Art Statement

“The Journey – Migration” is the second painting in a series titled “The Human Condition”. People typically fear those they do not know or cannot identify with culturally. Thus, we see (im)migration as a threat to our ourselves and our country. However, the migration of people has taken place for centuries. From as early as the Jewish Diaspora (550 BC), to the Irish Potato famine (1849), to today; people have been forced to migrate to escape persecution, violence, and famine.

Because we are a nation of immigrants, it is incumbent upon us to act with compassion towards those who are fleeing to freedom and a better life.

Artist Statement/Bio

One inch…One simple, little inch can change your life.

“If it weren’t for that one little inch between me and that out-of-control city bus careening towards my car, I would have been trapped in that tangled pile of metal under the belly of the bus. Instead, the lives of two young men were snatched away in an instant, and I walked away alive.  It was in that moment I decided that if I ever wanted to find my creative self, I had better get to it!”

Subsequently, Cyndy left her day job and enrolled at Watkins College of Art & Design in Nashville TN, graduating with an AFA in 2002. She has been making art ever since.

Cyndy has worked in a variety of mediums and genres including figure, landscape, still life, and abstraction.

“As an Empath, I frequently combine contemporary social issues with bold colors and thought-provoking compositions. I believe the body intuitively knows what it needs. If you create calm among the chaos of life and listen to your voice, it will allow you to hear the voices of those around you. From there, your creativity will begin to flow.”

Juried Competitions & Awards

• 2019 Bauhaus Prairie Art Gallery, “No Walls-Just Great” Art July Best of Show (July)
• 2019 Plymouth “Water Works”, Plymouth Art Center, WI (May)
• 2019 Re:Vision Gallery, Kenosha WI (April)
• 2019 League of Milwaukee Artists “For the Love of Arts”, Oconomowoc WI Honorable Mention (April)
• 2019 Bauhaus Prairie Art Gallery, “Open a New Year” Honorable Mention Award (January)
• 2019 Waukesha City Hall Solo Show, Waukesha WI (January)
• 2019 Light Space Time “All Women Art Exhibition” Award of Special Merit (January)
• 2018 Bauhaus Prairie Art Gallery, Award of Honorable Mention “Abstraction: Theoretical, Conceptual, Intellectual”, (December)
• 2018 Freeport Art Museum, Freeport, IL (November)
• 2018 WCAL Wisconsin Regional Art State Award Winner (June)
• 2018 Waukesha Public Library Solo Show (May 2018)
• 2018 Burlington Wisconsin Regional Art Show – Honorable Mention (April)

ARTIST STATEMENT

Don Bergland’s surrealistic art is an alchemical adventure into the mysteries of his own philosophy, beliefs, and values. Each of his artworks features a theatrical set defined by a stage with actors, props, and a backdrop. He consciously places symbolic interactions and connections within the objects populating his theatrical sets, and encourages viewers to build their own narrative interpretations of these connections. In this piece called, “Belief,” we may be able to perceive the closure of exploration, trapping consciousness in a net of ordered illusion. Through the process of ritualized repetition, we seek to strengthen established beliefs and transmute them to the status of eternal faith.

ARTIST BIO

Don Bergland is an Associate Professor Emeritus of Art Education at the University of Victoria and has been an active exhibiting artist for over 50 years. During that time, he has worked through a variety of professional media, from oil on canvas to his current studio use of digital tools and techniques. He maintains an active international exhibiting career and has featured his artwork in over 170 major exhibitions throughout the world. Don has won over 80 creative & professional awards for his work which is represented in major corporate and private collections such as the Gulf Oil Corporate Collection (Alberta), the Madrona Centre Permanent Collection (B.C.), the Canadian Utilities Corporate Collection (Alberta), the Timothy Eaton Foundation Collection (Canada), the Chevron Standard Corporate Collection (Alberta), as well as in private collections in Canada, the United States, and Europe. He has published 8 books dealing with art and creative activity, as well as published dozens of articles in scholarly and academic journals. His current studio focus is in using 3D modeling environments to create surrealistic imagery for international exhibitions. He currently lives and works in Victoria, BC, Canada.

