Through the Thicket
The Glencoe Art Festival is July 22 and July 23 2023. I am in Booth 108.
This summer has been great for art festivals with East Lansing, Kalamazoo, Wells St. and Madison already with high attendance and good weather.
Next Shows are:
Orchard Lake in West Bloomfield MI July 29 and 30
Lincolnshire IL August 12 and 13
Evanston IL August 18 and 19
Bucktown IL August 26 and 27
The Ann Arbor Show was well attended with enthusiastic and creative people! A group of German exchange students made a video of me explaining my work, which they are posting to Instagram. We had excellent sunny weather for the three day show. The images above are four Chicago Cityscape Panoramas taken from my booth. People most responded to the color combinations and the flow of the the work. My next show is in Suttons Bay Michigan August 6th and 7th.
It was awesome to be back at the Kalamazoo Art Fair after two years being cancelled because of Covid. We had great weather, and many people from the past stopped by to say hi. The largest painting 4’x5’ was sold early the first day, and then other works sold throughout the fair. I had a booth spot across the sidewalk from my usual spot on the corner of South and Rose near the Library. It makes it nice to have big paintings facing the cross-walk and traffic. My next show is in Ann Arbor at the Original on North University booth NU822. I am looking forward to being back at that show as well! The Ann Arbor Art Far runs from July 21-23.
Port Clinton Art Festival in Highland Park
My last art festival of the year at Highland Park was a great time! Someone found my booth first thing in the morning for a large piece. They had viewed the artists online beforehand. This show had a virtual component to the in-person show.
It had good weather, and wonderful people in this large show—the original art festival of the Amdur Productions Art Festivals in the Chicago area. I exhibited many of my new aquatic life paintings in the Eco-Reverie style, showing 4 and 5 foot works on canvas, and smaller paintings in frames as in the photo. There was positive response to the vivid colors and arrowhead plant paintings. I look forward to the Port Clinton show next year. Hopefully, I will be able to do more shows overall next year.
East Lansing Art Festival 2021
The East Lansing Art Festival was filled with jubilant collectors emerging out after last year’s cancelled show, and this year’s fest moving from spring to late summer. The weather was good, great conversations, with 9 paintings and 3 books collected. There may be a 5 foot commission from the show as well. Thanks to my mom, Mary, who helped during the whole show, and thanks to Kollin and Eric for helping with setup and take down! Next stop Highland Park Port Clinton August 28th and 29th.
“Luminous Gesture”
After all my art fairs were canceled last year, I have three still scheduled for this summer. Two are in the Chicago area and one in Michigan. I am looking forward to seeing crowds, and exhibiting my new work with floating frames. Glenview, Illinois 7/31/21-8/1/21, East Lansing, Michigan 8/7/21-8/8/21, and Highland Park, Illinois 8/28/21- 8/29/21.
At ancient teal dawn,
We fashion and hone
Our stone arrow heads
In hopes of fire festival feasts,
Or circle victory yelps.
Aquatic plants mingle and
Merge with our insights,
Spawning strength and
Renewal of life.
As time wanders on,
Those arrow-points sharpen
Our sights for flight,
As pink laser lights
Cut the space between us.
Momentum reels us
Afloat in legions of
Deepened blue shadows,
Coursing earth and water.
Progressions unfold
Technologies and destinies.
The constellations,
Finding our intertwined,
Vascular anatomy,
Now pulse light and sound
In vibrant fresh harmonies,
So that we again remember
Our birth.
Here is a 40”x16” cut-away painting of arrowheads in pink and blue. The flat graphic effect refers to digital layering, and the interconnected spontaneity of Eco-Reverie.
In Beneath and Beyond, the eye peers through the arrowhead leaves, as another water surface illuminates the rocks beneath. As the leaves move downward, they resemble dark birds circling around a golden egg, which can symbolize the self or mind. The green-blue lily pad ellipses drift deeper into the beyond, as pale trees reach upward against the dark blue water.
Acrylic on Canvas
36”x48”
This is a new technique I am playing with in a few recent paintings. The is a cut-away process to reveal painting underneath, with bold color notes. I’m also trying to be more minimal, leaving larger areas clear with color, and decisive arrangements. I am after a kind of lucid dream atmosphere, as if the mind is heightened and altered. I will post more once I take photos of the new work.
