Local photographer Marzena Grabczynska is one of the featured artists in an exhibit currently at LIU Post in Brookville titled “Endless Summer – Visions of Long Island.”
The exhibit is a fundraising event for the Nassau County Firefighter’s Operation Wounded Warrior (NCF-OWW), a non-profit organization centered on providing much-needed items to the wounded men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces.
Curated by Jill Rader Levine, the exhibit includes art from more than 50 of Long Island’s most distinguished, award-winning artists and photographers, who are making donations to the NCF-OWW, as well as donating a portion of any sales of their artwork to the organization.
More photographs by Marzena Grabczynska
The theme of the exhibit is summer on Long Island expressed in a wide variety of styles and mediums. More than 150 works of art will be displayed.
“After meeting curator Jill Levine and participating in Women of the World exhibit last March, I am thrilled to be among such a talented group of artists again and being a part of the charity exhibition to benefit the great cause: Nassau County Fire Fighter’s Operation Wounded Warrior,” says Grabczynska. “Not only will I be able to show my work in the Endless Summer Exhibition, but I am also contributing to something big and important. Another small contribution was my help with the installation of the exhibit at the gallery, lending my hands and hammer to the curator and making sure all the art hanging went as smoothly as possible.”
The exhibition will be professionally judged by Seung Lee, director of Fine Arts and professor of Art at LIU Post, Marc Kopman, a professor of the Hutton House Lectures at LIU Post, Dominick Totino, the official photographer for the Queens Borough president and photographer Tab Hauser of Glen Cove.
“I was born and raised in Poland and trained as a librarian graduating from college with deep love of art and literature. Photography came to me as a way to express myself and my feelings, document my travels and adventures,” says Grabczynska.
Recently, the artist has been very busy showing her work in galleries all over Long Island, including FotoFoto Gallery and Petite Gallery in Huntington, Long Island Photo Gallery in Islip, Jeanine Tengelsen Gallery in Dix Hills as well as the Hutchins Gallery in Brookville.
Last year she was invited to show her photographs at a designer showhouse at Hempstead House at Sands Point. She has also done group and solo exhibits at Long Island libraries including Manhasset, Freeport, Glen Cove, Mineola, Rockville Center, Syosset and South Huntington.
She won a “best in show” for one of her photographs at the Long Island Center of Photography juried exhibition at the African American Museum in Hempstead and had a photograph of Al Capone’s cell at Eastern State Penitentiary published in the book Secret Life Secret Death by Genevieve Davis.
“My favorite subjects are landscapes of different countries, unique architecture and abandoned places,” says Grabczynska. I want my photographs to stir people’s imagination. I want my photos to transport you to where I was. I want the viewer to be spellbound and taken away. I want them to hear the sounds, feel the air, and imagine the ground they are standing on. I want my photographs to give you a trip around the world without moving your feet.”
The exhibit runs through Aug. 27 and is open Tuesdays through Saturdays from 1 to 4 p.m., 720 Northern Blvd., Brookville, Hutchins Gallery in the Schwartz Library on the lower level.
