Portrait Of Berthe Morisot
In just the last four years, Rich Wagner’s works have been included in nearly 50 exhibitions in New York, Maryland, and California. Examples of his work are included in private collections and in the Law Library at Pace University.
The son of artists, Rich’s formal art education includes study at the Art Students League of New York, where he is an elected member, the Royal Academy of Arts, and the V&A Academy in London. In addition, he has studied art history, most recently at the Courtauld Institute, the University of Oxford, and the National Gallery of Ireland.
One of the factors influencing my art is the work of past masters. Their work speaks to me emotionally and intellectually. Elements of their style and approach have been incorporated into my style and approach.
The Impressionist masters are one such group. In addition to studying their work, I have studied their lives, which in turn has brought me even closer to them.
For this exhibition, I am submitting three portraits of Impressionists. Each was developed not from a single 19th-century photograph but through multiple photos and portraits filtered by my own thinking, image, and feelings toward these people. Each is a new visual assessment.
[I find it interesting that this exhibition will mark the one-year milestone for HMVC and, assuming my work is accepted, it will be my 50th exhibition].
Posed Woman In Museum
I was born and raised in NYC but mostly in The Bronx. I attended CCNY where I graduated with a BS in Mathematics and an MA in Mathematics Education. I taught high school mathematics in The Bronx. I have always been interested in the arts and started writing poems and playing guitar at age 19. I studied poetry under Professor Robert O’Clair. I studied guitar at The Guitar Workshop. I studied painting and drawing at SUNY in Purchase. Recently, I have had paintings and/or drawings in numerous online shows and paintings in 8 live group shows. I have had many poems published in literary magazines, in books, at HVMOCA, and self-published a children’s book, ”Mr. Fine Goes to the Eye Doctor”. My poem “Friends” was published (2022) at HVMOCA in written form and in audio in the “Writing Off the Walls” project. My principal artistic interest has been abstract painting and drawing for the last 10 years, but I have written many poems as well. I live in Putnam County, NY.
My work in fine arts has principally been in 2 classes of abstract paintings: oils and water-based paints. However, I have completed numerous works in the drawing. I focus on color, texture, methodology of delivery, and composition. In composition, I am interested in positive space and negative space as well. I believe the painting is a manifestation of my emotional state of both conscious and unconscious feelings.
The drawing I have submitted were executed at HVMOCA.
Posh Lady On New York City Street
Lawrence Bridges is best known for his work in the film and literary world. His photographs have recently appeared in the Las Laguna Art Gallery 2020, Humana Obscura, Wanderlust a Travel Journal, the London Photo Festival, Light Space & Time Art Gallery, and the ENSO Art Gallery in Malibu, California. His poetry has appeared in The New Yorker, Poetry, The Tampa Review, and Ambit. He has published three volumes of poetry: Horses on Drums (Red Hen Press, 2006), Flip Days (Red Hen Press, 2009), and Brownwood (Tupelo Press, 2016). He created a series of literary documentaries for the National Endowment for the Arts “Big Read” initiative, which includes profiles of Ray Bradbury, Amy Tan, Tobias Wolff, and Cynthia Ozick. He lives in Los Angeles.
I am a forager. Forager of poetic observations you might say, but that sounds a bit pretentious. Let’s just go with FORAGER. I forage for CHANGE, seeking Ovid, the greatest of all unmaskers of form and spirit. I seek mischievously and often. In my work, I employ the deliberate use of shock while attempting to reveal the truth in human behavior. Photographic truth is poetic and poetic truth is justice. There is no fake truth at the end of a pencil or lens. We suffer therefore we love and we protect one another. This is the burden of self-consciousness. My photographs attempt to unmask thoughts and images that change in front of me at high speed. I despair only when I cannot capture and before the moment disappears, but this often results in another photo, as strange and rich as the mind’s movement through time.
Posing Bold
Award-winning watercolor painter with a knack for pen & ink, Susan Lais Hostetler is a Hudson Valley and NYC long-time resident. A lifelong painter, she squeezed her creative life around a demanding career in medical education, and then went full-time in 2018.
