‘Pigment, Paper & Wood’ Opens

July 20 at Chandler Gallery

"Pigment, Paper & Wood," the paintings of Bob Eddy, the photographs of Annie Tiberio Cameron, and the furniture of Dan Pritchard opens Friday, July 20 at the Chandler Gallery on Main Street in Randolph.

"What ties these three artists together is a profound respect for the details of nature; the lines in the grain of wood, the single swollen seed pod, the slight impasto of the brushwork suggesting a stalk of hay in a bale; the subtleties of nature’s own design," explains curator Nina Gaby.

Eddy is best known for his photojournalism, and his portrait and landscape photography. For 20 years, he has served on the staff of The Herald of Randolph. His credits include The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Vermont Life, Readers Digest, Yankee, and numerous other periodicals and books. He is also staff photographer for farmers of the Cabot Creamery Cooperative of Vermont.

What may surprise people is that Eddy originally studied painting at UVM, Middlebury and Yale, and says of his dual passion, "work with a camera and painting are, for me, two distinct streams…my painting is intensely personal. Alone in my studio, and out in the field, tools of the painter are powerful pathways to understanding and celebration of life. When words fail, line and form, color, and ground help me to rejoice and grieve."

Cameron is a fine art photographer with an emphasis on the natural world. She recently re-located to Montpelier from Amherst, Mass., and has since shown locally at Studio Place Arts in Barre, at the City Center in Montpelier, and at Nina Gaby Studio and Gallery in Brookfield.

On a national level, Cameron’s photos have been exhibited in galleries and museums across the country. They have received awards and been published in numerous calendars, magazines and other publications, including a two editions of a top-selling Sierra Club book entitled "Mother Earth: Through the Eyes of Women Photographers and Writers," as well as its accompanying postcard book.

A lifelong photographer, Cameron states, "I bought my first Kodak Brownie camera for two dollars and a coffee can wrapper back in the 1950s." Since 1991, she has undertaken annual solo wilderness photography treks. During each of these trips, she sought to express her personal impressions of place, often an abstract study of color, shape, or texture, as opposed to recognizable postcard images.  

Pritchard creates his furniture from wood he has milled and dried from his own land or land nearby his home. His designs are simple, classic, with careful attention to wood selection and the finishing process. The result is a collection of work strong on function, architectural beauty and unique grain patterns.

Last year, Pritchard studied with Michael Dunbar, whom he describes as the "dean of Windsor chair making." He finds chair making the "most satisfying woodworking" he has ever experienced. He will share this process with visitors to the gallery in a portion of the exhibit that will show each stage in the creation of a Windsor chair, from the block of wood through each completed hand worked piece, along with the tools he uses during each phase of the process.

As curators, Gaby and Betsy Cantlin were searching for artists to accompany Cameron, and seeing Eddy’s painting for the first time in the Local Artists Show at Chandler this spring, they knew immediately that the complementary aesthetic would be "delightfully synergistic," according to Gaby. "We know Bob of course as a photographer, but when we saw his attention to detail and color in his painting, while so different in execution from the type of detail in Annie’s photographs, it feels very much like they are sharing a similar narrative." After being invited to Pritchard’s East Randolph studio to view his work, they asked him to join in the group show. "Dan’s work anchors the show and complements the overall authenticity and richness of the work."

Work will be for sale, however several of both Eddy’s and Pritchard pieces are on loan. There will be an opening reception from 6-8 p.m. and the show will continue through Sunday, Aug. 26. An artists’ roundtable discussion will take place in the gallery Tuesday, Aug. 21 from 5-7 p.m. and the public is invited to attend both functions. In addition, Cameron will narrate her visual retrospective "Death Valley, Okefinokee and Beyond" Sunday, Sept. 23 at 3 p.m. She will hold a photo workshop on "Basic Digital Camera Concepts" Sunday, Sept. 30 from 1-5 p.m. There is a charge for these two events.

For more information, call the gallery at 728-9878. Hours are Thursdays from 4-6 p.m., Saturday and Sunday from 1-3 p.m., or by appointment.

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