This April and May, VGPL welcomes two complementary Eldorado artists: Gwendolina Feisst will exhibit her landscape photography, her first exhibit at VGPL, and Heidi Vogel returns to the library with her always-popular, colorful watercolors of nature and animals. There will be a reception at the library for the artists on Saturday April 5, from 1-3 pm.
Vogel launched her art journey by reading books, soon discovering that she could recreate on paper what she observed in the world. Signing on for classes at a local university and joining workshops with various artists whose work she admired, she explored various styles and techniques until eventually choosing to paint using a palette knife with oils, a technique that allowed her to create pure colors and rich textures and to apply those color lessons to brush work. It was during the Covid-19 pandemic that Vogel took up watercolors, and the VGPL exhibit features her latest works in that medium.
You might recognize Vogel from other venues as well as from her previous library exhibit: she’s an accomplished musician with a bachelor’s degree in Music and plays French horn with community and semi-professional ensembles in Santa Fe and elsewhere in the state. A native of upstate New York (“think dairy cows,” she laughs), she has lived in Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona, Hawaii, and Alaska (where she served as Secretary of the State Senate), and, in all these places, her love of the outdoors shaped her art, which depicts the expansive landscapes and the creatures that dwell within. “Observing the effects of light has taught me to observe color and atmosphere in an innovative way,” she adds, saying, “Painting is teaching me to perceive the world differently, and I hope, in turn, my paintings allow viewers to expand their vision too.”
Vogel’s exhibitions include the Lahaina Arts Society in the Old Lahaina Courthouse at the Banyan Tree, on the island of Maui, Hawaii, (consumed in the August 2023 fire) and the Annual Old Church Fine Arts Show in Corrales, NM (she’s been invited for the past several years). Through April, she’s a featured artist in Madison & Main Gallery’s Goodnight Moon show in Greeley, Colorado. She and artist husband, Greg Cohen, have participated in the Eldorado Studio tour in the past and will do so again in 2025.
GWEN FEISST
Feisst’s exhibit, titled The Beauty I find in the World, is the first of her work to be shown at VGPL. A library volunteer, VGPL is proud to show her photography in the 2D exhibit space.
Born in the Black Forest in the Southwest of Germany, the artist’s father presented her with her first camera when she was just nine years old. Since then, photography has remained an important part of her life.
“With the camera I focus my field of vision and enter a state of meditation,” she says. “I see and create with what I find.”
Feisst studied art at the “Freie Kunstschule Nürtingen” and became an art therapist. Oil painting, sculpture (especially in clay), weaving, and multimedia became other ways of expressing herself. When she arrived in New Mexico to study at the Nizhoni School for Global Consciousness, graduating as a minister and spiritual teacher, she found that her creativity integrated well with her professional work with groups and individuals.
Colors and structures fascinate Feisst. Since moving to New Mexico 25 years ago, a new world of those opened to her, one of big skies and an earth that contained a completely different color spectrum than the lush green of the Black Forest she grew up in.
To the artist, the camera is an important tool to collect and communicate what she sees in the environment she lives in. “I recharge on my walks with my camera,” she says.
As always, the exhibits are a partnership between the library and community artists, and 20% of sales benefits VGPL, Southeast Santa Fe County’s independent 501c3 library.
