“BEYOND REALITY”
January 13- 31, 2015
Reception Thursday January 15, 6-8pm
CLAUDIA FAINGUERSCH, JOSHUA GREENBERG,
ELIZABETH FEATHERSTONE HOFF, RENEE KAHN, JEFFREY MELZACK,
SARAH RILEY, SHEILA SMITH, MEREDETH TURSHEN
Chelsea NY: Viridian Artists is pleased to present an exhibition of outstanding art by eight artists who are part of Viridian Artists’ Affiliate program. The show extends from January 13th to 31st with a reception to meet the artists Thursday January 15th, 6-8pm. The title of this exhibit was suggested by the statement Featherstone Hoff offered about her work but in many ways, all art explores the worlds “Beyond Reality”. The Viridian Artists Affiliate program is an important aspect of Viridian’s mission to expand exhibition and sales opportunities for outstanding contemporary artists, both emerging and well-known.
As ELIZABETH FEATHERSTONE HOFF states so aptly “My work is about life, the life I have lived, thus far, the life I have given birth to, and, the life I have observed. The human condition in all of its’ variety is an unending source for new work. It is, for me, the reality beyond the reality.
In Abstract Landscapes JOSHUA GREENBERG uses photo-based imagery to create abstract art from landscapes. The color, texture, and light of initial images are used to form new abstract prints. These qualities are present in the reflections, shadows, and segmentations of new images. Rain, snow, hills and trees now project a sense of movement and balance as part of emerging abstract art. Clouds, sky, horizon and sunlight add foreground, background and a sense of depth. All of these elements are used as paint on a palette to be mixed together to create new images. This series illustrates how photo-based imagery may help extend the use of less explored dimensions of photography to create contemporary art.
Architecture was CLAUDIA FAINGUERSCH’S first choice of media, with perspective, lights and shades, composition, color and space that she has now translated into photography. The artist states that for her “the camera approaches and gets lost between spaces and materials. It penetrates into reality, dissolves it and a new reality appears with its own places, its own lights and new sensations.” In these four images from the series “FAIT”, we discover a small world suggesting a route through cinematographic images like Film Noire. Mysterious Characters, Suggestive Lights, Threatening Shades, silence, shouts and questions without answers…
RENEE KAHN In my Bowl Series I represent women as the nurturers of society. The bowl of fruit symbolizes women’s offerings of caring, sustenance and hope to the world. In essence, my women are Earth Goddesses.
JEFFREY MELZACK, whose art is usually comprised of surrealistically conceptualized paintings, is presenting both two and three dimensional work that relate conceptually through sound and its absence. The 2D works are small pieces in watercolor with colored pencil that reflect moments of quiet introspection. The violin piece serves as the bridge between sound and the color or tonal value of the notes played. The artists asks that the viewer “Imagine, as you look at the violin the improvisation of sounds that it might project to you, try to see the notes using your minds eye and hear it played with your minds ear.”
SARAH RILEY is a painter/printmaker based on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. Her current works are explorations of mixed-imagery, combining drawing, collage, printmaking and paint. Many of her works contain feminist overtones and are drawn from myth, literature and personal history; the juxtaposition of images suggests both memories and re-imaginings. In these particular pieces, she explores alignments of colorful watercolor monotypes with intaglio and photo-based print imagery. Her works are concurrently on view at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum as part of their Centennial Celebration. Sarah Riley is Prof. Emeritus and former Head of Printmaking at Southeast Missouri State University. Her book, “Practical Mixed-media Printmaking Techniques” was published in the USA in January 2012 by A & C Black, London. Copies are available for purchase at the gallery.
SHEILA SMITH’s photo series entitled “Rainy Nights In N.Y.C.” were taken in 2014 during artistic wanderings on rainy nights in New York City. After shooting, she digitally transforms her images to create a painterly look and then prints them on canvas which are mounted on board. Each image is part of a limited edition.
MEREDETH TURSHEN is exhibiting new bold, layered and textured paintings on paper in oil, with traces of pastel and graphite; the compositions evoke energy and movement and radiate light. Drawing inspiration from her environment to represent imagined realities, the new work evokes a balance of sensibility and emotion, reality and imagination.