At the 123rd Annual Open Exhibition at the National Art Club on Gramercy Park, NYC, through the Catherine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club (CLWAC), Susan was a recipient of their highest watercolor honor: The Edgar A. Whitney Memorial 2020 Prize. Juried into CLWAC’s 1st Associates Online Show of 2020, she was also accepted at the NYC Salmagundi Art Club juried 2019 Annual Open Painting exhibit. Winner of 2 first prizes in watercolor & mixed media at the Wallisch Homestead Annual Art Show, Susan was also juried into lifelong membership to the National Association of Women Artists (NAWA) in 2021.
Susan has taught beginner watercolor classes for adults, holds plein air group painting sessions, sometimes with a model, and has published an article on a painting during a pandemic in the Plein Air Magazine’s Plein Air Today (article and images link is on her website, SusanLaisHostetler.com).
This year, Susan studied with master watercolor painter Joseph Zbukvic during a 3-day workshop at the San Diego Watercolor Society, and an artist workshop with New York painter (and President of the American Watercolor Society), Antonio Masi. She participated in the 11th Annual Art Publishers Invitational: Paint the Adirondacks Week 2022. She has studied with painter & inspiring instructor Carolyn Pedersen, NWS, participated in life model sessions at Art Student League, NYC, and drawing at 92Y Art Center, and numerous workshops and art conferences with nationally renowned watercolor instructors through the years. Her paintings and prints can be found in the historic waterfront Edenton, NC gallery, Chowan Arts Council Gallery, and in private collections across the country, especially in California, and New York.
Very recently, Susan was juried into the Summer TriAnnual Exhibition of the San Diego Watercolor Society, and this July was selected as a juried artist of the Hudson Valley Plein Air Festival 2022 partnered with the Wallkill River School of New York, as well as being accepted into the Juried Catherine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club’s Associates and Members 2022 Show. Her painting “Boscobel Poppies” won the 3rd Place Award in watercolor at the 21st Annual Festival of the Arts at Saint Francis Festival of the Arts, in Ringwood, NJ. Her painting “Stormy Days” will be exhibited at New York City’s Tribeca gallery, One Art Space this Fall.
Watercolor paints and pen & ink are the tools to which I’ve always gravitated. I discovered a dark lovely bottle of ink and a nib pen when I was young, and I’ve been a fan ever since.
Watercolors I picked them up because they went with ink it seemed to me. I’ve been carrying around little paint sets since I was a child, and although as an adult I know that watercolors are hard, fast, and difficult to control, I nearly always find the colors pleasing, even if I think I’ve botched them.
I get an adrenaline rush from plein air (outdoor) painting or studio painting with a breathing person in front of me. My style has been described as loose and fresh in figure studies & fast-sketch art, and lovely in landscapes, and city bridges. I feel as though I’m sometimes giving a voice to the unvoiced or the unseen, whether it be a figure or vintage barn, or a stand of verdant trees.
A long-time resident of Hudson Valley and New York City, I’m a hiker, a Hudson River walker, and a big traveler in finding subjects and art workshops. I organize plein air group sessions in my garden and recently published an article on my art journey versus my corporate career and on the etiquette of pandemic times painting.
Largely self-taught (I have a BA in both English and Journalism), I’ve been painting my whole life—my mother had artistic leanings, leaving art supplies around for me to discover. I squeezed in my private art time during a demanding career in medical education, but benefited from instruction from the famed Australian watercolorist Joseph Zbukvic, New York City’s Antonio Masi, and studied with painter and inspiring instructor Carolyn Pedersen NWS, and many, many other renown watercolor instructors through the years, as well as life model sessions at the Art Students League of New York, and at the Rockland Center for the Arts in West Nyack, NY. I’m grateful to be able to express creativity through painting, and I so appreciate those that have been supportive of my art.
Positive Energy
I am a passionate artist and I paint in a unique way using lots of color and expressive movements! My art is intuitive contemporary expressionism. Using lots of movement and layering of colorful paints and marks gives my art depth and expression. My abstract style expresses my feelings and experiences about life. I hope my art encourages others to sense the beauty of life all around.
EXHIBITIONS
Midwest in Springfield, MO. and Kansas City, Mo. as well in Southwest Florida in Bonita Springs, Fl., Fort Myers, Fl., and Punta Gorda Fl. cities, and online galleries here and abroad.