Art Statement

Physicians wore plague masks centuries ago when battled bubonic plague. The beaked masks look inhuman. The painting is done using a Velazquez technique. It is on a handmade rough linen herringbone canvas that had a pinkish red ground. The color scheme is predominately black and white. Scumbles, paint layers, and heavy impasto are used to create depth and mystery. The herringbone catches the paint layers which again creates depth. In parts of the mask, the reds of the ground show through.

Artist Biography

Hannah Apps painted her first landscape in oil at age 12 and has continued to make art ever since. She has always loved color and texture and transitioned from painting to quilting in her 20’s to satisfy this love. But by the time she hit 50, she was dying fabric and painting her quilts. After painting the Mackinac Bridge on a wall quilt, she decided it was time to paint on canvas and panel instead. Now, she works primarily in oils, acrylics, and pastels. She typically makes her own panels and canvases (it must be the quilt maker in her). She often does underpaintings and then use a series of glazes to give depth and richness to the colors. Lately she has been experimenting with imprimatura layers and thick and thin paint. Her work comments on the human condition. She wants to make a viewer laugh, cry, or question what they are seeing. Her art has been juried into shows throughout the Midwest and in several national and international online shows. In addition, she has won awards in several shows.

She has been very lucky throughout her life as she has had so many opportunities to serve her community, teach fantastically talented students at Kalamazoo College, and learn, write, and create. No matter where her life was taking her, art has always been in the forefront. She is a lifelong learner and always wants to try something new. Apps has studied in an atelier setting with Kenneth Freed, a nationally known oil painter. She has also studied with other pastel and oil painters. She is a member of Oil Painters of America, Great Lakes Pastel Society, and American Women Artists. Her website is www.hannahhilesapps.com.   She lives in Kalamazoo Michigan with her husband and two spoiled cats.

Art Statement

Water is a mirror. Sometimes clean and sparkling, sometimes covered in generations of dust and debris, it shows us not only who we are but where it has been. Our own walls, be they physical, emotional, spiritual or cultural, often shield us from the world outside of our comforts and luxuries. Our walls force out anything which may upset the delicately arranged apple cart of our daily existence. Our walls protect us from the very same punishments they inflict on others.

In the murky waters of a steaming river, we saw no greater reflection of who we are than in the loss of a brave father and child, fighting against impossible forces to breathe free. We built our own walls even taller.

But we must see our reflection. We must face down our own sins. We must shed our walls. What we see in the mirror is our own horror, reflecting in the giant eye of the city perpetuating our crimes. A mirror more famous than perhaps any other in our nation, and in the face of those who need the reflection the most.

Artist Biography

My home is in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, in Eastern Kentucky. Born in the coalfields of West Virginia, I relocated here many years ago and have found a place and a peace unlike any other within the confines of the hills and the comfort of the culture. To many, we are a stereotype. We exist as backwoods, uneducated swine rooting about in the world’s garden for a morsel of what may fall our way. But to see only that is to overlook the character and culture built on the backs of hundreds of years of life in one of the toughest places in the United States.

Eight of the poorest counties in the nation are my neighbors. The interstates don’t run through our part of the country very well. Our land, our jobs, and our very souls have been bought and sold by robber baron coal and oil barons, torn to shreds and left to die on the vine. Yet, we persist. In the face of adversity, we continue to give birth to art, music, poetry, literature and a world often kept all to ourselves. But we do not fit into one box. We are as varied in viewpoints and experiences as any place in America, and our culture is rich. That is who I am. I am one of many, but the many have undeniably shaped the one.

BIOGRAPHY

I was born in the state of Washington, one of the most beautiful places in the continental United States. Most of my formative years were spent growing up on the east coast, during a time when the diversity of life and culture changed at a very fast pace. I began my fascination with art, at an early age during my first class trip to the National Museum of Art. While standing in the corridor, I was so overwhelmed with a multitude of feelings, right then I decided there was only one thing important enough to be in my life, and that was an artist. I wanted to help others feel what I had when viewing the work. I began drawing in pencil at seven, and at the age of 12 I was working with oils. I have tried other mediums over the years and recognized that oils were my one true love. It is a medium with great flexibility and life that speaks deeply to me.