As the first glimmers of light peek across the reflected horizon, the world stirs. Out of the brambles of thought contradictions, into fresh hope, deepening the dawn--we enter. Clearing the purple fog, our minds absorb and illuminate, as our distractions become lifted. Gathering around the pond glow, ages pass in an instant.
This is a painting process video in the creation of Liquid Roots. After a visit to Buck Creek, I combined two photo references of roots along the creek. I work in an Eco-Expressionist style with gestural brushwork and exaggerated colors.
As we consider our social and spiritual roots, we must realize that our roots are liquid or mingled with all other roots. What we gain nourishment from also nourishes others; and at the deepest level, we are connected underneath it all.
From an aerial view, the pink mist shrouds the mint green landscape, as a stream weaves an s-curve through the trees. The eyes shift from the dark masses in the foreground, into the light blue horizon where someone’s smoke drifts on the wind. The light strikes just the caps of trees in a line, making leaves turn orange and skeleton branches become red. To drift above it all, gives one vantage on the lay of the land, and detached, floating observation.
I feel that the metaphor for looking beyond the tree line of our daily lives is important right now. Those looming figures who often block the view must not overshadow our perspective of the future. The waves of social trees can be interesting, but there is something more. We need and search for a transcendent vantage point, where the bigger picture can be seen. The curving path of the stream can signify the ways in which we must bend and swerve through life, always reaching for that final merging with the lake or ocean.
This painting was inspired from a hot air balloon ride some years ago, and now it takes on a new narrative for the prospects of the moment and the future.
It is the largest painting I have done in a while at 4 feet by 7 feet acrylic on canvas, which helps encompass the vastness of the landscape.
Above the canopy, a tree reaches out in explosive orange, as if in conversation with the greens surrounding its branches. Trees do communicate with each other, and with us, if we listen. The rhythms of the leaves and branches speak to the visceral energy coursing through our nerves and veins. The dendrites in our brains, that are formed through repeated action and thought, resemble the sunshine searching limbs of this expanding tree. The dripping colors mingle and merge to create a nebula base from which the tree can emerge.
This was a class demonstration for my Painting I class. I focused on complimentary colors (here blue and orange, and a little green and red). Also, this painting explores color as light, rather than only adding white tints to color to develop value. The orange reeds and light blue around them create an optical sensation of light. High chromo or saturated colors appear like light is shining on them, as opposed to the dull or muted brown tones near the roots and lily pads. I also attempted to show mist or fog in various areas to give a sense of moisture in the atmosphere and a feeling of depth.
Here is one of the paintings for the Photosynthesis Project exhibit November 1st at the CNM. In this, the roots resemble lungs or wings. They show the delicate and subtle side of nature against the more abstract, raw and dynamic water reflections. Both roots and water show us something of the world underneath or beyond our immediate perception--so crucial in the subtle awareness it takes to be fully connected to the environment and take meaningful steps toward guiding and protecting the natural/human ecosystem. With current issues at the forefront of many peoples awareness, we all may reflect on developing a more balanced relationship with the world around us. With deepening awareness, there is appreciation and acknowledgement that we are all sharing this Earth, and the Cosmos for that matter. Action, of course, will follow. Ownership has taken a precedence even over responsibility in some cases, and people many not realize that responsibility is a blessing, often greater that ownership. To give back and take care of the ecosystem is like the ripples or roots in the stream that keep going out from the source, while ownership is limited like pieces of changing water reflections that cannot be captured.
The Rockford Art Museum Greenwich Village Art Fair is my last art fair of the season. It is held in Illinois at the Rockford Art Museum. This is a new show for me and I am bringing my Buck Creek series along with my new book Eco-Expressionist Journey available on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=eco-expressionist+journey+by+justin+bernhardt&i=stripbooks&ref=nb_sb_noss My booth is 67. Looking forward to the event!
I will be back on Chicago’s North Shore this weekend in booth 527! I will be showing all water scenes at this show. Hope to see you there!
Next stop is the Glencoe Festival of Art on Chicago’s North Shore. You can find me in booth 53 Saturday July 27th and Sunday July 28th. I will be showing water scapes and cityscapes. New prints will be shown as well. I look forward to seeing you there!
Summer heat is here! This painting is inspired from the Chicago Botanic Gardens. I feel the gesture of cool meeting hot, of heavy meeting light, and of blue meeting orange. The drips help to define the relative movements in a sun drenched scene.