Lydia Bodnar Balahutrak "Hide and Seek" March, 2010

Sat. Mar. 6 - Sun. Mar. 28, 2010 / opening reception Sat. Mar. 6th,  6 to 9 PM
please scroll down to view more work / click here for 300 dpi hard copy images

“HIDE AND SEEK”  Lydia Bodnar Balahutrak, Barren Fruit, Collage and  Mixed Media on Canvas, 105 x 65, y. 2010   Lydia Bodnar-Balahutrak was born in Cleveland, Ohio, completed her undergraduate art studies at Kent State University, and, in 1977, received her Master of Fine Arts degree in painting from George Washington University, Washington, D.C. That year she moved to Houston with her husband Michael, where she continues to live and work.   . In the studio, left to right, Tangles, Curtains, Snow, Snags, and  Hedge   . Reflections, news clippings, collage and oil on canvas        "As a child of immigrants, a first-generation American, I was always drawn to explore “the other.”  I want to understand the world and my place in it. I engage in the play of “hide and seek”, which I believe is the heartbeat of life -- the pulsating rhythm of lost and found, yes/no, inside/outside, positive/negative. In my creative work, I'm compelled to dig through, to lift the veil, to reclaim and protect, to construct and de-construct what I find. " . Fallout    75" x 96"    oil, resins, collage / canvas         "All human beings, it seems, need order as well as disorder.  There's a proclivity to encounter the unexpected, manifested in curiosity and intense experience, but there is also the ameliorating desire for harmony and calm."       "For me, collage is a way of piecing things together. Seemingly fragmented things come together and are given some shape and coherence.  I collect newspaper and magazine clippings, save treasured mementos, keep bits of cultural artifacts, and then arrange them onto canvas, wood panel, or paper. The collages accrue and become grounds upon which, by combining disparate materials and processes, I can play hide and seek. Through layering, scraping, torching, veiling, and applying various markings with paint, charcoal and other media, some elements are concealed, others revealed, and a narrative begins." Snow    132" x 83"    charcoal, chalks, gesso, collage / canvas

Two years later she was a visiting artist at the Art Academy of Kiev, and her 1996 trip included a tour of the Chernobyl Zone, site of the 1986 nuclear plant explosion. In 2006, commemorating the 20 year anniversary of the Chernobyl cataclysm, a selection of her work was exhibited in a solo show at the University of Houston Art Gallery. 
 
 

"I recall my first visit to Ukraine, to my parents’ home. Upon   my return to Houston, I was compelled to embed Ukraine's ancestral story onto my own.  I used copies of historic texts and photos to document the ravages of the little-known 1932-33 Famine in Ukraine and the horrors propagated by the Soviet regime.  I wove these into icon-like compositions, often shrouding the images with broken gold leaf.  Fragments of embroidery and other handiwork were interlaced with images of my face and hands.  Symbols of oppression were reconfigured or burned, and the charred remnants became grounds for new imagery.  These were my first forays into collage." . For the Birds    41" x 61"    oil, resins, collage / canvas           "In 1996, ten years after the nuclear cataclysm of Chornobyl in Ukraine, I visited the Zone, ground zero.  I was struck by the wildly overgrown abandoned buildings and grounds. Trees were breaking through concrete floors and taking root; apple trees were laden with golden ripe fruit. Nature was resolutely reclaiming herself, regenerating life and spreading her healing mantle over the dust and decay." . Hedge     60" x 65"    charcoal, chalks, acrylic , collage / canvas      "The vines and berries, the flocks of birds, and the tangles of trees and branches in my art work are not exotic nor enchanted, but ever-present and close to home.  Life grows out of the layered ground and spreads out over images of war and suffering as well as those of joy and jubilation." . Detail of Hedge               " The poet Gerard Manley Hopkins wrote: “Nature is never spent; there lives the dearest freshness deep down things.”   Despite everything, even in the face of destruction and loss, humankind’s instinct for clarity and beauty lives on and arises from deep down things to create something new." . Tangles     60" X 65"     charcoal, chalks, acrylic, collage / canvas . Lydia Bodnar-Balahutrak has participated in several national and international exhibitions and her work can be found in museum and private collections. Her current mixed media paintings and drawings continue to explore collage, text, and figuration.  A monograph focusing on her art from 1979-2001 was published in 2005.  Since 1977, she has taught studio painting and drawing at The University of Houston at Clear Lake and HSPVA, and is currently on the faculty of the Glassell School of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.  In March 2010, her solo show titled “Hide and Seek” will be on view at Nau-Haus Art Space in Houston.  Solo Exhibition: Lydia Bodnar-Balahutrak Nau-haus Gallery, Houston