For Immediate Release For Further Information, please
contact New Hampshire and Maine Artists featured at Fenn Gallery Woodbury, CT - Fenn Gallery presents “Art as Impetus” featuring Kim Bernard of Berwick, Maine and Tom Driscoll of Plymouth, New Hampshire. The exhibit will include acrylic paintings on canvas and paper, work in encaustic, and ceramic sculpture. The show runs from May 17th - June 24, 2007, and the public is invited to the Artist Reception on Sat., May 19th from 4-6 pm. In his book entitled “Concerning the Spiritual in Art”, W. Kandinsky proffered that painting as an art “must be directed to the improvement and refinement of the human soul”. Both artists in this show identify the search for and expression of universal truths through an abstract visual language as a primary impetus for their work. “Encaustic”, meaning “to burn” in Greek, dates back to the 5th Century B.C. Used as a contemporary medium, it is a versatile method of painting with fortified, pigmented beeswax. Bernard achieves deeply luminous coloration and richly textured surfaces through the build up and scraping of layers of wax, which often include embedded collage material. Her earthy palette includes varying harmonizations of garnet, teal, golds, and sepias, sometimes with copper and lead accents. Bernard typically divides the picture plane into contrasting square or rectangular sections of color and material, and then over paints with free and spontaneous circles, spirals, dashes and scrapings. A palpable surface tension and excitement is achieved through the manipulation of line, space, color and contrasting textures. Bernard received her BFA from Parsons School of Design, NYC in 1987. She is the founding member of New England Wax, a professional association of encaustic artists, and is a frequent invited juror and guest lecturer. Her work was just featured on HGTV in April, 2007. Tom Driscoll’s visual language of pictographic
and calligraphic symbols convey a mythical quality similar to that
in Native American Indian and primitive art. Interested in the illusory
and metaphoric powers of color, he plays with surface, light and
the relationships between forms to present universal truths that
are communicated purely visually. Driscoll builds up luminous, modulated
color backgrounds, onto which he creates his narrative employing
recognizable shapes, such as crescents, pods, arrows, and human
and animal figures. There is both a somberness and sense of humor
evident in his work. Driscoll received his MFA at Cranbrook Academy
of Art, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, and is an Associate Professor
of Art at Plymouth State University. ###
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