External Exhibitions

James Bartlett, digital collage

James Bartlett feels that life is art, and we should take a moment to enjoy it.  Combining digital painting with photography, the artist breathes new life into his photos through layering and collaging abstractions, using line work and filters to enhance and abstract photos taken throughout his life. 

Bartlett’s work focuses on themes of nature, passion, community, exploration, and finding inner peace. Reliving moments, places, or even the idea of the places we have been helps inform how we move forward with our lives and to recognize what is truly important to us. He feels there is a great awakening happening in our culture, with a transition to more balance and inner peace, changing the focus of our daily lives. We are the mountains that we climb throughout our lives and every day, inviting the question - what is your next ascent?

Kari Meyer, acrylic landscapes (pictured)

Kari Meyer views art as a form of communication that has a power beyond that of words. Through imagery she attempts to portray ideas that words cannot, like the archetypal beauty that connects all things. She seeks to create a positive experience for the viewer while at the same time making a positive commentary on the world. 

Meyer finds inspiration from nature and the Japanese ideals of wabi-sabi, a prominent philosophy of Japanese aesthetics. She feels this philosophy changes the worldview of western civilization in that things we normally view as negative become beautiful. Loneliness, old age, and death become beautiful in that they are inevitable and represent the constant flux of the universe. 

The artist attempts to address this idea of the movement of eternity - of everything coming from or returning to nothingness, of the constant cycle between birth and death that is prominent in every aspect of the natural world, and of the cyclical rhythm of days, seasons, and moments. Meyer’s work urges the viewer to contemplate the relationship between oneself, nature, and the universe. 

Casey Blanchard (pictured)

Primarily a self-taught artist, Casey explores her experiences through the engaging and often unpredictable print medium of monoprinting. She is most interested in the spiritual aspects that emerge in the image, particularly relating to how we live in the world and how the world lives in us. In the beginning, the work may be a search for answers, but in the end it's more about being here without them.

Casey Blanchard was born in Greenwich, CT in 1953. She lives in Shelburne, VT with her husband, Dan Cox, and their daughter, Julia Cox. Her artwork is found on the walls of health care facilities, private residential collections, corporate offices, the hospitality industry, on web designs, and various published materials.

Johanne Durocher Yordan    

Johanne is a Burlington based artist who works out of her studio on Pine Street. She was born in Quebec, Canada, but has lived most of her life in Vermont. It was not until 1998 that Johanne began committing herself to her artwork and finding her own voice. She studied at the University of Vermont and has since developed a diverse body of work that is a testament to her ability to succeed as an independent artist. Creating work that fits a variety of audiences, while always building upon her unique self-taught style, is the secret to her success. Johanne has always been the type of person who explores on her own, tapping into the unknown and developing her own fashion and techniques. Many of her paintings include found or collected items which add depth and meaning to combine form and function to her work. Her abstract work captures her emotions and represents her unique style and expression. Johanne has exhibited her work extensively throughout Vermont in both solo and group exhibitions over the past 12 years.

Cameron Schmitz

Cameron Schmitz grew up in Greenwich, Connecticut and spent idle time in her youth drawing. Encouraged by two artistic parents, including her mother who is also a painter, she learned at a very early age the joy and satisfaction of participating in the visual arts. 
Schmitz holds a Master of Fine Arts in Painting from the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting & Drawing from the University of New Hampshire, in addition to studying Art and Art History at Studio Arts Center International in Florence, Italy. 

Following a month-long artist residency at the Vermont Studio Center in 2006, Schmitz moved to Vermont after discovering Vermont's rugged landscape to be uniquely inspirational. Now located in the Brattleboro area, Schmitz actively exhibits her work regionally and nationally. Her work has been featured at Fitchburg Art Museum's biannual exhibition, Ne England/New Talent, Green Mountain College, Kyoto Seika University in Japan, Emory University, Northern Arizona University Art Museum, and Rogue Space in Chelsea, New York. Her work is represented by The Drawing Room Art Gallery in Cos Cob, CT and Furchgott Sourdiffe in Shelburne, VT, and she is an artist member of the Copley Society of Art in Boston. In addition to her painting practice, Schmitz is also the Gallery Curator of The Drawing Room Art Gallery and teaches painting at the River Gallery School in Brattleboro, VT.

Carl Rubino
 
I strive to create unique interpretive, impressionistic and abstract images that relate my personal vision of or reaction to the subject matter before me.   Before I even pull out the camera I try to experience all that my subject reveals, or even what it makes illusive – not just the obvious, like the literal view, the colors, texture and patterns - but the less obvious sensual aspects, the energy and the “feeling” that it conveys. Whether in landscape, abstract, street photography, fine art nude or whatever else captures my interest, I seek to find and interpret life’s visual symphonies, one click at a time. 

I feel that to a large extent my photographs consist of three different points of view: the raw material that is the literal subject matter of the image that my camera captures; what I see, sense, and work to portray when I interpret that subject; and what the viewer sees when looking at the image on the wall.  Those may be three very distinct views of what is essentially rooted in the same thing.   That, to me, is stimulating art.  And that is a great part of what draws me to photography.

Jeff Schneiderman 

Jeff Schneiderman works as a wedding, portrait and fine art photographer in Williston, VT.  He has been taking photographs for over 35 years, traveled extensively throughout the U.S. and the world and has made Vermont his home for the last 27 years. Patterns are a major theme in Jeff’s work as he is fascinated with the designs in nature how they are reflected in things manmade.  More of Jeff's work can be seen at: www.jeffschneiderman.com."

