Bruce S. Kershner Art Gallery
Coming Soon
The public is invited to attend the reception for Fused at the Bruce S. Kershner Gallery on Thursday, July 23 at 5:30 pm to 7:30 pm. Shown will be encaustic art by Phyllis Ruffer, Nash Hyon, Deb Kouzoukian, and Bonnie Michell. The exhibit is from July 11 to September 5 during library hours.
Phyllis Ruffer has a Master Certificate in Painting from the Washington Studio School in Washington, DC. and also studied art in Israel and Ireland. Before that, she spent 25 years as an attorney and land conservation professional with The Trust for Public Land, a national land conservation not-for-profit.
She has exhibited at many galleries in Connecticut, New York, and in Washington.
Her art process involves the interplay between deliberate marks and repeated layering, until she achieves a surface that pleases her. She considers subtraction or excavation just as important as the laying down of paint or other material. She uses her own photographs as collage elements to create a connection between the photographs and finished work that is thematic, as well as visual. She says her interest in encaustic painting is a direct outgrowth of her use of transparent washes and collage elements in her oil and acrylic paintings. Encaustic paint allows her to work with texture, color and embedded images in multiple layers, providing opaque and translucent effects possible in no other medium. Her subject matter varies, but she has a particular interest in the interaction of the landscape and the geometry of the built environment.
Nash Hyon studied painting in Florence, Italy and received her MFA from Vermont College in 1998. She now creates her paintings in her studio in Connecticut.
Nash’s paintings involve the intersections of art and science, the abstract and the figurative. They have been shown in many museum exhibitions and are in many private and corporate collections.
She describes her interest in painting in one word “transformation”. Her primary medium is encaustic and it is one of the most transformative as fire (heat) is used throughout the painting process. She says, “This is one reason why I find painting with encaustic paint which is made primarily from beeswax so transformative right from the start. I call my paintings ‘narrative abstraction’ as many may look basically abstract but there is an underlying story that has to do with nature and the sciences-the challenge lies in combining the two in a painting that, hopefully, will encourage the viewer to take a closer look.”
Deb Kouzoukian is a Fairfield, Connecticut artist whose interest in Encaustic Painting came in a roundabout way. She was taking ceramics at Silvermine Art Center and one day she had a spare ball of clay and made a Pomegranate from porcelain. Her teacher suggested that she make one using an Encaustic medium (Bees wax and Damar Resin). When Silvermine had a Teacher Demonstration Day, Deb went to see Nash Hyon working with a heated palette, medium, and pigment and fell in love with the process.
Deb is a beekeeper with 4 hives in her Apiary “Mulberry Hill Bees”, so she uses the wax from her hives in conjunction with various pigments and collage for her multi layered paintings. She says the “Dashes” in her most current paintings represent bees in a swarm, an exciting and disruptive natural behavior that mostly happens in Spring or when the hives are getting too crowded.
Deb is also the owner of Loose Pearls LLC. designing and making jewelry with semi-precious gems and pearls. She had a 35 year career with Southport Design LTD interior design and is now a volunteer and former President of the Fairfield Women’s Exchange in Southport.
Bonnie Michell’s love and respect for nature has transcended into her artwork. It addresses her profound appreciation for our environment and the concerns of global climate change, which started from her earliest experiences as an instructor teaching children rock climbing, spelunking and orienteering.
She says her extensive travels to Alaska, through its breathtaking mountains and along the Kenai River influences her work. Receding glaciers, disintegration of landscapes, dwindling taxon and the subsequent regeneration of the environment resulting from wild fires are instrumental in her compositions.
Volunteers Welcome
Volunteers are welcome to assist in the gallery operation. Tasks include curating exhibits, selecting artists, attending monthly meetings, helping with opening receptions, and other various administrative tasks. Art experience preferred for curating and selecting artists. Please contact Liz Tardif, Gallery Manager, at 203-246-9065.
Click here for information about showing your work in our gallery (.pdf). Information pamphlets are also available in the gallery at the library.