Shany Porras - My artistic journey revolves around the interplay between visual art and music, where I translate the emotions of diverse musical genres into VISIBLE abstract paintings. The goal is to bridge these two powerful art forms, intending to elicit emotional responses and provoke contemplation. Music's unique ability to evoke deep emotions, transcending language and culture, is the primary inspiration for my creative process. As a visual artist, I aim to capture the essence of music by translating intricate melodies, harmonies, and rhythms into a visual language that resonates on a visceral level. To achieve this, I immerse myself in the music I intend to translate. Despite being a novice musician, I read the music scores, sketch onto them, and sometimes learn the piano pieces to gain a deeper understanding. Sketching and annotating emotions guide my selection of colors and textures, resulting in a series of paintings that collectively interpret a single musical piece. During the painting process, I use water-based and dry media on various surfaces such as wood, metal, or canvas. In this series, I aim to dissolve the boundaries between sound and color, paying close attention to harmonic and dissonant sounds. The visual translation of harmonious sounds translates easily into a painting with harmonious colors. However, when we listen to dissonant sounds wildly used by composers like Philip Glass and Max Richter, I find that the act of painting is freed of all formal design pretenses, allowing for colors not typically used together. My approach to these paintings has been largely intuitive, translating sonic vibrations into a visual vocabulary. In our subconscious, the most uncomplicated music can be visually stimulating when translated into abstract forms. Additionally, abstract painting allows me to move beyond literal representation, delving into the subconscious where colors, shapes, and textures meld into visual images. In conclusion, I aim to dissolve the boundaries between sound and painting, inviting viewers to an immersive, visual-audial exploration. By encouraging interpretations and embracing the profound resonance at the intersection of visual art and music, I hope to evoke wonder, inspire introspection, and create a shared experience that transcends artistic boundaries.
Brent Ridge - Light, heavy, thick, thin, viscous, sticky, runny, blotchy, luminous: these terms are the descriptions of paint and what paint does, and I am interested in pursuing abstract paintings problems through a process of transformation with a multiplicity of forms and materials. Looking to excavate from the post-industrial landscape, my abstract works transform found architectures of decline in the breakdown lane of transcendence. The purity of the landscape ideal and it’s threatened position in today’s post-industrial world is an overarching theme of mine in addition to abstracting it’s very form, and one can see this in the construction choices of fragmentary images, recycled materials, sewn bindings, and rough patinas. Mining the debris of the post-industrial through abstraction and industrially produced patterns and fabrics, as well as photographic encounters with the mundanity of everyday life found quietly underfoot, the artist investigates this fractured landscape and gives new life to recycled materials through mechanical and analogue means through a series of paintings made on thrift-store found fabrics, appropriating their machine-made patterns as the ground of his post-industrial landscape.
Donna Bernstein - Donna's journey into the world of pottery started in 1988 with a class at a local studio in NYC. Now, more than 35 years later, clay is her passion. She was a special education teacher by profession and a hobbyist potter for many years. Throughout that time, taking classes and workshops throughout NYC and NJ; making mostly functional work such as dinnerware and serving pieces. Over the years she has participated in pit, wood, and raku firings. In 2018 she was fortunate enough to become a full-time potter and move to The Berkshires. Currently, most of her work revolves around creating garden sculptures. She is honored to have her sculpture selected for the exhibit at The Mount in Lenox, MA. In addition, her sculptures are in private collections throughout the tri-state area. Donna also teaches pottery at The Berkshire Art Center and The Clay Cottage.
Kim Saul - Walking down a quiet, wooded path in a snow-covered forest,I felt I was being watched. Turning, I saw his eyes through the trees. It was a magical moment. He had on a fuzzy winter coat, and off white against the brilliance of the snow. We watched each other for a few moments, he nodded his head, and I felt a wonderful lightness. Back in my studio, I sketched and refined that moment from memory. I mistakenly thought I could just draw a horse, as I used to. Drawing muscles must be used, and this one was atrophied! So, I went to a nearby horse farm and sketched a 30-year-old horse who had the desired requirement to just stand still. I made my way into the barn, where I could brush them, and I felt their bones and muscles, regaining understanding. Getting back in the saddle is like getting back into the studio. It takes time to remember my relationship with the animal, the material, how to communicate, to determine where I want to go, and to take a risk. I may get bitten or fall - but it’s worth those brief moments when I am still, and in the zone.
Tara Bronner - While some artists work in pastel or paint, I choose a camera and tripod. In a time where people can take a photo in the instant it takes to push a button on a phone, I relish in taking the time to wait for a perfect shot, laying out a composition, and looking at subjects from angles others might miss. As a artist with a hearing impairment, it is an asset to be able to not hear distracting background noise and put the full focus on the aesthetic I am trying to create or the feelings I am trying to evoke in my work. I am a lifelong Massachusetts resident and I love the mix of post-industrial cities like Springfield and the rolling farmlands of Hadley that provide a variety of interesting scenes and subjects to photograph. I am also blessed to be in an area that supports local art and am lucky to have had opportunities to exhibit in various spaces and galleries throughout Western Massachusetts. I live with my incredibly supportive husband and my 16 year old son who is the achievement I am most proud of.