ABOUT ANN LADD FERENCZ..latest news....

“The Anantara Experience” is a luxurious immersion in a place of rich cultural traditions and natural beauty.
Guests are also invited to discover their own inner beauty, through the Resident Artist Program.
Starting on January 15, 2011, the Resident Artist at The Anantara Resort in Phuket, Thailand, will be Ann Ladd Ferencz. For 2 weeks she not only will paint her own interpretations of Thailand but also will teach her “Art of Life” class to resort guests.
Ann Ladd Ferencz
New York artist Ann Ladd Ferencz believes that while fine artworks are best seen in galleries and museums, art is to be found everywhere in life. So, for example, she teaches a “Junk Art” class in which her students learn to look for and see beauty and
significance even in castaway objects like worn-out tires. This in fact is the ancient Buddhist concept of tathagatagarbha (taught-ha-gata-garb-ha), referring to the natural beauty that is hidden within all life.
The essential corollary of that concept of art being everywhere is that everyone is an artist. In her classes for children, she encourages her students to find the mediums and materials that best express their own personalities and interests. She says, “To succeed as an artist is not a matter of competition with others, but a journey of self-discovery for each person.” That journey, she believes, should be fun, even humorous, rather than always solemn and serious—a perfect philosophy in Thailand, “the Land of Smiles.”
Ann is no newcomer to Thailand: as a young girl she attended the International School in Bangkok (1963-1965), where her mother taught English. Ann remembers those early days, when she fell in love not only with Thailand but also with the natural world and the world of art, in “Insects and Artworks and Mr. Reeves,” her chapter in a book just published in Canterbury UK, Young Scientist Journeys (July 2010).
Art is a family tradition, and her home in New York is a virtual museum of works by her father, Jim Ladd, her sculptor son Jude, and her daughter Kate, a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design.
In 2009 Ann returned to Thailand as a volunteer art teacher to several hundred children who had lost their homes and families in the 2004 tsunami. One of her most prized possessions today is a note written by one of her students. On the last day of that class, she was teary-eyed to be saying goodbye, and so the little boy handed her this note from the heart: “I wish you are happy and stop to cry. I will is inspiration to you. I happy you must happy with me. Everything no problem.” That, exactly, is Ann Ladd Ferencz’s personal philosophy for “The Art of Life.”
One reviewer said of her work, "Ann is driven by a desire to transform her entire world into a work of art. For her there is no distinction between the room, the walls and the art. The viewer doesn’t so much look at her work as enter into it.” You can experience Ann’s work not only at traditional art venues like the Katonah Museum of Art Triennial (2009) and the Neuberger Museum of Art (Purchase, NY), but also in such “real world” places as the Nicole Paone Restaurant in Manhattan, Emma’s Cafe in White Plains (NY), the Rye Synagogue, and the Thayer Hotel in West Point. The Children’s Rehabilitation Center in White Plains contains more than 50 of her murals. Her commissions have included murals for a British Airways corporate retreat, and Follow the Fish, an elaborate signage mural for the Westchester Medical Center, for which she received a grant from Reader’s Digest.
Past President of the Docent Program for the Neuberger Museum of Art, Ann paints murals for hospitals and nonprofit organizations through Westco Productions’ Healing Walls Project. She also teaches drawing and painting at the Rye Art Center, and is a Roster Artist for The Arts Westchester, which brings art into New York-area public schools.
Ann can be reached in Thailand at The Anantara Resort in January 2011 (www.anantara.com), and in New York through her website (www.wwandm.com). She welcomes comments, suggestions and enquiries at annimurals@aol.com.