A Hera Members Exhibition Featuring:
Maggy Allen, Catherine Armistead, Tory Reiff, Roberta Richman, Carrie Usmar, & Abigail Wamboldt
Closing Reception: Join the artists at Hera’s Spring Bash! March 30th, 6-9pm at Hera Gallery
Maggy Allen
Maggy Allen studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and received her BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art. She works out of her studio in Pawtucket Rhode Island and has exhibited in Rhode Island and Massachusetts.
Artist Statement
I make drawings that concentrate the beauty and energy of the figure into linear forms. Based in the reality of magnified detail and gesture of the physical, they portray intangible qualities and are a visual of personal presence and individual energy.
I see these drawings as unique signifiers that represent a DNA of personality. As such they are an alternative type of portraiture. Although these images are inspired by complex physical form, they vividly and playfully express persona via emotional and energetic vibration.
I notice these forms resonate with viewers, invoking curiosity and leading them to lean in for closer examination. My hope is that what I have seen in the abstract is conveyed and felt in the moment.
Catherine Armistead
Cat Armistead is a mixed media artist native to Charlotte, North Carolina. She incorporates a sense of movement in her work, referencing musical and topographic forms that mesmerize her. She layers different artistic processes to achieve rhythm and depth, while keeping her forms and concepts abstract. Cat loves to hike, and much of her inspiration comes from patterns and structures in forests. Her work includes large, cocoon structures made out of recycled plastic bags, steel and handmade paper sculptures, paintings, and one of a kind enamel jewelry. Cat graduated from the Tufts University and School of the Museum of Fine Arts dual degree program and has studied at Penland School of Crafts, Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, and MassArt. Cat works out of her studio at Humphreys Street Studios and currently resides in Boston.
Cat has exhibited in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, North Carolina, and Connecticut. Most recently, she received a grant from the New England Foundation for the Arts and a full work-study scholarship to Penland School of Crafts to continue her work exploring large-scale steel sculpture.
Artist Statement
I’m a mixed media artist. I create sculptures, paintings, and jewelry using metal, paint, handmade paper, found objects, recycled materials, and mica. Aesthetically, I cultivate movement in my work and often disguise plastic as bark or styrofoam as a precious stone. I’m interested in creating layered meanings, especially with overlooked materials. The rhythm in my work is deeply influenced by the slow movements of water that carve caverns over centuries and diverge from rivers to oceans. At the same time, I’m also inspired by the resiliency, patterns, and quiet determination of lichen, mosses, and mycelium.Through my art, I explore questions like how might different materials (especially what currently ends up in landfills) be reclaimed or disguised by these pioneering organisms (mycelium/lichen/moss). The scale of these organisms inspire notions of “intimate immensity” that are central to my practice, as I aspire to make small-scale pieces feel immense and create moments of intimacy in large-scale pieces.
I strive to make work that is intricate yet accessible, regardless of your familiarity with art or the concepts I’m exploring. I work abstractly because I’m interested in what the viewer sees in my work and what worlds I can create without relying too closely on the one we live in.
Tory Reiff
Tory Reiff expresses herself through clay and color. Her distinctive style of abstract hand-built ceramics was honed during her studies at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has been a participant in the Ceramic Artist in Residence Program at the Jamestown Arts Center since 2003, and is a member of Hera Gallery.
Artist Statement
The "Cognitive Reassembly" series reflects my journey back to an art practice in midlife, after years dedicated to family and career. It explores the intricate process of rediscovering my artistic voice, assembling fragments of my identity that had been momentarily set aside.
As I returned to my artistic practice, I experienced a profound sense of reconnection with parts of my brain that had lain dormant. Just as the brain continually knits together new connections and forms new pathways, the tactile act of hand-building ceramic forms becomes a metaphor for this cognitive reassembly. The use of bold, arresting colors evokes the feeling of electricity in reestablishing these connections.
For me, these sculptural expressions stand as joyful testaments to the resilience of creativity and the enduring capacity of the human brain to adapt and evolve.
Roberta Richman
Roberta Richman lives and works in her studio in Peace Dale, Rhode Island. She has an MFA in printmaking from Indiana University, a BA in Fine Arts from Brooklyn College and worked for several years at the Pratt Graphic Art Center in NYC.
She is a founding member of Hera Gallery and has been an artist member, gallery administrator and Board member since its inception in 1974. After many years of interrupted work she is now back full time to her studio work. She curated and juried many invitational and special interest exhibitions for Hera during her 50 year membership in the gallery.
