"Origins & Originals"

The Bachelier Cardonsky Gallery in Kent, CT, continues the celebration of its 20th Anniversary with a new show that opens Saturday, October 18th. It will feature three unique and extraordinary painters: Gregory Beylerian, Kirill Doron, and Patricia Traub.

GREGORY BEYLERIAN is a young powerhouse, a true original! His current works are primarily figure abstractions, many of them faces. They are raw and daring in color, form, and mixed materials. Some derive from a group he entitled the “Origins Series”, based on the definition, “An origin belief is any story that describes the beginning of humanity, earth, life, and the universe, . . .ideas perceived to be truths at a deeper, more symbolic level.” Born and raised in NYC, now living in LA, Beylerian studied at RIT and UCLA, and received a master’s degree from Domus Academy in Milan, Italy.

KIRILL DORON, who has shown here since 1990, is a phenomenal talent. His paintings are amazing, gorgeously rendered in accurate detail, stunningly real. His subjects are common: old bottles, cans, bricks, wooden crates, and rusty tools. But they are bathed in a new light that adores the simple forms, the quiet, unexpected still life. Originally from Moscow, Doron has lived in CT since 1982. He has been honored with numerous awards, including one by NY Times critic John Russell, and one by Diane Waldman, former curator and deputy director of the Guggenheim Museum.

PATRICIA TRAUB of Philadelphia is an exceptional painter, described as a new old master. “I explore the tenuous relationship between humans and animals”, she writes, and “content refers to evolution, extinction, and the human condition.” Nude figures and numerous animals co-habit her canvases against black backgrounds and a dramatic play of light. Her painted world is in sharp realism. Reviewed in the Philadelphia Metro Press, it seems “a reality born out of the depths of creation that is very much awake.” Traub’s biography is impressive, with shows since 1986, and many trips to Africa for her studies. Currently she is the guest exhibitor at the 2008 Munich Biennale with her work featured on the catalogue cover.

 

The 20th Anniversary celebration continues at the Bachelier Cardonsky Gallery in Kent, CT. On Saturday, September 13th, a new exhibition opens with 20 extraordinary artists who have shown in the gallery over the past 20 years. Four are sculptors, ten are painters, and six work in mixed media.

As diverse a group imaginable, it is cohesive in its 20 year overview of the gallery. The creative expressions are limitless! Some of the works are intricate in detail, others abstract and loose. There are large, vast landscapes and small, intimate collages. Witty sculptures join with pensive portraits and copious still lifes. Serious subjects hang with whimsical ones. And color moves from black and white to brilliance.

All 20 artists are truly wonderful and represent the gallery with a great, vibrant spirit. Come join them to celebrate a happy twenty years!

Diane Brawarsky, Joy Brown, Cole Carothers,
Margaret Crenson, Stephen Coyle, Bevin Engman,
Lisbeth Firmin, Dean Fisher, Julia Fosson, Ingrid Freidenbergs,
Kathryn Frund, Suzanne Howes-Stevens, David Loeb,
Irene Hardwicke-Olivieri, Michael Pilon, Melissa Stern,
Elisa Tenenbaum, William Thomson, Steven Whinfield, Judith Wyer

 

The Bachelier Cardonsky Gallery in Kent, CT, opens a new show on Saturday, August 9th. Twenty summers ago, the gallery had its inaugural exhibition! Four amazing women now join together with tremendous, unique talent, paying tribute to the past in their present work.

JANE ARNOLD, speaking of her ceramic work, seems to also define the gallery’s evolution over the past 20 years: “What I have discovered during my many years of working with clay is the spiraling nature of pursuit. I will often return to a form or techniques I have used in the past and find that the new work maintains some of the earlier qualities, but has gained a new dimension. As a result, the exploration is one of a constant creative unfolding with a continuous merging of the old and the new.” Arnold’s forms are gorgeously fired, vibrant and patterned. They are sensual and strong, influenced by ancient cultures. She resides in New York City and upstate as well.

LANI IRWIN, from her journal, writes, “I love early Italian and Flemish paintings. I love the implied drama of gesture held in suspended time, no time. Ambiguity. Questions. Mystery. Life is full of uncertainty, unexpected juxtapositions, forms that are magical.” An American living in Italy, she is a painter of quiet, strange narratives. Her figures, whether grouped or alone, are solitary. They are still, even when caught in motion. Like a dream, they are oddly balanced between the surreal and the real worlds.

HOLLY RUSSELL is Jane Arnold’s sister and this is the first exhibit in which they are wonderfully paired. Russell’s furniture is daringly inventive, made with materials found on farms, ranches, and old rail beds. “All of my work”, she writes, “is crafted from rusty old pieces of scrap metal. I rarely know what the pieces I find originally were, but I immediately know what they will become. A top for a table, a seat for a bench, a leg for a chair. I weld the old disparate parts together to create a new unified whole.” The results are extraordinary! Russell lives in New York City and Litchfield County, CT.

