ENVIRONMENTALLY SOUND: BLAKEMAN MESMERIZED BY WIDE OPEN SPACES

“We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” — T.S. Eliot.

What is it about human behavior that compels us so very often to return to our roots? Maybe not geographically back to our beginnings, but in some representative aspect of our beginnings, we return. That is the case for artist Marcia Blakeman of Bedford, New Hampshire.

Blakeman grew up in Wyoming and summered in Colorado, eventually settling with her family in New Hampshire. Earning her degree in advertising design from Metropolitan State College in Denver, she worked in that arena for some time. Later, upon having children, she picked up the paint brush and took her creative endeavors in a different direction.

Greatly influenced by her environment as a youth, she’s mesmerized by wide open spaces, the mountains, and most profoundly, by the lighting. Light, shadows and contrasts are present in her art whatever the subject might be. In this exhibition at the LaBelle Winery in Amherst, New Hampshire (located just west of Nashua), she has works in a variety of mediums — acrylic, oils and pastels — and several subject categories — animals, abandoned buildings and landscapes.