Richman began her training as an undergraduate at Brooklyn College where she studied with Ad Rhinehardt and Jimmy Ernst. She worked at the Pratt Graphic Art Center in Manhattan for several years before entering the MFA program in printmaking at Indiana University where she studied etching with Rudy Pozzatti. Her early work includes black and white etchings primarily of abstracted landscape. Since the mid 1980s she has gradually moved to painting as her primary medium, using oil sticks on paper glued to canvas. Throughout her career as an artist, landscape has inspired her work. While her work is increasingly abstract the underlying elements of natural landscape are clear.
Artist Statement
Landscape inspires my work. Looking at horizons, hills and fields, marshland, dunes and beginning new work with a particular place in mind is how I move from a clean sheet of paper to the first of many stages of the original image. My affinity to natural landscape has not changed but over time my expression of it has.
All of the work evolves organically and becomes the vision of my imagination. I am never certain when I start a painting, how it will ultimately end. The end is always a surprise. Although I may carry the initial image of landscape in my mind, art and nature are not the same. I make no effort to replicate nature in art. I think now that my paintings are pure abstractions.
Carrie Usmar
Carrie Usmar is Rhode Island based visual artist whose practice re-examines the family album. Utilizing a documentary approach, Usmar explores the complexity of womanhood and the tension and ambivalence within domesticity. Her narrative projects are devoted to highlighting the psychological and unseen, the isolation and challenges of motherhood, and the humorous and poignant moments of raising a family.
Usmar received a BFA from University of Rhode Island with a focus in photography and filmmaking. She has exhibited at numerous institutions across the U.S., including the Rhode Island Center For Photographic Arts, Newport Art Museum, Hera Gallery, and The Curated Fridge. Her work has been published on The Luupe and Lenscratch. She was selected for a residency at Garrett On The Green in upstate NY and was invited to attend the Eddie Adams Workshop XXXVI. Usmar is also a top 200 finalist for 2022 Critical Mass.
Artist Statement
One in five American parents stay home after having children. I am one of those parents who chose to pause my career and care for my children. In 2021, I received a copy of our tax return in the mail and my occupation was written as “Houseperson”. Angered by that title and the emptiness I felt, I created images that highlight the amount of work, skill, and dedication of a stay-at-home mother.
Using a tripod and remote, I document interactions with my children. These ordinary moments capture the joy, solitude, and sacrifice experienced daily. The process of choosing a title for each image that corresponds to a skill on a resume made me feel seen and valued in an often invisible and thankless role.
Abigail Wamboldt
Abigail Wamboldt was born in Massachusetts and raised in Massachusetts and California. She received a BFA from Montserrat College of Art, an MFA from the University of New Hampshire, and was a recipient of the Edwin & Mary Schafer Award, which allowed her to study in Italy. She currently lives in Rhode Island, and teaches studio art at several universities and colleges in New England. She endeavors to exhibit with organizations that inspire dialogue and innovation.
Yesterday, With Love: Artist Statement
I create out of the memory of a sensation or from visual material that manifests itself in my imagination. When there is a need for more heightened realism I work from personal photographs and live models. Through this process I discuss and explore the interaction between physical, mental and emotional evolution in our contemporary environment.
I am drawn to the two dimensional format because it feels like a window into another world. However, I sometimes feel the need to break the frame and bring the world of my imagination into a three dimensional installation. I gravitate towards tactile materials that allow me to become physically immersed in the experience of producing an artwork. My body is the vehicle for my interior images so I view the active component of making something the most effective form of communicating my vision.
Patterns and repetitions are a consistent, subtle part of my art. These patterns provide a structure in which the human forms undulate. Sometimes the patterns eliminate the figurative quality, obscuring the human form being embedded under the repetitions. Many of these patterns are derived from fractals in nature. Human development is based on both nature and nurture. We are part of the natural world, and we are products of the culture we have created. I am engaged in examining how these elements harmonize together to create an individual's multifaceted identity.
I am specifically interested in the tenacity required of women. I attempt to be inclusive in my work without appropriating others’ pain.
We are born with intuitive guides, and as female people develop we formulate ourselves within the rhythms of society. The collective beliefs and structures imposed upon women as we grow impact our behaviors, choices and self view. I endeavor to create a visual literature of women depicted with dignity and grace, while also considering the current and historical oppression of our gender.