February Solo Exhibitions
BRAD GUARINO - has a BA in Painting from Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts and an MFA from the University of Connecticut. He has been awarded several artist residencies, including recently for the postgraduate study program at the Bulgarian National Academy of Art. He is currently member of the Adjunct Teaching Faculty of the University of Connecticut, Eastern Connecticut State University and Connecticut College. The “visual narratives” in this exhibition explore Guarino’s interest in the role models society imposes on men, both with a sense of humor and “an implied sense of threat – the figures in my compositions are drawn or painted from photo-based collages made by recombining parts from various images of men. The awkwardness of the figures is deliberate, intending to illustrate the difficulties of living within the constructs of society’s ‘ambiguous role expectations.’”
MARTA JOHANSEN - Recondite Landscapes: In this exhibition of drawings on paper, “A line repeated creates a pattern. A manipulation of this pattern defines space. The lines hold each other or touch each other or almost touch or they break apart, creating topographies and textures, abstractions of places or things.”
Born in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, in 1980, Marta Elise Johansen grew up in Vermont and spent her early years traveling around the world with her parents before settling down in California. She earned a Bachelor of Architecture degree from the University of California, Los Angeles, CA and is currently a member of the Adjunct Faculty of California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, Department of Environmental Design.
MARY JEAN KENTON - has a BA from Pomona College, CA, and an MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute, CA. She was adjunct professor of art at Waynesburg College, PA, 2003-2008. Numerous exhibitions include most recently 2010 “Transitions,” The Pen & Brush, New York, NY; Virtual exhibition; and 2011 “The Lacquered Landscape Screen,” Westmoreland Community College. Collections include The Mattress Factory, Pittsburgh, PA; and The Museum of Contemporary Art and The Geffen Contemporary, Los Angeles, CA. Artist’s talks include Carnegie-Mellon University Art Gallery, Pittsburgh, PA; and Panel Discussion with members of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, Kennedy Center, Washington, DC.
MARLA KORR - is a New York City artist, with an MFA from Brooklyn College (CUNY), where she studied with Phillip Pearlstein, Lennart Anderson and Jimmy Ernst. She continued her studies at the New York Academy and then at the Stevenson Academy of Traditional Painting. “This classical training gave me the knowledge and freedom to paint the figure, still life, and landscape … My love of landscape painting was inspired by my father, whose reverence for nature took our family each summer from New York City to the lush environs of the Hudson River Valley.” Whether she paints the urban landscape of New York or the marine landscape of Cape Cod, it is what she calls “the transformational quality of the light” that she strives to express. Her work has been represented by many prestigious galleries, including the Cavalier Gallery, Nantucket, and the Dyansen Gallery, NYC. It is her first solo exhibition at the SVAC.
DAN MOSHEIM - has spent his entire career as a furniture maker in Vermont. “I made my first piece of furniture in 1972 at the age of 25. It was a simple colonial form called a dry sink, made with pine from the lumberyard, using a hammer, a Skilsaw and a jig saw … I was hooked.” Originally influenced by the simplicity of Shaker design, Mosheim now works with four assistants, including his two sons, and his design concept has undergone considerable modification and change. “My sons, Sam and
Will, and I have been collaborating on furniture and sculptural pieces for several years now … Our work for this show is a continuation on the theme of combining wood and steel, color and texture as well as a celebration of a legacy that is organic and endures.”
HARRY RICH - is a Vermont artist who received his BFA. from Pratt Institute, NY, where he studied with James Brooks, Jack Tworkov, and Adolph Gottlieb, and his MFA from Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT. He has won numerous awards and his work is in many public and private collections, including the Columbus Museum of Fine Art and AYCO Corporation. A lecturer and writer, exhibitions of his work include Albany Museum of History and Art, NY, and Dayton Museum Annual, OH. “My paintings are children of the New York School. They strive to build on their heritage, while remaining within the tradition of Modernism. In the studio, I work principally on the margins of what I already know about nonrepresentational painting and paint, searching for what I don’t know. Nonrepresentational painting, unfettered with distracting images, may allow the paint to release its transformative potential.”
ERIC TOBIN - is one of the most highly acclaimed artists exhibiting at the Southern Vermont Arts Center. His style and subject matter have universal appeal, primarily because of his unique ability to capture the beauty of the moment, the light, and the setting. His love for his native Vermont can be seen in all of his work. All of his painting is done outdoors, regardless of time of year, difficult setting, or rapidly changing conditions. Each of his works has a way of drawing one into the painting, as his expressive brushstrokes capture what could easily be missed from a photograph. Mentored as a child by Thomas Curtin, this awardwinning artist now works with other well-known artists Charles Movalli of Gloucester, MA, and Fred Hines from Johnson, VT, as well as simply on his own, with friends, or his daughter Eliza.
THOMAS TORAK - is a nationally recognized artist whose work has been seen in over 250 juried and invitational exhibitions. Among other prestigious awards, his work has been honored with the American Artists Professional League Medal of Honor; the Allied Artists of America Silver Medal of Honor; and he has received top awards at the Salmagundi Club in New York City. A long time member of the Arts Center, Torak is an instructor at the Art Students League of New York, where he first began studying in 1974, with Robert Beverly Hale, and subsequently with Frank Mason. His work is featured in this solo exhibition and one of his paintings is included in the exhibition of drawings and paintings by his wife Elizabeth Torak in the Elizabeth de C. Wilson Museum.
OSCAR TRUGLER - Born in the Netherlands and now living with his family in Dorset, Vermont, Oscar Trugler is an art teacher at Burr and Burton Academy in Manchester. Although primarily a figurative painter, Trugler has been painting landscapes over the past several years in order to concentrate more fully on the elements of formal and emotional aesthetics. “With these paintings I’m looking to minimize subject and focus and instead have them play an overall supporting role in the balance between sky and ground under extreme light …Within the image of the enduring landscape I hope to offer the viewer a level of emotional ground and a place for contemplation.” Trugler has shown his work internationally as well as regionally, and this is his second solo exhibition at the SVAC.