Wildflowers and watercolors

Celebrate Spring at the Wildflower Show & Festival with
Watercolor Artist Phyllis Case Bennett ~ a one-woman exhibition

Where:             Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden
                        1500 North College Ave., Claremont
 
What:               Annual Wildflower Show & Festival
 
When:              Saturday and Sunday, April 11 and 12, 2009
                        10 a.m. - 4 p.m.

 
Claremont:  Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden will host its Annual Wildflower Show and Festival on Saturday and Sunday, April 11 and 12, 2009, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The spectacular indoor display features hundreds of wildflowers collected from the Garden's living collection, the high and low deserts, inland valleys and foothill regions of our local mountains.
 
A watercolor exhibition by artist Phyllis Case Bennett will be on display during the 2-day Wildflower Show and Festival. Bennett is an instructor with 28 years of experience in watercolor and Chinese Brush painting. When ask about her career as a teacher, she replies, "I teach because it causes me to focus on what's really important. Students are stimulating, critical and inquisitive."
 
Bennett explains her life's work and focus in watercolor by stating, "I work in water media because it is direct, quick, responsive and clean." She adds, "I believe that intellect and intuition, method and creativity together lead to the highest form of human expression. I have attempted to follow this muse throughout my art life." 
 
Bennett received her BA degree in Art at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She  has studied with well-known local artists Rex Brandt, Robert Wood and Millard Sheets, and in Hangzhou, China, at the China Academy of Fine Art, where she has traveled since 1985 to coordinate the Academy's Foreign Study Programs. 
 
Bennett is a member of The Sumie Society of America, Inc., Pomona Valley Art Association, the Yuan Chinese Brush Painting Association, and a Signature Member of WatercolorWest. She will be on site during the Show and Festival to discuss her work.
 
The 2-day Wildflower Show and Festival offers activity stations, kids' crafts and face painting by "Claremont's Face Painter" - Lilly Walters Schermerhorn, Saturday 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. Experience a rare and magical time when deserts blooms in "Season of the Sand Blossoms," an environmental art film set to music. Relax, refresh at the Sycamore Café serving gourmet salads, sandwiches, nutritious children's snacks and beverages. This spring the Annual Wildflower Show and Festival at Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden makes for a full day of Garden exploration and family fun.
 
Admission: Members, free. Non-members: $8 adults, $6 seniors (65 yrs. and older); $6 students (13 to 17 years old or full-time college students); $4 child (3 to 12 years of age); Children under 3 years, free.