Works in Clay, Stone and Encaustic at Glenview

is hosting an exhibit of more than 130 polymer clay paintings, indoor sculptures and encaustic/mixed-media works by seven local artists through July 31.

The multimedia exhibit features the work of Fran Abrams, Elizabeth Steel and Women in Wax members Susan Feller, Angela White, Christy Diniz Liffmann, Marilyn Banner and Beverly Ryan.

Abrams enjoys the facility of working with polymer clay, which behaves like paint when mixing colors and looks like sculpture when it bakes at 265 degrees, not requiring a high-temperature kiln. Her background in architecture and urban planning is evident in the black and white or colorful geometric patterns that snake across the surface of the canvas to which she mounts the finished composition.

"I am fascinated by the wide range of color, texture and form that can be created with polymer clay and the sense of exploration that comes with mixing colors, creating designs and draping the sheets of clay yielded by the pasta machine," explains Abrams in her artist's statement. She uses the pasta machine to form the clay and mix the colors.

The product of a less malleable process, Steel's sculptures, mostly carved in alabaster, are both abstract and representational and don't necessarily follow the rules of logic.

"Stone is a durable material that tends to have a mind of its own," says the artist. "A finished work may be quite different from my original design."

Despite the undpredictability inherent in chiseling stone, Steel's process yields simple, smooth and elegant gestural forms inspired by pre-Columbian art.

Some of Feller's encaustic photograph's from at Glenview are still in view as part of the Women in Wax exhibit. Popular themes in this group's work include bucolic landscapes, waterscapes, abstract patterns and figures in transition from one movement to another. The encaustic process allows for layering of paint and mixed media materials and yields a finished surface with the depth of the piece's working history behind it.

"It adds luster and luminosity, and there is often an element of spontaneity in creating with it," says Feller in her statement.

The exhibit is on view at Glenview Mansion for the month of July.

Gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Monday, Wednesday and Friday and 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Tuesday and Thursday.