Central Street Gallery is very pleased to announce that Manchester resident and fine art painter Grace Vasta-Carr, has joined the Gallery at 11 Central Street, as an artist member. She has been painting for 30 years and has shown her paintings in gallery and museum exhibitions across the United States and in London. Grace has won many awards in juried competitions, and her work is in private collections in the US and Canada, and in corporate collections including Sonesta Hotels, Cambridgeport Bank and General Dynamics. Her work has also been exhibited in corporations in the Boston area through the DeCordova Museum Corporate Art Program.

After graduating from Massachusetts College of Art with a BFA in Painting in 1984 she travelled to London and abroad where she had a unique opportunity to study artists long admired, as well as discovering many more gardens to paint.

Vasta-Carr says ‘I consider the garden a metaphor for the human experience. In a garden, as in ourselves, the infinite possibilities of nature are restrained and carefully managed to project a cohesive image. The challenge is to strike a balance between the extremes of boundless chaos and contrived order. I allude to this by focusing on the interplay between light and dark, which to me is representative of the struggle between that which is conscious and the unconscious. Light defines dark and vice versa; smooth passages of paint interweave with thick, crusty, abrasive passages; dark inky shapes with glints of light bursting through’.

Grace will debut her paintings in the upcoming’Winter Show’ at the Gallery, Artists Reception on Saturday February 11, 4.00 ‘ 8.00pm. The show will run through April, 2012. Central Street Gallery is a co-operative of 14 award-winning artists who paint plein-air on Cape Ann, capturing the beauty of this landscape. Hours for January: Thursday through Sunday 12 noon to 5.30pm. February hours Thursday through Monday, 12 noon to 6.00pm. www.centralstreetgallery.com