Lancaster Arts Hotel Gallery

Table with Bust and Pink Roses 32 x32 oil on canvas

FIRST FRIDAY Artists' Receptions Monthly, five o'clock to eight o'clock Gallery Hop Happy Hour four o'clock to six o'clock, John J. Jeffries Restaurant

AUGUST: Ruth Bernard
FIRST FRIDAY Artist Reception, August 1
Exhibition Continues through September 3

The LANCASTER ARTS HOTEL GALLERY
Is pleased to present and exhibition of paintings by Ruth Bernard: Chaotic Upheaval
of the “Still Life”. A First Friday Artists’ Reception will be held August 1st, from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. Adjacent to John J. Jeffries Restaurant, the Hotel offers a warm and inviting beginning or end to an evening of Gallery events in Downtown Lancaster, with Gallery Hop Happy Hour from 4:00 to 6:00.

NEW YORK MAGAZINE recently featured Ruth Bernard in the insider section of it’s magazine, geared to the “eclectic collector of art, antiques and stylish finds.” Following is an excerpt of that article:

As a girl in New Haven, Connecticut, artist Ruth Bernard often visited the Yale University Art Gallery, where Vincent Van Gogh’s painting, “Card Terrace at Night,” impressed her with the strong use of color and brushwork. These days, the Pennsylvania-based painter employs similarly vibrant hues in her own body of work. “I’ve always been drawn to rich colors,” she notes. “They’re active, passionate and appealing. Working with drab tones really depresses me.” Even so, the messages behind Bernard’s paintings of lush, plentiful flowers and fruit, are not necessarily upbeat. “The Dutch used still life to suggest the wealth of the earth and it’s gift to mankind,” she says. “I hope to paint a still life that expresses a world of excess, abuse, decadence and greed. I want to depict the overuse of the land and its resources, and the unfortunate gluttony that exists in our society.”
TRAVELING FROM CHELSEA, New York City, New York, earlier this year, this exhibition features large paintings in oil on canvas in Ruth’s characteristic, juicy style. Prior to it’s arrival at the Bowery Gallery on 25th Street, the exhibition traveled to the Oxbow Gallery in Boston, Massachusetts after it’s premier at the Lynden Gallery in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania.

A PAINTER AND A TEACHER, Bernard was born in 1951, in New Haven, Ct.
She has taught at numerous colleges and universities throughout Central Pennsylvania, including Lincoln University, Lincoln, PA, Kutztown University, Kutztown, PA, and Pennsylvania College of Art and Design, Lancaster, PA. Prior to moving to Pennsylvania, she taught at Queens College, Flushing NY, and at Massachusettes College of Art, Boston, MA.

BERNARD BEGAN FORMAL ART EDUCATION at the School of the Worcester Art Museum, and the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston where she earned honors in painting. She chose to continue her education at Queens College, CUNY, in New York City where she graduated sum cum loud with an MFA in painting in 1989. Bernard studied with Gabriel Ladderman, Louis Finkelstein, Rosemarie Beck and Benny Andrews at Queens College and with George Nick at Massachusetts College of Art.

EARLY INFLUENCES for Bernard were the work of Van Gogh, and then de Kooning and Frankenthaler. Later influences are artists such as the British painters: David Bomberg Lucian Freud and Frank Auerbach and the American Stanley Lewis. Frequently the paintings start with a brilliant red ground that pulsates through the work and activates the surface from the first phases. The thick textured surface is progressively built up representing the physical embodiment of this world and the quagmire of our time.

THE LANCASTER ARTS HOTEL is open daily, and is a popular space for Board Meetings and Cocktail Parties. It is suggested you call the Hotel prior to your visit if you are making a special trip to be sure the Gallery is not occupied at 717.299.3000. The Arts Hotel Gallery endeavors to expose the work of established Artists to a broader audience and promote the rich fabric of the Arts in Lancaster County. For more information refer to our website, www.artshotelgallery.com.