Artists' Backgrounds

Nash Hyon

Ms. Hyon’s primary medium—encaustic—is comprised of beeswax, damar resin (from pine trees) with pigment, and is one of the oldest mediums used by painters. This medium also functions as a metaphor as her paintings are about transformation and the natural world. Since 2000 she has been painting a series based on the elements of the Periodic Table. The elements form a miniature universe or microcosm. Within this universe is water, which becomes the inspiration for the work exhibited at the Kershner Gallery. As she was growing up, Ms. Hyon spent weekends on Long Island Sound and at area beaches and has felt the need to live near the water (being a Pisces might have a role in this) with all its visual and physical permutations.

Water, so simple, yet so complex. Two gases bond and become liquid, the liquid solid. We experience it as rain, snow, ice floats. The fact we can float in it-seems like magic not just chemistry. Covering 70% of our world’s surface, by weight 65% of our bodies, necessary for life, often wasted and in many places not clean enough to drink.

Painter Nash Hyon received her MFA in 1998. Since then her work has been exhibited in Waxing Poetic: Encaustic Art in America at the Montclair Art Museum, The National Academy of Sciences in D.C. and The Knoxville Museum of Art among others. She is an artist member and teacher at the Silvermine Guild of Artists and will be a speaker for the second year at the National Encaustic Conference being held this summer in Massachusetts.

 

Roger Mudre

The thought of infinity as part of our lives has been the inspiration for Roger Mudre’s work. Creating microscopic worlds of cellular growths, auras, cosmos, places unseen and only imagined informs his work. Focusing on the concept of an infinite space and attempting its expression allows him, to enter new places and travel within the layers of color and pattern, imagining an ever-growing and expanding life form with endless possibilities.

The process begins with preparing the paper or canvas with a ground and then applying metallic leaf to the surface. Next the leaf is sealed and Mudre begins to transform the surface with sheer layers of glazed color. Numerous layers are later applied to the surface in an additive and subtractive process, either with a brush, rag or scraper. The organic forms are created in the moment as the paint reacts to the process. This layering process also adds another dimension of depth to the paintings. The square format allows for a field of pattern that continues equally in all directions.

Mudre resides and works at his studio in Weston, Connecticut.  His works have been included in exhibits at Reece Galleries, NYC; General Electric Corporate Headquarters, Fairfield, CT; Jorgensen Center Gallery, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT; John Slade Ely House, New Haven, CT; Westport Art Center, Westport, CT; Silvermine Guild Arts Center, New Canaan, CT. Roger serves as Co-Chair of the Silvermine Guild of Artists and is also on staff as the Scenic Designer at Fairfield Ludlowe High School.