Page 16 - Paradise City Guide Fall 2018

Art & Sculpture

Sarah Blodgett often uses her modern camera to get
viewers in touch with the past in carefully arranged still life
photographs that evoke the masterpieces of 16th century
Dutch painters. Sculptural oak leaves, dried hydrangeas, a
scattering of acorns, old metal teapots and desiccated apple
cores take on a wistful, remembrance-of-things-past quality
in her quiet work. She photographs a wide range of subject
matter in color and black and white, from birds and landscapes of upstate New
York to intimate portraits. Blodgett helps us narrow our visual field so that we stop
and notice. We pay attention and feel the better for having done so.
Blodgett’s photography has appeared in many print and online publications,
including Fine Gardening, Country Living Gardener, Woman’s World, The Knot,
Martha Stewart, Sun Magazine, and Quest Magazine. She has been featured as
a “trendsetter” in Art Business News, is the winner of an Audubon Photography
Award and was selected by Jennifer Blessing, Guggenheim Museum curator, in
the 2014 Photo Review Competition. Sarah Blodgett lives in Lansing, NY and will
exhibit at her first Paradise City Arts Festival in Northampton this October.
Still Life with Oak Leaves, color photograph. 20” x 16”.

Randy Eckard takes a non-traditional approach to
watercolor. Although traditional wet washes are an
integral part of his process, he loves to layer color onto
paper through the technique of glazing and drybrush.
By using both dry and wet techniques, Eckard achieves
depth of color and an extraordinary luminosity.
“For me, the subtle or dramatic interplay of light and
shadow are the subject more than the objects themselves. Light reveals the
character, color, and texture of landscapes and buildings,” says Eckard. The
clear light of Blue Hill, Maine, where he lives and works, has inspired his
watercolors for more than three decades. His most recent solo show was
at the Richard Boyd Gallery in Portland, and his work has been included
in many national and regional gallery and museum exhibitions focusing on
realism and watercolor painting. We welcome this accomplished painter to
his first Paradise City show in Marlborough.
Unaccountable Effect, watercolor on paper. 21” x 15”.

The saying “one person’s trash is
another person’s treasure” might be
an apt metaphor for the rich, layered
art of Kirsten Fischler. Fischler earned
her BFA from R.I.S.D. and an MFA in
Painting from Pratt Institute. She has
developed a highly personal style of
mixed-media art that incorporates reclaimed wood to transform
the “leftover mundane into rustic refinement.” She often rescues
plywood from dumpsters, deconstructs and reconstructs the
wood while mixing it with acrylics, oil paint, and colored
pencils to create colorful, multi-dimensional pieces that are truly
both painting and sculpture.
Fischler’s portfolio explores aspects of the natural world, such as a "clade", which is a group of organisms that have evolved from a common ancestor
and represent a single branch on the tree of life. These complex multiple panel works act as a narrative, an archive of our times. A native of Pennsylvania,
her work is featured in 100 Artists of the Brandywine Valley. She now lives and works in Salem, MA and will exhibit at Paradise City Marlborough.
Clade I - VI, reclaimed wood, acrylic, colored pencil, oil on hardboard. Each panel 30” x 3” x 12”.

16 | preview the shows at www.paradisecityarts.com