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COLLECTOR'S FOCUS
WOMEN ARTISTSourselves in a time when, as Karl Marx
observed, ‘all that is solid melts into air?’”
Bryony Bensly explains that her work
explores “the preciousness of this planet
and the life it sustains as we face environ-
mental and political challenges. I wish to
celebrate all the beauty that surrounds us
—which in turn, reflects all that is within.”
Born in Thailand and brought up in Hong
Kong and England, she now lives in rural
Massachusetts painting from the experi-
ence of different cultures, spiritual prac-
tices and natural environments. In SpringSprang Sprung a deer wearing a floral neck-
lace cavorts freely in a spring field with its
fellow mammals, a young boy and other
creatures from a pit bull to ducklings. In
the distance, however, there is an ominous
high wall. The air of camaraderie was such
that the boy could adorn the deer before
they all sprang into their dance. William
Blake wrote, “We become what we behold.”
In Bensly’s paintings we’re reminded to
become again what we’ve forgotten we are.
If Bensly’s boy were unencumbered by
modest clothing, he could have dancedout of a painting by Susannah Martin.
Martin’s nudes cavort in what she calls a
“primordial connectedness” that is brief
and more often becomes disconnected
and fettered. In Artist, she addresses
the artist’s and all humanity’s need to
be psychologically unfettered. Martin is
responding to her experiences of recent
censorship. “I began to think of artists as a
type of liberal army in the woods,” she says,
“facing the elements in order to create work
that is honest and free to take on socially
critical themes. It has often been the- RJD Gallery, Spring Sprang Sprung, oil on canvas, 24 x 36", by Bryony Bensly. 3. Courthouse Gallery Fine Art, Balancing Rock, acrylic on canvas, 18 x 18", by Janice Anthony.
- Judith Belzer, All That is Solid #2, oil on canvas, 80 x 56" 5. PoetsArtists, Initiate, oil on aluminum, 24 x 15", by Cheryl Kelley. 6. PoetsArtists, Promised to the Wild Unknown,
acrylic, 40 x 30", by Mary Chiaramonte.
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