drawing into one body of art. Is it a book, a sculpture, broadsides, or a journal? Its an amalgam of form, content & interaction. Holding a handmade book heightens one's awareness of its creation & leads to a deep understanding of the content. At its basic, a digital book is about recording something. A handmade book is about expressing something."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $300
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4th Place
Steven Purtee
New York
Evening Pomegranates
18" x 36" x 3"
Oil, Encaustic
"Trying to capture that evening light after the golden hour when lights starts turning on but the deep blue light of dusk still shows through the window. Using a Japanese screen like structure with its object against a grid of gold leaf. Continuing my exploration of contrasting illusionistic space with the abstract material quality of paint. Bringing all these ideas together in one painting is the experiment this painting represents."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $5,300
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Juror Award
Christine Peloquin
Florida
I Am at Peace
30" x 40" x 2"
Oils and charcoal on fabric and paper collage on wood panel
"Inspired by my meditation and yoga practice, I experimented with collaging fabrics, papers and found objects and drawing and painting multiple renditions of the same figure over or next to itself. My intention was to capture split moment changes in time and layers of the human experience."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $3,600
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Renate Trapkowski Legacy Award
Barbara Balzer
Florida
Athena Trades Her Owl for a Dove
17" x 14" x 8"
Ceramic, glaze, acrylic paint
"I entrusted the surface of my slab-built hollow ceramic figure to the vicissitudes of "glaze abuse", to a dance between intention and surrender. After splashing pastel commercial underglazes onto the figure, I poured my homemade white overglaze over it, deliberately firing the kiln to a temperature higher than my recipe intends. The glaze contracted into "chips" failing to cover the surface. I poured and fired again, incrementally cooler than before, but still hotter than the recipe intends. While the first application remained in place, the second resulted in smaller chips. I poured a third time, firing yet cooler, but still hotter than the recipe intends. Then I stopped. I was happy. While the overglaze had contracted into jewel-like fractals, smaller with each successive firing, the pastel commercial underglazes, exposed to temperatures exceeding that recommended on their jars, had burnt to a warm gray. I used my pinky finger to add orange acrylic highlights. The dance was done."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $5,800
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ISEA Legacy Award
Sudie Rakusin
North Carolina
Orbits/Spheres No. 5
24" x 24" x 1"
Cold wax and oil on wood panel
"In my cold wax paintings, the properties of this medium fascinate me and keep me curious; how the underlying layers inform and alter the layers applied over them, how incising and scraping and glazing make more changes. I know I am wielding the palette knife and mixing the colors, but what happens on the panel is beyond my control. I'm learning how to be fine with the state of not knowing."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $2,000
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"The challenge in jurying this exhibition was that each submission embodied experimentation in a distinct way. Each work presented elements of innovation, insight, and exploration. To assemble an exhibition that collectively reflects its focus, I considered both the artwork and the artists’ statements, as well as the questions they raised. In the end, I made selections that best embody the ISEA’s commitment to creative thinking, imagination, and experimentation."
Innovations 2025 Juror Meghan Martin
Gallery Director of Arts on Douglas, Atlantic Center for the Arts
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Merit Award
Miles Batt 2
Florida
Kindred Spirits
28" x 20"
Watercolor
"I can't remember the last time I painted anything that was not an experiment. It starts with a pencil & evolves as the drawing progresses. Rarely do I have a predetermined outcome in mind, maybe a thought that keeps me mentally engaged. After the drawing, it's time to paint & inevitably as I move forward things again change...that's the joy of creation."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $3,000
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Merit Award
Robert Burridge
California
9 Cups
31.25" x 31.25" x 1"
acrylic mixed media on paper
"I love to draw - making marks on my drawings and paintings is just something I do. For this piece, "Nine Cups" - My goal was to create a series of individually intriguing and original graphic images on paper, using only color, markers, and collage, and appear as a unified message of "manna from heaven"-a larger body of work."
