|
 PAMELA RILEY-ABEAR A self taught painter, I attended Tyler School of Fine Arts in Philadelphia
as a metal-smith major and transferred to the University of New Hampshire to complete my studies in metalsmithing. In
my teens, I studied under Harold Seroy, a portrait painter and early in my career I was a clourist for Marlene Siff,
a wallpaper and linens designer in Westport, CT. and then painted designs for a Wedgewood pattern designer, Veda Brock Turner
in Connecticut. As a commissioned
artist for the past 25 years I have created unique, large window paintings and murals for homes and offices, as well as house
and pet portraits to include winning race horses for clients along the East Coast, Bermuda and England. I am always
thinking about and finding new ways to approach the canvas with paint and perspectives creating new and different pieces which
inevitably lead to more new ideas. My
primary painting mediums are acrylic and oil and I have won numerous awards for my paintings. I designed and painted
the cow "Surf and Turf" for the Stamford Cow parade in 2000; an elephant called "Elephantasy" which graced
the UBS Warburg's lawn in 2003 and "In the Dog House" in Stamford's Reigning Cats and Dogs in 2010. Since 2005 I have been working under the tutalage of two sculptors
in New York; Ron Mineo and Mike Keropian. Clay has been my sculpture medium so far and I have created pieces concerning
the human figure in their life sculpture class and life size head portraits. I also like to fit clay peices together,
creating a larger sculpture and using creative thinking to get it to all work. A particularly involved peice that required
a bit of engineering to put together was a 5 foot lighthouse. I created eight pieces in clay that needed to fit together
once fired and incorporated a piece from a wooden column that the eight pieces all worked around. It is currently for
sale at the Geary Gallery in Darien. From there I created a 3.5 foot high piece with two swirling otters in kelp and
that has inspired me to step yet another direction with three abstract pieces concerning the sea. Its organic matter
and creatures have influenced me greatly both in paintings and now in my scuplture. The undulations caused by the sea
upon the kelp have me creating ribboning pieces in clay to mimic the motion. I have pushed the clay to its limits in
asking it to hold these shapes. I am challenging both myself and the clay. I have currently completed my first stone carvings and have found an excitement in the art of stone not yet found in clay. Stone has hidden veins and colours that come out as you shape the stone and often it makes you rethink the direction you originally were heading. It is a long and exhilarating process of bringing out the best in the stone. A Stamford native, my work can be seen at the Stamford Art Association, Rowayton Art Center, the Geary Gallery in Darien and in my studio. Email: Bermuda59@optonline.net. |