Home Community Blog “Urban Abstracts”, Bernard C. Meyers

Photography faculty member, Bernard C. Meyers work, "Urban Abstracts" will be on exhibition at Camerawork Gallery, March 2-March 29, 2019. Mr. Meyers will open the exhibition with an artist talk and reception on Saturday March 2, 3:30-4:30 PM.

Camerawork Gallery is the nation’s oldest continuously running Fine Art Photography Gallery. It has been exhibiting monthly shows since 1970. The inspiration for the gallery initially arose from 20th Century master photographer and photography icon Minor White during his Portland Workshops that started in 1959.

Bernard C. Meyers Photography
Hong Kong 8038a, 2017, Bernard C. Meyers

 

Bernard C. Meyers notes: 

I want to rattle the bones of a building, shake common perceptions of concrete reality. I want the temporal elements shifting between both the original architecture and my imagination. For me the higher ground of art has always been occupied by the unexplainable, the abstract.

I see architecture as possibilities, as material to mold and shape. My intent is to uncover uncommon collisions of color and form, to exemplify texture and the rearrangement of line. I am building and deconstructing simultaneously. I want the original geometric intentions of the structure to find new life. I want these elements to discover a new context, a world off kilter, where conventional space is fraught; as if caught between like ends of magnets. Committed to lens-based capture I ask myself this question, “What is visually possible with new cutting-edge technologies, software and how can I apply it to my work?” Within that question this project was born. From a background as an architectural view camera photographer I have found a visual language between the structural impossibilities of M.C. Escher and the complex color spaces of Richard Diebencorn. The world of abstract expressionism has new chapter being written with the tools and techniques of the twenty-first century.

I am celebrating the latent beauty possible with the building blocks of 2D design, color and the technology available in 2019. The distinctions between painting, printmaking and photography for me have become irrelevant as all disciplines merge in these images. I love the work, it both intrigues and surprises me. The reward lies in creating what I have never seen before. Throughout my career as an artist my guiding premise, from Minor White, has always been, photograph something not for what it is but for what it can become.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Bernard C. Meyers is recognized internationally as an artist and master printer. His work is held in public, private, and corporate collections nationwide. He is represented by the Klotz Gallery in New York. Portfolios can be seen at www.klotzgallery.com/bernard-meyers. His pursuit of beauty and the abstract has been an unwavering life-long passion. Bernard earned an MFA in traditional printmaking, etching and lithography and a BFA in photography as a fine art from the Rochester Institute of Technology. In the eighties he founded and managed a fine art printing business, Portland Photographics specializing in portfolio and an exhibition photographic printing. This rapidly became one of the finest photographic printing facilities drawing clients from Magnum, National Geographic, ICP and photographers from around the world.

From 1990 through 2010 his photographic studio specialized in architectural photography and art reproduction. Bernard has taught photography at the University of New England and the University of Southern Maine, Rochester Institute of Technology and the Maine Workshops and currently at the Waterford School in Sandy. Throughout all of this time he has continued to exhibit work. Klotz gallery has featured his work at the last three AIPAD shows. His exhibition history includes numerous group and solo shows. In 2017 early Urban Abstracts work was a solo show of large prints exhibited at the Rochester Institute of Technology University Gallery.

www.BernardCMeyers.com

SOLO EXHIBITS
2017, University Gallery Rochester Institute Of Technology, (January – March 2017)
2014, Alice Gallery, Utah Arts & Museums, Salt Lake City
2010 & 2011 The Waterford School, Sandy Utah
2008, University of New England, Biddeford Maine
2007, Plum Gallery, “Out of The Garden”, Williamstown, Ma
2002, Portland Museum of Art, Nov.3-Jan.2, "Open House" exhibit
1998, Uma Gallery, 30 West 57th St NY. NY,
1996, "Full Circle", June Fitzpatrick Gallery Portland, Maine,
1995, "Light Structure", Area Gallery University of So. Maine, photographs
1991, "Moving Pictures", Betsy Evans Gallery, forty Cibachrome photographs
1990-1987, Portland Performing Arts Center,
1994-1985, Maine Photographic Workshops Gallery, annual faculty exhibit
1981, Boris Gallery of Photography, Boston Ma.
1981, International Center for Photography, Education Gallery, NY, NY.
 
SELECTED GROUP SHOWS
2018 & 2017 & 2016 & 2015 AIPAD Show, New York, featured work 2017 & 2018
2017 Springville Museum, Utah Annual Juried Salon
2015 Abstract Show, Seattle Design Center, Seattle
2012 Utah Arts & Museums Photography, Gallery Rio, Triennial, Juror’s Award
2012 & 2011 Springville Museum, Utah Annual Juried Salon merit award 2012
2010, Elizabeth Moss Gallery, “Contact: 50 Maine Photographers” Falmouth.
2010-2009, University of New England, Faculty Exhibit, Biddeford Maine
2009, CourtHouse Gallery, Ellsworth, Maine
2009, Elizabeth Moss Gallery, “A Picture’s Worth” Falmouth. Maine
2008, Handworks Gallery, Blue Hill Maine
2007-2005, Domaine Gallery, Portland Maine
2007-2003, Plum Gallery, Summer & Fall Exhibitions, Williamstown, Ma
2002, Portland Museum of Art, "Summing Up"
2002, Maine Art Gallery, Spring show Wiscasset, Maine
2000, Via Gallery, "Recent Works", Meyers, Moore, Philbrick, Portland, Maine
2000, SoHo Photo Co Op Gallery, Summer, Tribeca, New York
1998, Portland Museum of Art, Ernst Haas Memorial Exhibition,
1995, Photography: State of the Art Round Top CT. for Arts, Damariscotta, Me.
1994, "New Faculty Show", University of Southern Maine, New Art Space
2003-91, "Faculty Show”, University of Southern Maine, Art Gallery
1989, Maine Coast Artists Gallery, Rockport Maine, photographs
1987, " Work from Two Decades”, NE. Regional S.P.E
1987, Alexander Hall Gallery, Westbrook College,
1981, "Flowers and Other Fantasies", Kathleen Ewing Gallery Washington DC.
1981, Photography Invitational Gallery 10 Ltd. Washington D.C.
1980, George Frederick Gallery, lithographs, Rochester New York
1980, Sandstone Gallery, lithographs, Rochester New York
1979, Memorial Art Gallery, Lending and Sales, drawings and watercolors
 
RESIDENCY
2007, Eliot & Fairfield Porter Residency, Great Sprucehead Island, Maine
2016, Hewn Oaks Artist Residency, Lovell, Maine
 
PERMANENT COLLECTIONS
Maine Medical Center Portland, Maine 2008
Portland Museum of Art, Color Photographs, 1989, 1999, and 2002
Wallace Center Archives, Rochester, NY. 1980, 2017
Empire State Government Mall, Albany New York,
Maine Cardiology Group
Texaco Corporation
Bunnen Collection, Atlanta Georgia

 

More at @meyers_bernard

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