March exhibit

Gwenn Seemel and Becca Bernstein are showing work of a shared project in portraiture named Subjective at The Arts Center in March 2010. Seemel is so fascinated with portraiture that she has dedicated herself entirely to the genre; Bernstein’s focus is on human relationships, family and aging. Both have a strong interest in socially conscious subject matters.

For this project, which is accompanied by a book of the same title: Subjective, Portraits by Becca Bernstein and Gwenn Seemel the artists painted their own and each others family members and friends, and will be showing portraits of the same people in pairs. The book will be launched at the reception on March 5; the author is Richard Brilliant, Emeritus Professor of Art History & Archaeology, and Anna S. Garbedian Professor in the Humanities both at Columbia University.

Seemel and Bernstein feel that portraits convince the viewer that the paintings are impersonations of the subjects: a portrait of mom becomes “mom’s portrait or simply “mom” in conversation; the subject looks like a person with feelings. The two artists feel that portraits are deft impersonators – and not just because they are made of pigment and binding instead of flesh and blood, but because of differences in the sitters.

Seemel and Bernstein have come to the realization, and are of the opinion that painting the same person by two artists does not only result in two paintings in two different styles and interpretations of the artists. It is also the person portrayed who showed him or herself in a different manner to each artist; as one personality to one artist and as a slightly different personality to the other artist. In that sense the subject of a portrait is not actually the subject of that portrait, but rather the representation of the chemistry between the artist and the portrayed.

The Brown Bag Art Talk for Subjective is scheduled on March 11at noon; both artists will come and speak about their joint project