AWARDS AND RECOGNITIONS
Art Show International Gallery
Finalist award ”Landscapes”. August 2022
Finalist award “Flower 4”. June 2022
Finalist Award “ Water 2” July 2022
Talent Award “Abstract 1” February 2022
TeraVera Online Gallery
Talent Award “Colors” February 2023
Global Conclave Gallery
Bronze Award “Landscapes” November 2022
Luxembourg Recognition Certificate 2021
Luxembourg Recognition Certificate 2020
Sherry is known for her use of colorful palettes and layers of paint. When she begins a piece there are no predetermined images or forms in her mind. The beginning of each piece starts with intuitive movements of two or three color combinations making a simplified background. The background forms the basis to begin her creation. She paints colorful strokes, and blended colors, using painterly movements. Whether on canvas or board, Sherry produces vivid colorful energy filled contemporary expressive artwork. Her style is simplistic and overstated with lots of layers which brings out her expressive feelings or emotions. Using various techniques highlights her ability to create striking and expressive pieces.
Potato Chip Bag
American sculptor Robin Antar tells stories in stone. Over a career spanning more than four decades, she has developed two parallel yet intertwining bodies of work: hyper-realistic carvings of everyday objects that immortalize icons of American pop culture, and expressionist stone forms that embody deeply personal narratives of trauma, healing, and resilience.
Born in Atlantic City in 1957 and raised in Brooklyn, Antar began carving stone as a teenager, discovering both a calling and an emotional lifeline. In 1998, she launched her Realism in Stone series, returning to a technique she first developed in the 1980s, including a custom tinting process to replicate the colors of real objects. From Skechers boots to Oreo cookies, Dr. Martens, hamburgers and fries, to a four-foot Ball Park frank, these meticulously crafted works capture the humor, nostalgia, and contradictions of American life. Following the September 11 attacks, Antar’s sculptures turned toward collective grief, with works like North Tower 9/11—an 800-pound marble bag spilling M&Ms—now regarded as one of her most poignant pieces.
Antar’s expressionist works explore equally profound themes, particularly through her series of stone knots, which symbolize human struggle and perseverance. David’s Knot in Flames, carved from a 1,500-pound block of Turkish marble and permanently installed at Zucker Hillside Hospital in New York, serves as a tribute to her late son and exemplifies her commitment to transforming personal grief into collective healing.
Her honors include the Wynn Newhouse Grant, the Allied Artists of America Gold Medal of Honor, the Margo Harris Hammerschlag Award from the National Association of Women Artists, and inclusion in 100 Sculptors of Tomorrow (Thames & Hudson, Kurt Beers). Her work has been exhibited in major venues including Sotheby’s, The Butler Institute of American Art, and The National Arts Club, and has been featured by The Huffington Post, New York Post, Fox News, and NY1, among others.
Antar continues to carve from her studio in Long Branch, NJ, creating works that observe and record cultural and personal histories in stone.
Sculpting has always been my spiritual refuge. I infuse my work with all the forces at play, and while each piece begins with my own struggles and reflections, the sculptures inevitably transcend personal emotion to offer insight into the broader culture that surrounds me.
As an artist-observer of American life and human nature, my sculptural work comprises two parallel and intertwining bodies of work that create a dialogue between the tangible and the intangible, the specific and the universal.
My realism series serves as a visual record of American contemporary culture, featuring popular icons and symbols that resonate with our collective identity. These works immortalize familiar forms, from consumer products to pop culture references, in stone, connecting viewers to shared memories and experiences while inviting reflection on their significance in American history and identity.
My expressionist works explore the internal landscape of human emotion and personal trauma. Sculptures in this series embody conflict, resilience, and introspection, providing a counterpoint to the external focus of my realism. Works such as David’s Knot in Flames and The U.S. Constitution in a Knot use the language of stone knots to symbolize human struggle, loss, and the intertwined challenges of both personal and national life.
