“Two of my early paintings have a new home in our library’s art collection, thanks to Greg Bell, of King County’s 4Culture program in Seattle.
The larger one shows an old man. He is walking along contemplatively, with a cane. Perhaps he is looking inward. We see that his heart is a red rose. Wings have sprung from the rose and are also his own. Under his fee, the path gives way to empty space, the black, starry cosmos. His is stepping there but he also appears to made of the same stuff.
On the other waiting canvas, I painted a second red rose, huge and embedded in a stand of trees. Did the rose grow out of the woods, or the woods emerge from the rose? It was all one. The image was my farewell to that kind refuge, where the wise old man had also walked in imagination and mystery.”
Barbara Berger is also a children's book author and illustrator. You can find more about her books in our local author section on this website. In 2006, she was named an Island Treasure by the Bainbridge Island Arts and Humanities Council.
