Louisa Gould Gallery

54 Main Street

Vineyard Haven, MA

Press Release: The Louisa Gould Gallery is pleased to announce the first abstract art show of Vineyard artists at the Gallery in the exhibit called Vineyard Abstraction. The following artists will exhibit: Marjorie Mason, Ed Cohen, Jules Worthington, Roberta Gross, Margo Ouellette , and Ovid Ward. The shows opens Friday , August 29th and runs until Sept 12th. Please join us to meet the artists at an artist s' reception on Saturday , August 30^th , from 6-8pm. Live music and refreshments will be provided.

Marjorie Mason's tradition al artwork needs no introduction on the Vineyard . However , her non-representational artwork should been seen now, as this is a first -time showing of her abstract work on the Vineyard.

"The body of work that is called Tea Lane series or T-lane and the Chilmark series were begun in the mid -1990s. My intention is to explore further the process of image making in 2-D and specifically to see how far I can push the familiar limits of painting this Island landscape in monotype. I am very interested in the work of Richard Diebenkorn and borrow heavily from his model of form as a way to see landscape more elementally. When pictorial ingredients are undressed this way , what is left is a more sobering view of the ‘bricks and mortar ,’ so to speak. It is in this more essential world that the usual games played with color, shape, edges and composition can be held up to the light and discovered anew. Stepping out of the world of ‘recognizable association’ is a joyful experience that strengthens the most important pathway to artistic satisfaction; that path is the art of allowing."

Ovid Ward is well know n for his photorealistic maritime paintings of the Vineyard, many which are on the walls of the Gallery. But in Vineyard Abstraction there are new , very large abstract works which show the range of this talented artist.

Ovid says of his new abstract work, "Whimsicals… I love my whimsical paintings...they are the only paintings in my house . They are spontaneous , energetic, happy, colorful, and fun . They have a good long-distant "read," and when you look up close, there are all sorts of interesting things going on . Although they are abstract, there is realistic subject matter scattered throughout the paintings (realism I've learned by years of doing my photo realistic paintings)."

A new artist to the gallery is Roberta L. Gross. A long time summer resident , Roberta has recently taught abstract painting at Featherstone Center for the Arts.

Roberta says, "My paintings, sometimes lyrical, and other times, bold and organic, represent my instinctive, gestural and expressionistic reactions to specific images, whether still lifes or the human figure. Other times, my paintings are my personalized readings of literature and myths. The colors, however, often reflect my immersion in the Vineyard landscape, particularly the reds, yellows, blues and greens of the Aquinnah beaches, as seen in the morning light and evening sunsets. Even my use of black lines, sometimes bold and other times wispy and coiled, also can be seen in the dark, inky seaweed left by the waves on the changing contours of the sand.

"I work by layering and scraping the surface, applying color , and shaping the composition with emphatic gestural lines. The finished paintings, sometimes personal in meaning to me but always reflecting my immersion in the painting process, are for the viewer to interpret from an individualized point of view."

Ed Cohen will show his work for the first time on the Vineyard. Although painting for over 18 years, both in New York City, where he has a solo show opening next month, and in Chilmark. Ed's fresh canvases with bold but discriminating use of color complete the show. Ed paints with acrylics in a process called fluid acrylics in which he lets the paint flow onto the canvas.

"My interests grow out of my experience of painting --playing with materials, experimenting, confronting a blank canvas--for over 18 years.

"I have summered on the Vineyard for over 30 years and painted for 18.

Living on Stonewall Pond, I experience the peace of the pond and the drama of the ocean waves pounding the endless rocks on Stonewall beach.

"The ebb and flow of the tides, the changing moonlight on the pond and ocean, and waking to the sunrise on the Eastern horizon are all experiences of natural forms that influence my work.

"I use the flow of the paint and am interested in the resulting natural forms.

"I have been influenced by the paintings of 17th century Japanese monks. Their works are called enso paintings in which painting is an expression of a state of mind and a way of seeing the world. In my painting, I seek a mental and physical space where painting becomes a kind of meditation. I hope the viewer has a similar experience.

"My work reflects my interest in cosmology and the cosmos.

Often I try to create a dialectic between a sense of the cosmos (the infinite) and the microcosms I create."

Louisa Gould Gallery is located at 54 Main Street , Vineyard Haven. The gallery is open daily from 11-5pm. Please call with any questions (508) 693.7373 or visit the www.louisagould.com. for further information.