Works Of Bethesda Painting Awards Finalists To Go On Display In June

BETHESDA, MD — Nine painters have been selected as the 2023 finalists for the Bethesda Painting Awards, a competition and exhibition produced by the Bethesda Arts & Entertainment District.

The top prize winners will be announced on June 7 in a private reception. The Best in Show winner will be awarded $10,000; second place will win $2,000; and third place will be awarded $1,000.

Nearly 300 artists from Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C., submitted works to the annual competition.

The competition’s jurors were Lillian Hoover, an artist and 2019 finalist of the Bethesda Painting Awards, and 2012 Best in Show Winner of the Trawick Prize: Bethesda Contemporary Art Awards; Hedieh Javanshir Ilchi, an artist and 2015 finalist of Bethesda Painting Awards; and John Lee, associate professor of painting at College of William & Mary.

The finalists’ work will be on display from June 8 to July 2 at Gallery B at 7700 Wisconsin Avenue in Bethesda. Gallery hours during the exhibit will be Thursday through Sunday, from noon to 5 p.m., and a public opening reception will be held on Friday, June 9 from 6 to 8 p.m.

The nine artists selected as finalists by the jurors are:

Stephanie Cobb of Washington, D.C.

• Stephanie Cobb received her Master of Fine Arts in studio art at Louisiana State University College of Art + Design and her Bachelor of Fine Arts in painting from Savannah College of Art and Design. Cobb’s work has been exhibited in galleries nationally and internationally including: The Manifest Gallery, Cincinnati; Viridian Artists, New York, NY; Intersect Arts Center, St. Louis, MO; and SCAD’s Open Studio event in Lacoste, France.

Grace Doyle of Parkville, Maryland

• Grace Doyle is a 2023 Master of Fine Arts candidate in Towson University's Studio Arts program. Doyle graduated from The University of Baltimore with a Master’s in Business Administration in 2019, and Maryland Institute College of Art with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2009. She has spent summers painting abroad, including in Norway under contemporary painter Odd Nerdrum. Doyle was a Finalist in the 2023 Miami University Young Painters Competition for the William and Dorothy Yeck Award.

Katherine Fleming of Arlington

• Kate Fleming is a painter, printmaker, and muralist. Fleming graduated from College of William & Mary in 2014 and participated in Maryland Institute College of Art’s summer travel intensive program at Sorrento, Italy in 2013. Between 2019 and 2021, Kate traveled to and painted in all 50 states alongside her partner, photographer Tom Woodruff. The small oil paintings she created on the road capture the human-built American landscape: gas stations, parking lots, strip malls, and big box stores.

Jeffrey Hall of Richmond

• Jeffrey Deane Hall received a Bachelor of Arts in both Physics and Studio Art at the University of Richmond before continuing on to get his Master’s at Virginia Commonwealth University. Hall’s art is highly influenced by the trompe l’oeil painters of the 19th century, both in the high degree of realism and deep symbolic meaning. Often his paintings deal with the challenges of family life, from marriage to the complex balancing act that is one’s relationship with their own children.

Trace Miller of Towson

• Trace Miller was born in western Pennsylvania and now resides in Towson, MD, where he is a lecturer and assistant chair in the Department of Art + Design, Art History, Art Education at Towson University. Miller received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia and a Master of Fine Arts from Maryland Institute College of Art, Hoffberger School of Painting in Baltimore.

Lindsay Mueller of Arlington

• Lindsay Mueller received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Boston University. While living in Boston, she exhibited in galleries, including at VanDernoot Gallery and Muskat Studios Gallery. Mueller values the power of arts to create connection within communities, and she has worked often with older adults and teens, leading art classes and community arts programming. Mueller primarily paints in oil, focusing on landscape.

Rachel Rush of Baltimore

• Rachel Rush earned her Bachelor of Fine Arts from The University of the Arts in Philadelphia. She is a recipient of the Ted Carey prize, and a Richard C. Von Hess Prize Nominee. The artist has participated in solo and group shows, including Full Moon Acupuncture and Apothecary, Baltimore, MD; Wishbone Reserve, Baltimore, MD; Goucher College, Baltimore, MD; Creative Alliance, Baltimore, MD; and The University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA.

Nicole Santiago of Williamsburg

• Nicole M. Santiago holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in studio art from Indiana University and a Master in Fine Arts in painting from the University of New Hampshire. She is a Professor of Art at the College of William and Mary, where she teaches life drawing, drawing, color theory, and 2D design. Most of Santiago's works consist of semi-autobiographical paintings, drawings, and prints, containing layered narratives thinly veiled by the mundane debris of domesticity.

Julio Valdez of Washington, D.C.

• Born in the Dominican Republic, Julio Valdez is a painter, printmaker, teacher, and mixed-media installation artist. He studied at the National School of Fine Arts in Santo Domingo and graduated in Fine Arts/Illustration from The Altos de Chavόn School of Design, the Parsons School of Design affiliate in 1988. Valdez received his first museum exhibition at the Omar Rayo Museum in Colombia in 1988. Since then, he has exhibited across Latin America and the United States.

The Bethesda Arts & Entertainment District is managed by the Bethesda Urban Partnership Inc.