Bergen Rose

Artist’s Statement

Bergen Rose has painted in distant locales from Nepal to Norway, inspired by landscape and culture.  She began her pursuits in art in 1979 after participating in Judy Chicago’s now historic Dinner Party Project, which opened at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and is now a permanent acquisition of the Brooklyn Museum.  Bergen has exhibited her work for over 25 years in Los Angeles, New York and Seattle.  See her current work at the Brackenwood Gallery on Whidbey Island, the NW Seattle Center Gallery, and at www.bergenrose.com.

Considered a landscape artist with an appreciation for the surreal, Bergen’s work contains a quiet narrative within dreamy views of light, land, water and sky, often edging on the abstract.  She paints light-infused ethereal views that can mirror her own interior-scape, views that can border on the invisible, similar to aspects of humanity that are often invisible and overlooked, until closer inspection.  But, we also see quirky aspects, such as birds, animals, chairs, balls, boats or other objects passing through her landscapes as simple images to express human emotion.  A bird looks toward a boat, imagining its own life journey; the chair waiting patiently for company; the ball rolling its way across the canvas as a burst of pure energy.  When asked about the use of red in her work, she simply says she cannot help it – the red creates a lot of tension within herself to paint – but it is as close as she can get to painting an inner life force which otherwise would not show itself…  Bergen’s drive to paint is continually charged by her views of the world, filtered through emotion and spiritual influences.  A list of her solo and group exhibits is provided on request.  Bergen’s work is included in the private & public art collections of:

Seattle Area Collectors

Seattle area collectors include Janet Upjohn, Ron & Carolyn Woodard, Kathy Opler, Mariel & Bruce Bailey, Jody Bone, Maggie Kennedy, Sally Eustis, Jack & Sandy McCullough, Ruth Nomura, David Ishii, Mark & Karen Mullens, Karen Mountain, Diana White, Mindi Katzman & Michael Dupille, Sylvia Glover, Greta & Graham Fernald, Marjorie Hemphill, Louise Hoeschen-Goldberg, Anita Katzman Estate, Bo Barker, Beth & Dan Woodman, Justine Kreher, Susan Faw, Jude Janis, Rick Rasmussen, Enso House, Julie O’Brien & Dwight Zehm, Nancy Broaders, Barbara Joy Laffey, Michelle Rose, MaryJo & Michael Stansbury, Hiroshi & Camille Colaizzo, Kellie & Pat Elliott, Joyce & David Stettler, Carol Webb, Susan & George Soltman, Katherine Zaring, Paul Menzel, David & Sydney Blank, M. Henderson, Heide Johnecheck; Diana & Kelly Lindsay; Barbara Phillips; Lucie & Andy Ury; Nancy & Terry Parker; Danielle & Norm Bodine; Peggy Zafarana & John Crowser; Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center;

California Area Collectors

California collectors include Judy Carter, Martha & Charlie Francis, Jerry Rubin, David Farrar, Betsy Spann, Steve Kunishima, Danette & Julio Rivera, John Gallagher, Pam & Mark Lough, Justine Linforth, Mike & Julie Fletcher, Diana Farnsworth, Marjorie Braude, Barbara Marsh, Virginia Fink;

East Coast & Midwest collectors include Dennis Snyder, New York; Judy Geist, Philadelphia; Virginia Lucero, Washington D.C.; Kirby Upjohn, Kansas City, to name a few.

Bio

Born in Washington D.C., Bergen spent some of her early childhood living on a farm with grandparents in Oklahoma after her mother took ill.  Her grandmother, a woman of few words, painted images of their rural surroundings.  She put a paintbrush into Bergen’s hand, and Bergen never let go.  Bergen eventually moved to Southern California, mainly Santa Monica, where she lived for many years.  In the 1970s, she lived in England and Spain, a nearly three-year experience that further fueled her love of art and adventure.  Bergen continued her explorations in the 1980s by traveling to Nepal many times, hiking, painting and visiting Tibetan monasteries.  She also traveled to Africa, hiking and painting Mt. Kilimanjaro, bicycled over New Zealand, and ducked bullets in Sri Lanka.  These adventures expanded her love of landscape as did traveling and painting in Paris, Zurich, Germany, Basque country, Portugal, Norway and Japan.  She moved to the Northwest in 1994, where she resides today…

Education

Bergen studied art in the late 1970s with Martin Facey, an exceptional teacher at Santa Monica College and UCLA.  It was through Martin that she met his mentor, Richard Diebenkorn, and was inspired to pursue her art.  She also feels fortunate to have studied and exhibited with master calligrapher Yoshiyasu Fujii in the art of sumi-e (ink painting) and shodo (Japanese calligraphy).  Bergen has also worked in the mediums of oil and encaustic wax.  Currently, acrylic, monoprints and collage have her attention.  Influences and inspirations include painters Franz Klein, Mark Rothko, Dennis Snyder, and of course Richard Diebenkorn and Martin Facey, as well as Turner’s landscapes, and the poetry of Rilke, Lorca and Leonard Cohen.  The inspired visuals that hold her interest are within nature itself, the sky and the sea, and the Japanese aesthetic of wabi-sabi – simple, random, irregular and imperfect beauty.