Efram Burk is an Ogunquit Art Association member-artist (Photographer/Graphic Artist) and one of our 6 Showcase Artists at Barn Gallery for the 2022 Season.

Burk’s Showcase at Barn Gallery will run from June 29 – July 31, 2022 with an Opening Reception on Saturday, July 9th, 2022 (from 4PM – 7:30PM) and a Gallery Talk on Thursday, July 14, 2022 (at 6PM).

Learn more about the Barn Gallery 2022 Schedule: https://barngallery.org/get-ready-for-some-art-in-ogunquit-barn-gallerys-2022-season/

 

Continue reading below for some excerpts from a discussion we had with Efram Burk about his background and work.

How long have you been a part of the Ogunquit Art Assocation?

I have been a member of the Ogunquit Art Association since 2012.
Describe your art and art practice.
I am a photographer but enjoy painting and drawing as well. As an educator, I have taught Art History at the college level since 1998—first at the University of South Carolina at Beaufort for eight years, and, since 2006, at Curry College in Milton, Massachusetts.
What is the theme – Title – of the body of work will you be exhibiting in your showcase?
I’m not envisioning a specific title for this body of work–I can say though, that the imagery is broadly speaking inspired by nature. Having said that I often travel to Tivoli, just outside of Rome in Italy, and am deeply moved by its ancient architecture, the walls of which reflect the constant ravages of time. In addition, I’m drawn to the enormous blocks of travertine from the local quarries—they too are all about time, but in an entirely different scale and fashion.
What materials and sizes and processes are you using?
For this show I’m exhibiting photography, painting and drawings of various sizes.
What ideas are you expressing in the body of work you will be exhibiting?
I suppose these works are reflective of the myriad of modernist styles that have influenced me over the years. Altogether, I’d say I strive to reproduce a sense of poetry in the surfaces of the materials I try to capture.
What is the take away idea from your exhibition?

I love to travel and, in the process, constantly search for new sources of awareness and inspiration.

 

Photos of Work by Efram Burk.

 

ARTIST BIO: Efram Burke

An artist and educator, Efram Burk has taught Art History at the college level since 1998. He has been a member of the Ogunquit Art Association since 2012. A resident of Milton, Massachusetts, he spends much of the summer in Maine. His favorite activities are to travel and explore fresh places in a constant search for new sources of awareness and inspiration.

 

Artist Statement

My exercise is purely formal. I select what the viewer will ultimately see, a process involving considerations of: pattern and rhythm, juxtapositions in scale, and contrast between foreground/background forms, surface texture and light. I never want the space to reveal itself too quickly—there seems to be more mystery, surprise and intrigue in asking: how does this scene work? How does everything fit together? When is there too much information in a particular composition? When does it become too obvious? These are questions I constantly ask myself as I try and abstract my source. In large part I’m drawn to abstracting my subject with an eye for aesthetic balance, an overall symmetry, an ensemble, a gestalt. The lure of innumerable movements from the modernist period are of immense influence upon me, as I strive to touch upon, what I like to call, the poetry of disintegration.

 

 

Learn more about the Barn Gallery 2022 Schedule: https://barngallery.org/get-ready-for-some-art-in-ogunquit-barn-gallerys-2022-season/

 

Interview by Dustan Knight.