On exhibition at the Kelly Adirondack Center
November 6, 2024 – April 4, 2025
Plein air painting at Great Camp Sagamore: and so much more
March 28 at the Kelly Adirondack Center
(time to be determined)
talk by Great Camp Sagamore En Plein Air Painting Workshop instructor
Wes Sherman
Please join artist and instructor Wes Sherman for his upcoming presentation related to his journey as a plein air painter, how the program at Great Camp Sagamore came to be, what it looks like 10 years later, and what he hopes the program will grow into.
As an artist Sherman has always enjoyed the literary tool of allegorical stories with a simple narrative and a hidden or camouflaged meaning. Employing the recognizable language of landscapes—a horizon line, sky, water, trees—to express a straight-forward narrative. Ideas are entwined in the scene and intended to be visible only upon a closer viewing. Sherman’s paintings are a sort of visual allegory, expressing a direct, often visually appealing, landscape narrative with a secondary story of marks and symbols—something like personal hieroglyphics—woven through it.
As an instructor Sherman values the traditions of painting and drawing. Always starting his instruction from a classical and creative place. Throughout the students process he introduces critical thinking, art history, and devises to solve compositional problems. All the while keeping the focus on the long tradition of landscape painting.
Wes Sherman has been an artist for over 30 years. In that time, he’s had 50 solo exhibitions and has been included in hundreds of group exhibitions in the US and in Europe. He has also published a few books, among them “This Is True” and “Penumbra”. He was the Curator and Chair of Exhibitions at the Center for Contemporary Art in Bedminster, NJ for 10 years. He has been a frequent visiting artist at universities and schools and is regularly asked to lead art programs for organizations and clubs. Sherman is an adjunct professor, teaching at William Paterson University and Raritan Valley Community College. He received his MFA at Rutgers University, where he studied with his mentor Tom Nozkowski.