Upcoming CAFEs and Art Talks

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• MAL Book Club: "Your Brain on Art"

  • When
    Wednesday, September 10, 2025
  •  
    3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
  • Location
    MAL Studio, 4069 Washington Rd., McMurray, PA 15317
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  Please join Marlene Boas and Jan Pini for the next meeting of the MAL Art and Artists Book Club! Come even if you haven't read the book! 

  We will meet to discuss "Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us" by Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross. 

  Feel free to read the book and add to the discussion. And bring friends and snacks! A voluntary donation of $5 is requested.
  

  Here's Amazon's synopsis: 
  What is art? Many of us think of the arts as entertainment—a luxury of some kind. In Your Brain on Art, authors Susan Magsamen and Ivy Ross show how activities from painting and dancing to expressive writing, architecture, and more are essential to our lives.
  
  We’re on the verge of a cultural shift in which the arts can deliver potent, accessible, and proven solutions for the well-being of everyone. Magsamen and Ross offer compelling research that shows how engaging in an art project for as little as forty-five minutes reduces the stress hormone cortisol, no matter your skill level, and just one art experience per month can extend your life by ten years. They expand our understanding of how playing music builds cognitive skills and enhances learning; the vibrations of a tuning fork create sound waves to counteract stress; virtual reality can provide cutting-edge therapeutic benefit; and interactive exhibits dissolve the boundaries between art and viewers, engaging all of our senses and strengthening memory. Doctors have even been prescribing museum visits to address loneliness, dementia, and many other physical and mental health concerns.
  
  Your Brain on Art is a portal into this new understanding about how the arts and aesthetics can help us transform traditional medicine, build healthier communities, and mend an aching planet.
  
  Featuring conversations with artists such as David Byrne, Renée Fleming, and evolutionary biologist E. O. Wilson, Your Brain on Art is an authoritative guide to neuroaesthetics. The book weaves a tapestry of breakthrough research, insights from multidisciplinary pioneers, and compelling stories from people who are using the arts to enhance their lives.
  

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• MAL Art Talk: Windows into Eternity: the Art and Meaning of Byzantine Icons by Lana Sakharova

  • When
    Sunday, September 28, 2025
  •  
    3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
  • Location
    MAL Studio and Gallery, 4069 Washington Rd., McMurray, PA 15317
  • Registered
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  “Windows into Eternity: The Art and Meaning of Byzantine Icons”

  Step into the world of Byzantine icons with Lana Sakharova, where art, history, and spirituality meet. From the lifelike Fayum portraits of ancient Egypt to the luminous works of Andrei Rublev, icons have inspired devotion for over a thousand years. This talk will explore the symbolism, techniques, and cultural impact of icons—why they were created, how they survived struggles like iconoclasm, and why they continue to move people today. The presentation will include visuals of famous icons, stories of their history, and a live demonstration of traditional techniques with egg tempera, natural pigments, and gold leaf.

  Feel free to do your own research and add to the discussion. And bring friends and snacks! A voluntary donation of $5 is requested.

  
  

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• CAFE: Vision Boards - with a Twist with Laura Sippos

  • When
    Saturday, October 18, 2025
  •  
    11:00 AM - 2:00 PM
  • Location
    MAL Studio and Gallery, 4069 Washington Rd., McMurray, PA 15317
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  An intuitive vision board class - participants are encouraged to tap into their inner voice and choose images that resonate with them on a deeper level, allowing for unexpected connections and insights. This approach aims to unlock hidden desires and potential, leading to a more meaningful and aligned vision for the future. 

  The selected images are then arranged on a board (paper, poster board, etc.) to create a visual representation guide for the future. 

  Drop in any time 11-2! A $5 donation is requested.

  Please register so that enough materials are available.

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• MAL Book Club: "The Art Forger"

  • When
    Thursday, October 30, 2025
  •  
    3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
  • Location
    MAL Studio, 4069 Washington Rd., McMurray, PA 15317
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  Please join Marlene Boas and Jan Pini for the next meeting of the MAL Art and Artists Book Club! Come even if you haven't read the book! 

  We will meet to discuss "The Art Forger" by B.A. Shapiro. 

  Feel free to read the book and add to the discussion. And bring friends and snacks! A voluntary donation of $5 is requested.
  

  Here's Amazon's synopsis: 
  Almost twenty-five years after the infamous art heist at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum—still the largest unsolved art theft in history—one of the stolen Degas paintings is delivered to the Boston studio of a young artist. Claire Roth has entered into a Faustian bargain with a powerful gallery owner by agreeing to forge the Degas in exchange for a one-woman show in his renowned gallery. But as she begins her work, she starts to suspect that this long-missing masterpiece—the very one that had been hanging at the Gardner for one hundred years—may itself be a forgery. The Art Forger is a thrilling novel about seeing—and not seeing—the secrets that lie beneath the canvas.
  

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• CAFE: China Painting with Jan and Sandy

  • When
    Saturday, November 01, 2025
  •  
    10:00 AM - 2:00 PM
  • Location
    MAL Studio and Gallery, 4069 Washington Rd., McMurray, PA 15317
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  Work with donated china pieces to make a masterpiece! Paints provided for a small materials fee.

  A $5 donation is requested.

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• MAL Book Club: "The Creative Act"

  • When
    Thursday, November 20, 2025
  •  
    3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
  • Location
    MAL Studio, 4069 Washington Rd., McMurray, PA 15317
  • Registered
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  Please join Marlene Boas and Jan Pini for the next meeting of the MAL Art and Artists Book Club! Come even if you haven't read the book! 

  We will meet to discuss "The Creative Act: A Way of Being" by Rick Rubin. 

  Feel free to read the book and add to the discussion. And bring friends and snacks! A voluntary donation of $5 is requested.
  

  Here's Amazon's synopsis: 
  From the legendary music producer, a master at helping people connect with the wellsprings of their creativity, comes a beautifully crafted book many years in the making that offers that same deep wisdom to all of us.
  
  “I set out to write a book about what to do to make a great work of art. Instead, it revealed itself to be a book on how to be.” —Rick Rubin
  
  Many famed music producers are known for a particular sound that has its day. Rick Rubin is known for something else: creating a space where artists of all different genres and traditions can home in on who they really are and what they really offer. He has made a practice of helping people transcend their self-imposed expectations in order to reconnect with a state of innocence from which the surprising becomes inevitable. Over the years, as he has thought deeply about where creativity comes from and where it doesn’t, he has learned that being an artist isn’t about your specific output, it’s about your relationship to the world. Creativity has a place in everyone’s life, and everyone can make that place larger. In fact, there are few more important responsibilities.
  
  The Creative Act is a beautiful and generous course of study that illuminates the path of the artist as a road we all can follow. It distills the wisdom gleaned from a lifetime’s work into a luminous reading experience that puts the power to create moments—and lifetimes—of exhilaration and transcendence within closer reach for all of us.

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