Artwork for Sale: No
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Merit Award
Lee Ann Frame
Michigan
Union Square
18" x 12"
Intaglio
"Printing two plates, one is an etching line, aquatint, drypoint while the second plate is a monotype relief color plate."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $700
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Merit Award
Kathy O'Meara
Florida
Fragile Persistence
22" x 7" x 7"
Mixed
"I work with found objects. They are often very different in their usage in their prior life. Like rusted metal gears, old toaster parts, a small tattered silken umbrella and a small bird. I like putting them together, juxtapositioning them, listening and looking to see what they tell me. I realized they were telling me about the precariousness of life and the persistence of life in the face of all obstacles. I found the story and so then it was just a matter of securely combining them to artistically convey the story these pieces told to me."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $600
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Merit Award
Robert Shirk & Lillian Verkins
Florida
Red Sky Dancer
36" x 36" x 3"
Acrylic paint on plexiglass sheets and acrylic on canvas
"This painting is a collaboration between two artists with very different styles. One artist is an expressionist painter, the other artist is a neo-pointillist painter. The idea is to have the two contrasting styles harmonize yet still have that tension created by the different styles. There are two sheets of plexiglass mounted with neo-pointillist dots on top of the expressionist mixed media piece. The title "Red Sky Dancer" describes how the two combined images create a new narrative joining the two artists contributions."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $3000
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Merit Award
Nancy Priest
Colorado
Winter Garden
30" x 22"
Embossed wallpaper (Anaglypta) and collage papers
"I worked with embossed wallpaper and collaged it into the image."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $850
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Merit Award
Natasha Ramras
Washington
Strength
10" x 8" x 0.1"
Mixed
"I started with an abstraction and saw a face in it. I then developed the face a little and integrated abstract marks into it."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $300
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Merit Award
Debra Reid Jenkins
Michigan
Color of Time
12" x 12" x 2"
oil /cold wax
"In my previous cold wax paintings bold color and shapes were always a prominent aspect of the work. I was interested in experimenting with a more subtle approach to create a sense of space and movement. In this piece I used very thin veils of muted color to cover the early layers and expose their shapes to create a visual illusion of thicker texture and depth."
Artwork for Sale: No
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Merit Award
April Rimpo
Maryland
Celebraciones
14" x 6" x 6"
Watercolor on watercolor paper 3-D sculpture
""Celebraciones" is my first 3-D watercolor, created to celebrate the baby's christening with family present. There was more family in my reference photo from Guatemala, but with a 4-sided pyramid structure I limited my choice to four: the parents, baby, and the woman I assumed was the baby's grandma. The first challenge was the composition of the people on the paper that I would fold; how to get them to fit and still create a vision of celebration from each angle. I decided to use hot press watercolor paper since I would need to fold it. What a relief when it folded without too much fighting with the paper. My fear was white edges would appear, but that didn't occur. Then I needed to find some small weights to use to make the piece stable, so it wouldn't tip when presented on a pedestal. Last I needed to find a strong tape to allow me to make tight seals where the folded paper met. I think the happy celebration shines through which was essential as my goal is telling stories of life."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $1,200
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Merit Award
Kelly Zeng
Illinois
Like Never Before
28" x 34" x 1"
Watercolor
"I find endless inspiration in the beauty of dance and the emotions dancers convey. For me, feelings closest to my heart often defy words, making movement my true language-it expresses what words cannot. Through this series, I explore the interplay of sound, movement, and emotion, bridging my inner world with visual art. Recently, I began practicing Kundalini yoga with a choreographer friend. The spiritual, healing music of these sessions evoked vivid dance imagery, inspiring Like Never Before, a series of paintings based on my emotional responses to the music. Using pencil sketches, I built a reference library of dance movements, designing and rearranging figures to tell my own story, guided by key design principles. This particular painting was sketched while listening to "Be the Light," with the composition evolving as I painted. The series reflects my journey to translate emotion into a visual and dynamic form."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $1,800
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Honorable Mention
Linda Chipperfield
Florida
Wildness is Necessity
30" x 22" x 1.5"
watercolor and embroidery on paper
"I am usually quite controlled and realistic in my mark-making. With this piece I was trying to express my frustration with too much control and not enough freedom. I often go on hikes to relieve stress and get away from civilization. The statement by John Muir (one of my personal heroes) expressed precisely what I was trying to portray in my watercolor, so I found a way to incorporate it."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $450
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Honorable Mention
Todd K Fox
Florida
Self Love
36" x 24" x 4"
Mixed Media
"The assemblage was an experimental work in ways in which I pushed the envelope to give the end user a different perspective by using my allegorical inclusions in a new technique where the visual plane and narrative are more inviting and intriguing. Instead of a deeper box or a flat surface I introduced a reversed cradle panel and included some of my existing elements but in a different point of view. This was the first piece I completed in this series."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $2,195
INSTAGRAM
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Honorable Mention
Lisa Iagulli Geren
Michigan
Reaching for Spring
21" x 28" x .5"
Mixed Media (Watercolor, acrylic, collage, charcoal)
"My original intention was to create a textured background paper for figure drawing. I began by collaging clear wrinkled papers and brushing splotches of a neutral sienna wash on watercolor paper. The suggestion of bare tangled branches and outstretched tree forms appeared. I followed what my art wanted to become instead of what I originally intended. When I tossed powdered charcoal on and splashed it off with water, it created contrast and revealed more organic shapes and textures. Manipulation with erasers, charcoal pencils and sienna in creases added touches of definition. I almost left it mostly colorless until I viewed it again after coming home from a walk with the signs of new growth all around me. That's when I noticed the light area that could become the glow of warmth through the trees, and I experimented with accents of watercolor, acrylic and painted rice papers to add touches of color and express the emotional exploding emergence of life in the early days of Spring!"
