April 28 - May 28, 2005

"Fire in the Heart," 2005, 50 x 32 in. Oil and wax on canvas

"Halo Effect," 2005, 50 x 38.5 in. Oil and wax medium on canvas

M.Y. ART PROSPECTS is pleased to announce the new exhibition, "AFTERGLOW" by Robert Stuart. The exhibition features the latest incarnation of Stuart's geometric abstract paintings.

Throughout his career, Stuart's work has gravitated toward the essential, even in the dozen years when he was painting landscapes and still-lifes. Stuart has always tried to achieve a distillation of light, color, and surface in his work. His abstract paintings pursue the same objectives more directly, without the intermediary representation of objects.

The optical sensation of blurred color fields in Stuart's oil and wax paintings brings mind to Mark Rothko, while the tension and simplicity of sharp thin stripes recalls Barnett Newman. Seeking a mystical mood from the inner glow of light, Stuart suggests a kind of transcendent, otherworldly awakening of the physical world. Stuart describes one such experience that he relates directly to his painting: "Early morning sunlight was flooding the interior (of his barn/studio in rural Virginia). As I glanced down, the light was bursting through thin slits between the floorboards marking brilliant crevices of light."

"AFTERGLOW" marks the first New York solo exhibition for this artist based in Rockbridge Baths, VA.

Robert Stuart (b.1955) studied art at Boston University School for the Arts, Boston, MA (BFA) and James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA (MFA). Since the mid-1980s, his work has been exhibited at numerous museums, university galleries, and commercial galleries in Virginia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Washington, D.C., and New York. In 2004 he was awarded an Academy Award in Art by the American Academy of Arts and Letters, New York.

Stuart is affiliated with the Beverley Street Studio School in Staunton, VA, where he teaches, lectures, and curates exhibitions. Public collections of his work include the Mint Museum, Bank America, General Electric (Charlotte, NC), University of Virginia Medical Center, and University of Virginia Law School (Charlottesville, VA).

For further information and/or photographic materials, please contact: tel. 212 268 7132 / email MYartpro@aol.com

Small Exhibition Series Vol. 6
April 28 - May 28, 2005

For our Small Exhibition Series, M.Y. ART PROSPECTS is pleased to present "LIVE ON LAND," four new landscape paintings by Hans Benda.

Following his last series "Close to Nature," Benda continues to portray landscapes framed by skylines and architectural elements that evoke both a magical Old World ambience and a more real contemporary living environment.

A virtuoso of the traditional European painting technique of oil-on-wood that involves a layering of multiple thin glazes, Benda creates fascinating and complex moods and emotions in his paintings.

Born in 1960 in Berlin, Hans Benda studied fine art at the Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Karlstruhe, Germany. An abstract artist for almost a decade, Benda made the decision to swim against the prevailing artistic tide by adopting his signature figurative style in 1988. He has shown his work in Paris, Brussels, Tokyo, Dhaka, and New York.

"KISSING THE GROUND," Benda's solo show last year at M.Y. ART PROSPECTS, featured his landscapes and provocative female portraits (another favorite genre of this artist). Grace Glueck at The New York Times reviewed the exhibition in "Art In Review," May 14, 2004.

For further information about the artist and available work, please contact the gallery at 212 268 7132 or e-mail to MYartpro@aol.com