"I want to link the heart with the eye so that the invisible speaks through the visible." 

AbouT

 These paintings embrace interconnected life through the city and nature.  Energy connects all.  Everything is in flux, amidst instances of recognition.  And even what is acknowledged, transforms itself before the eyes. 

I am drawn to the ever changing reflections of water microcosms, and the bright morphing city streets, always searching for harmony within the action.  The vital bonds between city and nature can be felt as active peace.  The colors are amplified to emphasize a heightened experience, and the compositions are abstracted to inspire discovery in the mystery.  The mind creates place beyond the physical location. The work can be called Eco-Reverie as the dream-like color and abstract visions play in the ecology of the mind.

ARtTIST BIOGRAPHY

Justin Bernhardt grew up next door to artists on either side of his childhood home in Kalamazoo, Michigan.  From an early age, he would visit their houses to watch them work, and create with them.  His focus has been on painting since 1989 when he transitioned from practicing the violin into the visual arts.  Around this time, he was greatly inspired on a trip to the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. by the bright and dramatic visions of the Hudson River School landscape painters.  His recent work goes beyond the tradition of American landscape painting to embrace a contemporary universal ideology—often naturally abstract—with dreamlike color, which can be called Eco-Reverie.

Bernhardt graduated from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago with a BFA in 1999.  In 2013, he earned an MFA from Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont.  After graduating from college in 1999, he traveled the United States in his van and painted the landscape for exhibit in shows.  From 2001-2005 and 2007-2008 Bernhardt owned two art galleries in Kalamazoo exhibiting his own work and the artwork of other artists.  He has won several awards including three Purchase Prize awards, a Best of Show, Best in Category of Painting, First Place in Painting, a Merit Scholarship to study at Ox-Bow School of Fine Art, and the Lang Scholarship to study at Guilford College.  Many gallery and institutes have exhibited his artwork over the years since 1996.  Bernhardt’s work has been collected by numerous hospitals, colleges, schools, businesses, and private collectors worldwide. Inspired by ecological interconnection, he began the water microcosm series in 2009.  He has instructed art courses at Kalamazoo Valley Community College since 2002.  Currently, Bernhardt creates from his studio and home on a partial wetland protected lake in Southwest Michigan, where he lives with his wife and son.

3% of the profits from every painting sold on this website goes to Healing Waters International giving safe water to people around the world.