Two Sohn Fine Arts Exhibitions Announced at Spruce Peak Arts Gallery

Spruce Peak Arts Gallery presents: "Housatonic" Featuring photographs by John Clarke and "Conversations with Nature" Featuring photography by Seth Resnick. Both exhibitions are curated by Cassandra Sohn and featured through Sohn Fine Art.

Both exhibitions are now on view through April 16, 2023 before/during events and by appointment. For more information visit www.sprucepeakarts.org or email gallery@sprucepeakarts.org

Sohn Fine Art was founded in 2011, by photographer Cassandra Sohn. The Gallery specializes in contemporary photography and unconventional mediums and is dedicated to the development, promotion and exhibition of innovative contemporary artworks by international and local artists. It is the company's mission to promote broader understanding of, and community engagement with photographic mediums through exhibitions, lectures and workshops. Sohn Fine Art's Master Artist Series Program hosts world class photographers in the Berkshires annually. The goal of this program is to offer unique experiences with artists in the top of their fields to patrons and collectors of photography, as well as professional and aspiring photographers and artists.

In addition to the Gallery, Sohn Fine Art specializes in producing creative projects. Visit Sohn Fine Art for your fine art printing and framing needs. Sohn Fine Art offers custom, one-on-one service with attention to detail, using only archival materials. Utilizing pigmented inks and the highest resolution and widest gamut printer available, Sohn Fine Art produces stunning works of color and B&W exhibition quality pigment prints (also known as giclee prints) on a wide range of archival fine art and photographic papers including watercolor, canvas, glossy, matte, pearl, luster, rags, silver rags, large variety of fabrics, reusable adhesive vinyl, and transparencies. Sohn Fine Art showcases innovative and contemporary framing designs as well as traditional framing. Framing options are available from affordable to high end in a variety of materials that fit your style and budget at any size.

About John Clarke

John Clarke has lived in the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts since 2007. He was born in central Massachusetts around a landscape of mills, rivers, trains and bridges. Clarke received his degree in classical music composition from Bates College in Maine.

Clarke's fine art work is created using a range of mediums. Oil paints, pastels and pencil were his main tools for many years. A series of fifteen large pieces were inspired by a neoclassical piece of music called Alina by the Estonian composer Arva Part. The Alina series exemplifies his style and use of color, line and shape. In an article in the on-line journal Rural Intelligence, Associate Editor Nichole Dupont called him a "multimedia abstract master." Earlier, in 2002, Clarke started scanning pressed flowers through a now-outdated color printer. The results, what he called Flower, Stain and Fingerprint, were a novel type of botanical illustration, which cannot be recreated, as newer printers do not produce the same effects. Also, around 2002 Clarke stopped riding freight trains and realized he had not documented the incredible journeys and places he had discovered. So, he bought a camera and started exploring railroad tracks and train yards to capture some of those memories. At that time Clarke was interested in sharply focused images, describing his desire for sharpness as wanting to feel the rust in his photos. In 201 2, his tripod broke. During an autumn hike Clarke headed out without his tripod and produced images with accidental blur. The trails of light and color appealed to the abstract line painter in him and changed the way he thought about photography. The experience established a new course for him as a visual artist. A year later, Clarke discovered the iPhone and has become an accomplished iPhone photographer.

Clarke continues to push the camera to its limits, translating photographic images into other mediums. Painting with light, his works are often mistakenly viewed as pastel or charcoal drawings. Long exposures and gestural movements blur the distinction between art forms. There is often a tension in his work between what is revealed and what is obscured. This has been with him since the beginning when he started painting and is revisited in alternative ways again and again. He is driven to create images that are purely personal, diffusing and abstracting the world around him in the hopes that they will spark an unknown journey into aesthetic, emotional and spiritual territories. He calls it "looking through the curtain." The creation of an image holds the excitement of unlimited potential.

Hanging one visual language on the balance of another, Clarke's latest work combines mediums, using photographic prints or post-written stories as backdrops for emotional layers of line, color and symbol with acrylic, pastel, pencil and gesso to create one-of-a-kind pieces. Clarke's most recent body of work, "Drawing on Memory" is a tactile and visual exploration of past written stories of jumping freight trains throughout the northeast.

Often described as a "renaissance man" Clarke was front man and a primary songwriter for the band Bell Engine. He also has a solo album, All Beneath Our Train. An avid writer, he has written more than 60 short stories about his years jumping freight trains and more recently, after the birth of his son and daughter, writes poems for children. Clarke's work has been shown at The Berkshire Museum, The Katonah Museum of Art, Geoff Young Gallery, Art on Main at Barnbrook, Joyce Goldstein Gallery, lsha Nelson Gallery, Deb Koffman's Little Gallery and Sohn Fine Art Gallery, where he is currently represented. Clarke has been featured in the April 2011, August 2016 and September 2019 issues of The Artful Mind Magazine and the 201 8 Autumn issue of Art Ascent Magazine (silver medal honor).

About Seth Resnick

Seth Resnick has marked the world of contemporary Photography by a prolific career spanning fine art, education, editorial, stock and commercial work, and entrepreneurial contributions to the education of digital workflow through D-65. Chosen as one of the 30 most influential photographers of the decade by Photo District News Magazine, Seth is greatly in demand for his beautiful graphic images in both natural and created light. Resnick has been published in the world's most prestigious magazines. His credits include over 2500 publications worldwide including The New York Times, Sports Illustrated, Time, Newsweek, Forbes and National Geographic, and his clients constitute a virtual list of Corporate America.

"The things that stimulate me are color, design, light, texture, and gesture," says Resnick, who has a unique ability to seamlessly merge these elements together, capturing scenes in ways not normally seen. His signature photographs reveal vibrant colors coupled with graphic elements that encompass soulfulness and grandeur.

Resnick is co-founder of D-65, an organization teaching digital workflow workshops, webinars, one-on-one training, tech support, and consulting for photographers, studios, agencies, and corporate art departments. Resnick is also a co-founder of Digital Photo Destinations, an organization that combines exotic travel in an educational workshop teaching environment. He is at the forefront of digital innovation working with Adobe, NEC, Canon, Xrite, Epson and others to help them formulate more useful products for photographers. He is also one of 34 photographers worldwide named as a Canon Explorer of Light. He is a member of the prestigious X-rite Colorati program as well as The Ilford Master's Program, and Alpha/Beta and feature consultant for Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom. He travels extensively presenting the various aspects of photography, and is also the former Founding President of Editorial Photographers, a trade organization dedicated to the promotion of sound business practices for editorial photography. Resnick is also a partner of PixelGenius developing Photoshop plug-ins and software and a regular contributing columnist to a variety of trade publications.

He has given hundreds of lectures to industry organizations such as American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP), Advertising Photographers of America (APA), Professional Photographers of America (PPA), Advertising Photographers of New York (APNY), colleges and universities. He received his Bachelor of Science degree in Photojournalism from the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University in May of 1979.

This exhibition is made possible thanks to generous support of the 2022-23 Spruce Peak Arts Season Sponsors: Alchemist Brewery, Bourne's Energy, Joy and Tom Cronin, Edward Jones / Caren Merson, Deborah and Ron Feinstein, Front Porch Forum, The Merson Family, Neil Stempel & Family, PC Construction, Spruce Peak Realty, The Stires-Stark Family Foundation, and Stowe Mountain Rentals.

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