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $600
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Honorable Mention
Nancy McElroy
Florida
Solo
12" x 11" x 10"
Raku clay, red clay, glaze
"This soft slab-built vessel was raku fired. During the building process I embedded previously fired Pyrometric cones that were used to determine temperature range. Each straight red clay cone created a spiked, armor-like surface. Once dried and bisque fired to 1940 degrees Fahrenheit, I was surprised and delighted to discover the cones had melted and some even dripped off the piece. This discovery led to adding more recycled cones to create interesting surface textures to my work."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $800
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Honorable Mention
Joye Moon
Wisconsin
Festival Time
22" x 15
Watercolor
"Festival Time was created by starting with no idea what so ever. I randomly drew shapes, then started to create textures using a variety of salts, alcohol drops, scraping the paint, forcing a burst of color and implementing lots of negative painting to make the shapes come alive."
Artwork for Sale: Yes | Price/Value: $1,300
Art Innovation Symposium
ISEA Workshops at OMAM
Those who register for the symposium (Sept. 17-20) will have the opportunity to attend the amazing workshops listed below. Workshop tuition ranges from $150 to $345. Some prices may include materials fee, so please read the full course description on the ISEA website. Registration for all of the Innovations events/workshops are processed by ISEA. Learn more at iseaartexhibit.org/Symposium2025.
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Two-Day Workshop with Fran Gardner
Wednesday & Thursday, Sept. 17-18 | 10:30am - 3:30pm -
Two-Day Workshop with Gila Rayberg
Wednesday & Thursday, Sept. 17-18 | 10:30am - 3:30pm -
One-Day Workshop with Christine Peloquin
Thursday, Sept. 18 | 10:30am - 3:30pm -
One-Day Workshop with Aida Tejada & Deborah Rosental
Friday, Sept. 19 | 10:30am - 3:30pm
If you have questions, please email symposium@iseaartexhibit.org.
Past ISEA Best of Show – Max & Gracie Founders Award Winners:
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2024
Kendra Postma
Nestle
2024
Clay/wood, 30" x 9.5" x 2"
“Nestle” is experimental due to the abnormal use of clay. The pieces, or “shards,” are made from the leftover clay from my extruder. After each clay extrusion, the extruder tube is left to dry out until the next use. When I saw how thin and fragile the dried clay had become, I thought it would be a challenge to see how many pieces I could save without breaking them. I love how they stack inside each other and create dimension and structure, hence the name Nestle. The best part is when light shines onto the piece, creating all kinds of interesting shadows. Sometimes, when the light is shown onto it, they almost look like birds nestling together.
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2023
Christine Alfery
Your Mind Sings - Listen
2023
Acrylic on paper, 44" x 34" x 0"
The controlled mapping of the face, and the controlled brushwork within the mapping, were so different for me. I pride myself on never coloring within the lines. While I was frustrated with the lack of free spontaneous marking and form-making that I so enjoy when creating, I continued to fill in the spaces to see where the work would take me. Later when I returned to work, I immediately created the red-orange hair and was able to stand back and say "she is finished." I listened to the music the work was singing to me. At first, with the controlled mark-making it was like a controlled symphony slowly, slowly building and then a crescendo of the symphony happened with a burst of red-orange hair, making the work very experimental for me. In the end I enjoyed the statement the work made, it speaks of the contrast of robotic control, the machine, and the fluid flow of creativity.
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2022
Jean Pederson
Blink
2022
Mixed media, 30" x 30" x 2"
I’ve been integrating the ideas of time and movement from quantum mechanics into my practice. Transforming realism into distorted or shifting shapes offers my mixed media a new fresh approach.
"When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change." — Max Planck
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2021
Dennis Salaty
The Dwelling
2021
Mixed media assemblage, acrylic and found objects, 12" x 12" x 3"
I usually work with acrylic, collage and assemblage. This piece was experimental for me because I used different materials to create an assemblage-type painting. I experimented using a canvas panel as a base to construct the piece. I also experimented by using new materials, such as the course pumice gel that covers the canvas, which I never used before.