LAURA VON ROSK is a landscape painter who lives in the Adirondack Mountains of New York. Despite the magnitude of her surroundings, her paintings are small in scale, most no more than 12 inches square. They are intimate works of vast space, painted more from memory than anywhere else. Her earthy tones are layered with glazes that glow like amber. In an article from Saratoga Springs, Von Rosk’s work was applauded: “Beneath all the visual beauty, . . .a stillness pervades each scene. . the feeling of nostalgia. The pictures tug at our collective memory. You feel you know these places.”

 

The Bachelier Cardonsky Gallery in Kent, CT, continues to celebrate its 20th anniversary season. On Saturday, July 5th, a new show opens with three extraordinary artists: Marianne Barcellona, Benjamin Long, and Andrew Nash.

MARIANNE BARCELLONA is an astounding painter with shows in NYC since 1996. As the photographer for Brown University’s archeological excavations, she went to Egypt in 2006. From notes on her paintings, she writes, “I’m still inspired by the incredible month I spent in Giza. I was working every day with the pyramids looming above. . on the tombs as they were uncovered. . deeply affected by small carvings. . figures hauntingly poignant. .almost felt I could see them breathe. I have been painting their portraits ever since.” Barcellona’s images are powerful, some four feet square, others just several inches. They are bold in color, utterly transcendent and pure.

BENJAMIN LONG’s work has been called poetic, using nature as a metaphor to discuss human issues. His plant forms are sensual, entwined with environmental commentary. They speak of big themes: growth and decay, order and chaos, good and evil. The art critic Roberta Fallon wrote, “Long’s paintings have a baroque sensibility – they are ornamented and effusive in their effects. Paint is glazed and dripped, even stenciled and stamped in sumptuous build-ups. Colors are lush. . . The plants, like divas, stand alone and deliver a heartfelt song.” A recipient of numerous awards and fellowships, Long has had many gallery and museum shows since 1985.

ANDREW NASH is rooted in nature too. His subjects are often singular -- trees and flowers -- but his methods are complex. His paintings are multi-layered with oils, wax, erasures, scratches and daubs. The effect, he says, is “buttery”. In a stunning review of a NY show, Joan Baum wrote, “If you don’t know Andrew Nash’s work, you should. (He) begins with direct observation and then opens himself to a kind of “transformative” power, a constant building up and wiping away of layers and pigment, the result of which is a complex mix of abstraction and representation.” With many shows since 1981, Nash studied at Hartford Art School in Ct and School of Visual Arts in NYC.

 

The 2008 season at the Bachelier Cardonsky Gallery in Kent, CT, is a continuous celebration of its Twentieth Anniversary! On Saturday, May 31st, a new exhibition opens with three magnificent artists: ROBERT CRONIN of Connecticut, DAVID EDDY of Massachusetts, and LEIGH PALMER of New York.

ROBERT CRONIN is an established artist with works in the Brooklyn Museum, the National Academy, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and many other collections. His paintings and sculptures, both on view, are magical. He is a master in each form, whether working in paint or in steel. His recent series of still life paintings are simply gorgeous. Delightful in spirit, punchy in color, they are gems. Like his narrative paintings of people, they are curious relationships, sometimes funny and mysterious. So too are the sculptures that are lyrical drawings in space, always perfect in balance. What a beautiful, full showing of Cronin’s mastery!

DAVID EDDY is another powerhouse! His paintings are phenomenal in their universal reach, speaking in a language that talks to everyone. His figures portray tender stories with an honest simplicity. They are raw and delicate, quiet and bold. A self taught artist, Eddy paints with heightened texture, layering his works, scratching the surfaces, revealing and hiding what lies underneath. These are gutsy paintings with a naive sophistication. Eddy has received glowing reviews from many of his shows across the country. The New York Times distinguished him as “notably reminiscent of Paul Klee”.

LEIGH PALMER paints glorious landscapes that reach far beyond normal horizons. They are majestic in scale, whether done on large or small canvasses. And Palmer is adept at both. His affinity to the nineteenth century Hudson River school painters is natural, as he lives along the river in upstate New York. His paintings are beautifully lit in deep, glowing colors, mysteriously shadowed and dramatic. A graduate of RISD, he was awarded a MacDowell Colony fellowship and has had numerous shows since 1983.
His works are in many private and public collections

 

How time flies! The Bachelier Cardonsky Gallery in Kent, CT, is twenty years old!! What began in 1988 as a dream, built solely on passion and a commitment to the arts, is now an established gallery.

During the past twenty years, the gallery has received countless reviews in the New York Times, The International Herald Tribune, Art & Auction Magazine, and other numerous publications. It has grown to represent artists throughout the United States and Europe, often discovered here as new, rising stars. It has curated shows in NYC, Paris, and Tokyo; but its home will always be Litchfield County.

To start its twentieth anniversary year and in celebration of spring, the gallery opens on Saturday, April 26th with a show called “Winging It”. A delightful group exhibition, it is a flight of fancy that fills the gallery with movement, texture, and glorious color. Painters, sculptors, and mixed media artists, some new and others familiar, come from California, Delaware, New York and Connecticut. They are all extraordinary and joined together with wit, grace and soaring spirits.

Jhina Alvarado, Julie Fraenkel, Lucy Gaylord-Lindholm
Eleanor Miller, Andrew Nash, Tim Prentice
Kathy Ruttenberg, Tommy Simpson, Nora Sturges