Strummer
Kylo-Patrick Hart is an award-winning artist/photographer (Budapest International Foto Awards, European Photography Awards, Global Photography Awards, Golden Shot International Photography Awards, London Photography Awards, Pollux Awards, Tokyo International Foto Awards, etc.) and 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 works have been exhibited in numerous cities throughout the United States and in several countries abroad.
My motivation as an artist/photographer 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 believe the finest images are those that are serious yet playful, aesthetically appealing yet a bit quirky. As both a creator and an admirer, my favorite works tend to be ones whose contents speak loudly for themselves, even when it is not immediately clear exactly what they are saying. They seek to inspire their viewers to wrestle with their intriguing content and, as a result, ponder various aspects of our surrounding world in new and unique ways.
Stunning Desert Flower
* I’m Tracy Medeiros, an artist based in Watertown, NY, dedicated to bringing unique and impactful art to the world.
* With over 38 years as a military family member, my travels have deeply enriched my artistic journey, providing me with diverse experiences that have shaped my creativity, skills, and vision.
* I’m passionate about sharing the stories and ideas that fuel my imagination, and I love connecting with others through the power of art.
I made this portrait of my daughter on her elopement. It was located in Red Rock, Nevada. She loved her unique bouquet; unfortunately, it was destroyed in shipping, so this is my way of capturing it forever for her. It took over 20 hours, and it was my first time attempting that many different flowers together.
Styles
Kylo-Patrick Hart is an award-winning photographer and 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 believe the finest images are those that are serious yet playful, aesthetically appealing yet a bit quirky. As both an artist and an admirer, my favorite photographs tend to be ones whose contents speak loudly for themselves — even when it is not immediately clear exactly what they are saying. They seek to inspire their viewers to wrestle with their intriguing content and, as a result, ponder various aspects of our surrounding world in new and unique ways.
Subconscious Spaces II
Based in Boston, US, Mary L. Peng is a self-taught multi-media artist, spanning collage, digital work, painting, mixed-media installation, and photography, whose oeuvre delves into the intricate links between the human body and psyche, reality, perception, and nature. Blending visual elements as organic living forms, Peng’s work oscillates between outright exploration of visceral aesthetics and the probing of philosophical concepts on constructionism and connectedness. Peng’s prints are united by the motif of “merging”, utilizing organic forms to create ethereality and an impression of oneness from chaos and manifest the mind-body-nature interconnection. Peng sets out to capture the contradiction and harmony of human existence by exploring the ever-evolving dynamic between material and transcendental realities.
When language becomes insufficient to capture the multi-layers of our perception, awareness, and consciousness, the unknown and intangible territory of which remains perennially inevitable, intuitive abstractions fill in the opaque space to unveil the inexpressible just a little closer to our sensorial grasp. In ‘Subconscious Spaces II’, I seek to transcend the constraints of verbal language, acknowledging its inadequacy in fully capturing the multifaceted layers of our perception, awareness, and consciousness. This print is an odyssey into the unknown, an intangible territory that, while elusive, is an inevitable aspect of our human experience. Through surreal abstractions, I aim to peel back the opaque veil that shrouds our deepest thoughts and feelings, bringing us a step closer to articulating the inexpressible. This work is less of a representation, but an audacious and somewhat absurd imagination of the complexities of our inner selves.
Submerged
When I was in grade school and high school i did a lot of art. I like to think it offered me an incredible foundation for what would come much later. In high school i studied under Walt Bartman, doing oil painting. I was accepted into the Maryland College of Art and Design on a figure drawing scholarship program that they offered to high school students when I was 16. After high school i went on to pursue my other passion — helping people. I’ve spent the last 25 years working as a psychotherapist. Sometime in the middle of all of that i had kids (twins), and eventually came back to drawing in 2017. What I do now is primarily self-taught, though I do feel my training and education as a child have created an invaluable foundation for my work today. I’ve watched countless hours of slowed down youtube videos and tutorials, and have spent thousands of hours drawing, practicing, and improving. It’s been a wonderful and challenging journey, and I’ve loved every minute of it! My goal moving forward is to continue to learn and challenge myself as I transition to art full-time. I feel the next step is to get my name out there to the art world.
My goal as an artist is the same as my goal as a human — connection. I work to find the place where we all meet; that place where our differences recede, and we can settle in. That’s why I draw, to find that snapshot moment where someone can look at my art and go, oh, yes. I know that feeling.
My artistic practice centers on portraiture—on drawing out the unseen essence of a subject and translating it through the delicate control of graphite. I explore the quiet power of detail—each mark is an invitation to slow down, to look closer, and to witness what is often overlooked. Every drawing is a form of deep listening, an act of attention that honors the emotional and psychological presence of the individual.
I believe hyperrealism, when pursued with discipline and sensitivity, becomes more than a replication of the visible world—it becomes a mirror, a bridge, and sometimes, a wound made visible. I’m fascinated by the complexity of the human face and the subtle interplay of light, texture, and expression that gives a portrait its emotional charge. As a psychotherapist, I’m naturally attuned to nuance, which shapes my artistic philosophy: that realism can reveal as much about the internal world as the external one. It allows me to build tonal depth slowly, almost sculpturally, honoring the patience, presence, and attention each subject deserves.
My style has evolved over the last eight years to a refined form of realism that balances technical control with expressive intent. I see art as a language, and my goal is to create a sense of atmosphere and feeling. I’m currently exploring new directions, including the integration of charcoal for its expressive depth and contrast. I’ve just completed my largest piece to date—a graphite portrait measuring three feet tall and two feet wide—which has expanded both my physical and emotional engagement with the medium, allowing space for story, intimacy, and connection.