Together, these two bodies of work form a comprehensive exploration of the human experience. By bridging the gap between the visible and the invisible, I aim to show how cultural icons are inseparable from the personal and collective traumas that shape our existence. My goal is not only to express my own artistic vision, but also to foster a deeper connection with viewers, inviting them to engage with both the familiar and the abstract aspects of their own lives, and in turn, the story of our nation.
Power Couple
Hilary Saner is a South African-born, California and Hawai’i-based painter working primarily in oil. Her large-scale representational and mixed media works draw from surrealist and symbolic traditions, layering sensory richness with quiet contemplation. Her paintings have been exhibited widely across the United States and internationally, earning recognition including Best in Show, Juror’s Choice, and Merit awards in California, Washington, D.C., and New York. She divides her time between the Central Coast of California and Waimea, Hawai’i, where the landscape and flora continue to shape her practice.
Flowers have always been my teachers. They hold opposites without apology — fragility and force, silence and declaration, the singular and the abundant. In these three paintings, I wasn’t arranging flowers so much as listening to what they were trying to say.
Power Couple began as a study in relationship — two calla lilies, mismatched in scale but perfectly attuned, rising from vessels that glow like embers against a sky that has pooled onto a table. There is something flamboyant and theatrical about them, and also something deeply tender. This contrast was interesting.
New Moon grew until it became something I hadn’t planned. What started as a still life became an eruption — golden callas curling like cresting waves, red tulips pressing forward with urgency, white blooms opening into the blue dark, a crescent moon watching from the corner. I wanted the viewer to feel they had stepped into the night garden at the moment everything decided to bloom at once.
Lanai Still Life is the most personal of the three — a painting born from living in Hawai’i, where abundance arrives quietly and without ceremony. Yellow orchids spill across a cloth whose woven pattern holds its own geometry. Behind them, bananas, cacao, dragonfruit — the everyday sacred of the tropics. This is still life as a gratitude practice.
Across all three works, I return to the same question flowers have always posed: what does it mean to open fully, knowing you will not last? I don’t paint flowers for their beauty alone. I paint them because they carry grief and celebration in the same breath, because they are brief and they know it, and because that knowledge makes them luminous.
Powerful Forces At Work (In Time)
Arlette Stella is an abstract painter with occasional work that reaches surrealism. Her work is characterized by bold colors since she is mainly color-blind and needs bold colors to see the work. Arlette’s philosophical nature is the basis for her work. Every work is the result of a conversation she has had with canvas, paints, and colors.
Arlette Stella works predominately in acrylic paint. Because of open nature is always exploring, she also experiments with gouache, acrylic ink, molding pastes, and water. Painting is, for Arlette, an exploration into the possibilities and depths of thought and feeling.
Each work aims to incur, inspire, and maybe even nudge (kick you in the yeah-butt!) the viewer to experience and act on kindness. Arlette states clearly: Kindness is my brand!
Arlette Stella is an artist member of the San Diego Artist Guild of the San Diego Museum and of the Artist Guild of Palm Springs/Palm Desert, among other groups. She is self-taught, late-blooming, and unstoppable.
For me, the juncture between education, imagination, and experience yearns to illustrate and inspire the action of kindness through art.
My deeply philosophical & innately abstract nature is evident in every stroke & movement. Even a blank canvas does not interfere with the active dialogue I enjoy with color and canvas.
Being partially color blind, my work tends to be bright and colorful. Color expresses the energy of movement. Movement is life. Kindness is life at its best.
I aim to engender and call out the kindness within you that in turn urges you to action.
Prague
Kylo-Patrick Hart is chair of the Department of Film, Television, and Digital Media at Texas Christian University (Fort Worth, Texas, USA). He received his formal training in digital media arts while a student at the University of Michigan and Wayne State University, with additional instruction provided by offerings of the Maine Media Workshops and Santa Fe Workshops. His photographs have been exhibited in numerous cities throughout the United States and in several countries abroad.
Photography has been my passion since early childhood. My motivation is to discover and capture the beauty, even when it is not always readily self-evident, that surrounds us continuously in all areas of our everyday lives. I derive substantial pleasure from devoting time to my creative activity each day and am delighted that so many of my various works have been exhibited in recent months in Athens, Greece; Barcelona, Spain; Glasgow, Scotland; Rome, Italy; and elsewhere.