Krista Cheney

Krista Cheney is a native Vermonter, currently living in St. George, Vermont. She studied English Literature and Agricultural Economics at the University of Vermont. She has studied photography since 2003, taking classes and workshops at local venues and the Maine Media Workshops in Rockport, Maine.

Carolyn Enz-Hack

Carolyn Enz-Hack's work includes painting, sculpture, and scenery design. While she has spent most of her life on a farm she holds a degree in theatrical design from Rutgers University and has spent years designing for the theatre. Her rural sensibility is informed by themes explored in ancient theatrical and religious literature, and by developments in cross-disciplinary Science. Each piece is an attempt to process the exterior world through an internal lens. Her most recent solo exhibitions have been at the Castleton Downtown Gallery in Rutland, Vermont, and Creare Inc. and the Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center both in Lebanon, New Hampshire. She is the recipient of a Vermont Arts Endowment Award, a painting merit award from the Chaffee Center for the Arts, a residency at the Vermont Studio Center, and her work has been selected for exhibition in regional and nationally competitive shows.

Erinn Simon

Erinn Simon is a fiber artist and yarnbomber. She crochets tapestries, toys, baby mobiles, vegetables, baked goods, blankets, scarves for trees, and the occasional bloodthirsty zombie cupcake. Her work has appeared in group shows in Burlington, Seattle, and Australia and she ships her one of a kind creations to customers around the world. She lives in the Old North End of Burlington with her husband and three kids. You can find her on facebook as Callie Callie Jump Jump.

Bette Ann Libby, latex on vinyl (Blue Path, Mary Fletcher, Healing Garden)

Bette Ann Libby has spent 50 years as multi-disciplinary artist, working in the mediums of painting, sculpture, stoneware and ceramic shard mosaics. Utilizing upcycled materials such as ceramic shards, discarded house paint and banners, her work explores a variety of themes including those of strong women, the universality of tea, love, home, and the beauty of nature - as is reflected in this series of paintings entitled Hello Earth. 

Libby has spearheaded many community projects in a variety of mediums over the last several decades. She is the founder of Studios Without Walls in Brookline, MA, and the creator of Banners on Bridge Street in Waitsfield, VT.  Over a dozen of her community mosaic murals are permanently installed in VT and MA.  The artists’ work reflects her passion for bringing communities and art together.

Natasha Bogar, oil on canvas (Blue path) (pictured)

Natasha Bogar explores the dynamic interplay between light and shadow, capturing the essence of nature's ever-changing moods. Her landscapes evoke a sense of anticipation and wonder, reflecting her fascination with the natural world, particularly the moments when tranquility meets the raw energy of impending storms or sunsets. 

Inspired by her personal experiences in the outdoors, Bogar finds beauty in the contrasts of vibrant sunlight against dark, brooding clouds – a duality that both highlights the drama of the landscape and serves as a metaphor for life's complexities. The artist strives to convey these emotions through vivid colors and thoughtful compositions, inviting viewers to reflect on their connections to nature. Through her work, Bogar seeks to foster a deeper appreciation for the environment and its transient beauty, celebrating the moments that remind us of nature's power and grace and our relationship with the world around us.

Amy Jelen, paper collage (McClure 4)

Amy Jelen spent many years working in stained glass before she began experimenting with paper as a medium. She finds that in some ways her collage work mimics her stained glass style through a shared method of utilizing tiny pieces to create larger scenes. Inspired by the colors and textures she sees in the natural world, she uses paper from the pages of magazines to create abstract pieces, imagined landscapes, and recognizable Vermont scenes. Through her work she seeks to connect with community, stir a feeling in a viewer, and create works that communicate serenity and quiet the mind.

Susan Smereka, collaged monotype (Shepard Patrick Hub 3)

Susan Smereka’s work explores themes of memory, place, and the body through reclaimed materials and layered processes. She begins with surfaces that already hold history—stained paper, unfinished artwork, worn shirts, topographical maps of Vermont—fragments marked by time and use. Through monotype printmaking, collage, and sewing, she shapes these remnants into new visual languages.

Smereka finds that her sources of inspiration shift… at times it is from her late brother’s drawings (tubular forms), at others it is the shape and texture of domestic cloth, and still sometimes it is simply color. During the pandemic, she began stitching shirt scraps onto maps—an act of resourcefulness that became a meditation. The names on the maps, often tender and domestic, echoed how we shape the land in our own image—just as we inhabit the clothes we wear. 

Through her work, Smereka seeks to invite new forms to emerge where past and present meet—stories layered, remade, and reaching toward a reimagined future.

Matt Larson, mixed media (Breast Care Center)

Matt Larson’s work is inspired by the shifting mosaics of ecological patterns that contextualizes our passage through time and place. The artist strives to balance randomness and accident with order and reason in a manner that emulates natural processes, altering and obscuring what came before, and leaving glimpses of initial conditions visible through the overlaid patterns and juxtapositions of subsequent events. Through this he seeks to facilitate the emergence of abstractions of the natural world that embody the connections between ourselves and the landscape.

Phil Laughlin, oil on canvas (Hematology/Oncology)   

Phil Laughlin describes his artistic process as taking color and shape - raw materials with no intrinsic value - and assembling them into something coherent that has the power and purpose to speak. 

Laughlin’s work explores a variety of locales, subjects and seasons, with a regional range from gentle sandy beaches along the coast to towering mountains in Vermont. Inseparable from the specifics is the greater awareness that all things are intricately connected. The artist feels that everything reflects the universe conceived as a whole.