My goal is to create drawings that don’t simply replicate life but evoke it—quietly, powerfully, and with honesty.
Submerged
Barbara Kreitzer holds an MFA in Printmaking from Syracuse University. She has taught art and printmaking, served as an adjunct professor, and previously founded a children’s clothing design and manufacturing business. Now a full-time artist, she builds her work slowly, layer by layer, through staining, scraping, and mark-making. She is drawn to the moment when a surface begins to shift, when control loosens, and something quieter starts to emerge. Her work lives in that space between intention and instinct, where forms soften, fracture, and open into something felt rather than fully defined.
My work explores emotional landscapes as shifting states rather than fixed places. In States of Water, each painting inhabits a moment of transition, submersion, force, and emergence, where boundaries dissolve, and form resists settling. The work moves between stillness and disruption, holding tension between what is visible and what is felt, as something begins to surface.
Subterranean Lake
Stanislav “Standa” Riha
Visual artist, photographer, and writer
Member of CARFAC
Born in 1952 in Prague, former Czechoslovakia. He grew up in Lesser Town (Malá Strana), surrounded by great medieval and modern art and artists that caused his desire to create. From early childhood, he enjoyed drawing and later painting; as a young man, he focused mainly on surrealism. His artistic attitude was shaped by many art courses in childhood, followed by art training by MgA Milos Saska and work in the set production of the Realistic Theatre.
In 1980, he lived for a year in Grinzing, Vienna, Austria, and then moved to Vancouver, BC, Canada. Enchanted with the natural beauty of British Columbia, he dedicated the first few years to realistic nature themes and then switched to Surreal and later Surreal-abstract creative work.
In the last three decades, I have been creating wall-mounted, cast resin, and aluminum sculptures combined with canvas and gold leaf, and exploring the computer as an art tool for creating digital artwork.
All my life, I have loved to create art full of emotions and feelings, “soul,” with the satisfaction of fun. I am interested in the balance and composition of colors and objects rather than the reality of the items.
The direction of the last two decades has been aimed at understanding and, through artwork, expressing the human struggle of emotions and adaptations. For the past ten years, I have been polishing my creative work in the Surreal-abstract style.
The main motto of my artwork is: Just as in a good story, the readers have space to create their image; in a good picture, the viewers can form their own account.
Suddenly Awake
Gerrit van Ommering is a fine art photographer based in Gold River, California. Originally from the Netherlands, he relocated to the United States at the age of 19 to pursue a dynamic career in the invention, design, and development of innovative space systems. Following retirement, he transitioned to photography – channeling his technical expertise and creative drive into a new artistic medium. His photography, much of which is creative and abstract, explores the tension between realism and imagination.
Gerrit is actively involved in Northern California’s photography and arts communities. He is active in the Viewpoint Photographic Art Center and Gallery, the Sierra Camera Club, Sacramento Fine Arts, Rancho Cordova Arts, and many others. His work has been in numerous exhibitions and competitions, earning regional awards and entering several private collections.
In 2024, he co-presented the successful duo exhibition “REALISMFantasy” at the Mills Station Arts & Culture Center, where he provided the 31-print “Fantasy” segment. In 2025, he had a well-received solo exhibition “Embellished Emblems” at Gallery 1075 in West Sacramento, displaying 24 prints of creatively modified automotive emblems with stunning colors and textures. In 2025 and so far in 2026, he has had 276 images accepted in 45 physical and 106 online/magazine exhibits.
I have always been drawn to images that surprise – ones that feel a little offbeat, mysterious, or just plain strange. While I do plenty of straight or lightly enhanced photography, what I really enjoy is taking an image and pushing it into new territory: twisting, layering, and abstracting until it feels like something unexpected has emerged
In our smartphone era, many billions of photos are taken each year. To even barely stand out, I feel the need to create something different, often strange, abstract, or slightly weird. My eye tends to land on unusual shapes, odd juxtapositions, or scenes that others might overlook. I collect these visual ingredients and let instinct take over in the editing process. Sometimes I know where I’m going; often I don’t. I just keep experimenting until something tells me I’m done. And often the result is a mysterious abstract image.
My entries for “Creatures of Earth, Sea & Air” don’t take it that far. They are based on animal photos in which I have isolated an animal’s key feature and applied techniques to make it more pronounced and striking, quite different from the path most photographers would follow.
Sueno
Agata Matczak – Born in Poland, she currently lives in Germany. Even as a child, she showed great artistic abilities in the field of painting and drawing. Love for nature and the accompanying phenomena prompts her to study at the Faculty of Physics and deepen the secrets of nature, but she never gives up her passion for painting, which over time turns into something more.
A graduate of physics through her paintings takes us into the fascinating world of colors. For her, creating art is a very deep and emotional process. Her world is shimmering with colors, because Nature is her main source of inspiration, which through its contrasts, shadows, refractions, and reflections creates the opportunity to observe amazing effects that she transfers to the canvas, creating fascinating spectacles of colors, feelings, and emotions such as freedom, joy, pain, and longing.
Her paintings are very intuitive and personal, full of hope, passion, and gratitude for the beautiful world around us. Whether we see something more in this magical world depends only on ourselves.
Creating art is a very deep and emotional process for me. Emotions, freedom, joy. My paintings are very intuitive and personal, full of hope, passion, and gratitude for the beautiful world around us. All my photos are made of feelings.