Emily Berger’s web site — designed by Good Form Design — is up and running, which means everyone has the opportunity to peruse her paintings and drawings and learn more about what’s she’s up to. The painting to the left is called "Ninth Street." Her artist statement is written in poetic form.
280 Nevins, Looking West over the Gowanus
Out my window
Shapes rise and fall.
A wooden wall folds into the soft dirt of a grassy hill.
Curved by shadows
Fences undulate across tar,
Black pipes curl like stiff plants
In a tropical garden.
Tarnished silver,
A triangle of road recedes.
Great truck, glorious hippo, you
Emerge slowly from the dark waters of
The Heating Oil Co.
Tree branches shake their leaves and shimmy.
Squares and slants of old buildings hold them
In spaces indeterminate.
I wonder if my words could hold this place
Like an attic room I knew –
Closets, dormers
On a leafy hill,
Tiny blue flowers on the wall.
A bird flies.
A man turns a valve and water sprays
Across a green lot.
The black conduits glisten and the trees continue to move.
The view is packed and layered.
Where does one thought end and another begin?
Emily Berger