Interconnected River without beginning or end
Albany Center Gallery’s upcoming River exhibit features Jane Bloodgood-Abrams,
C. Ryder Cooley, Kristen DeFontes, Tom Nelson, Jan-Marie Spanard, Deborah
Webster and John Whipple opens June 17 and runs until July 28. The opening
reception will be held on July 4 from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. and Friday July 18
from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Gallery hours are Tuesday to Saturday Noon to 5 p.m.
The gallery is located at 39 Columbia Street in downtown Albany.
All forms of life are interconnected in a life cycle without beginning or
end. No other force of nature illustrates this truth better than the River.
The artists in this exhibit use a variety of mediums such as painting, photography,
installation, and performance; many find inspiration from the Hudson River.
Jane Bloodgood-Abrams is inspired and deeply connected to landscape of the
Hudson River Valley and its artistic heritage. Her multilayered oil paintings
capture profound timeless moments. “ While caught in these fleeting moments,
stopped along a road at sunset or standing on a bluff above the river, I
feel infused by that moment, allowing it to soak in as much as possible,
and then later, after some tempering and distillation through my own psyche,
I use that memory to create an image. Bloodgood-Abrams is an elected member
of the National Association of Women Artists, she received her M.F.A. from
SUNY New Paltz and her Bachelor Studio Arts from The College of St. Rose.
C. Ryder Cooley is a multi-media artist, musician and performer. Weaving
together chimeric images with found props and forgotten objects, she creates
cinematic performances and installation spaces. Most recently, Ryder has
been working with artist Todd Chandler on a series of songs and collaborations
called Fall Harbor. Dedicated to presenting work in unique and site specific
settings, Ryder has participated in a wide range of public works, educational
projects and international shows. Awarded Best Performance Artist of the
NY Capital District in 2006 & 2007, selected exhibitions have included:
White Box and Exit Art in NYC, Theater Artaud in San Francisco, Contemporary
Artist Center in N. Adams MA, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco,
public art projects in Indonesia, El Salvador, France and the Czech Republic.
From 1993-2004 C. Ryder Cooley was an active member of the San Francisco
art and music communities. She received a BFA in Sculpture from the Rhode
Island School of Design in 1993, an MA in Combined Media from SUNY Albany
in 2006 and an MFA in Integrated Electronic Arts at Rensselaer Polytechnic
in 2008. For more information see: http://www.carolynrydercooley.com
Kristen DeFontes’ prints and collages developed during a train trip from
Albany to Manhattan in December of 2007. Through the train window, she took
inventory of objects and wildlife that interacted with the Hudson River’s
natural landscape. Minimal landscapes capturing the sheer essence of the
seasonal color changes were the result. “As I was viewing the river from
an already interrupted glance through the train window, I began to make
correlations between manmade obstructions within the landscape. Structures
like bridges, smokestacks and relics of past industry, became part of my
consciousness, and I felt the need to juxtapose them with naturally occurring
elements”. Kristen DeFontes currently lives in Altamont, NY. She received
her B.F.A. from Purchase College, NY.
Tom Nelson has curated numerous Hudson River painting exhibitions for more
than a decade such as The Hudson River Artists and the Catskill Mountains,
permanent exhibition at the Mountaintop Historical Society, Haines Falls,
NY, 2006; Three Hundred Years of Landscape Painting: Selections from the
Collection, Albany Institute of History & Art, Summer 1999; Paradise
Lost, Contemporary Landscape Art, Dietal Gallery, Emma Willard School, Troy,
NY 1997; The Realism Show, TED Gallery, 1989; The Drawings of John Butler
Yeats, Albany Institute, 1986 and Leonard Baskin, AIHA, 1986. Nelson’s passion
for the Hudson River School not only extends to his curatorial projects,
but also to his own painting of the Hudson River landscape. For thirty years,
Nelson has been exhibiting his realist paintings of the Hudson River in
gallery’s such as BRIK Gallery, Catskill, NY, Coffey Gallery, Kingston,
NY, Gerald Peters Gallery, New York, NY, Union College, Nott Memorial, and
The Albany Institute of History & Art, to name just a few. Nelson holds
a B.F.A. in painting with departmental honors, from the State University
of New York, College at New Paltz.
Known for the photoreal Trompe L’oeil public art paintings commissioned
by The City of Albany along the Hudson River Way pedestrian bridge, Jan-Marie
Spanard’s personal art making differs in scale and scope. Spanard is the
principal artist of AlbanyMural Ltd. located in Albany, New York. AlbanyMural
Ltd. is an organization of highly skilled figurative painters who create
public artworks, restore historic paintings, and participate in community
creative programs. After considerable research, Spanard and her team designed
thirty trompe l'oeil still lifes depicting the passage of time in Albany.
Spanard’s personal work differs from her public works, and she works in
the solitude of the Adirondacks. “In the studio I think about abstract trompe
l’oeil painting as a form of communication, as a language. A language that
expresses thoughts and feelings that we don't really know how to communicate
through written or verbal language. Abstract trompe l'oeil for me works
as the intuitive language of visual perception. It's actually a meta-language
-- a visual expression or language about something that happens inside us
when we come face to face with time, or beauty, or natural events”.
Deborah Webster works as an art educator at Sayles School of Fine Arts at
Schenectady High School. Her work embodies the unique patterns of thought
and energy systems we create in relationships with one another. The last
two decades have been spent exploring relationships through narrative images
and more recently in abstract form with mixed media visually creating water
systems. Deborah's undergraduate training focused on psychology and art.
She holds a master's degree in painting and has received various grants
and awards for arts-in-education programs she has developed. She was the
recipient of an NEA sponsored residency at the Art Institute of Chicago
for two summers and in 2005, Deborah was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship
to study aboriginal art as she traveled through Australia. Her work has
been exhibited in several solo shows as well as numerous juried and invitational
exhibits in local and national galleries.
John Whipple is a documentary photographer who has been working in his chosen
profession for more than 20 years. While he devoted a period of his life
to the restoration and sale of vintage American stringed instruments, photography
has remained his prime dedication since picking up a camera. Whipple has
been documenting people, places, and objects found along the Hudson River
for many years.