“I have been interpreting the world in visual terms since childhood, seriously, with humor, and seriously with humor. Art making is a daily practice for me.” —Nancy Merrill
2015, continuing
Recent and recent-ish work. I post these images to look among them for through lines, patterns, influences.
2019. Found objects, mandolin tuning machine posts, glue.
4.5" x 4.5" x 4.5"
2018. Graphite on paper.
16" x 16"
2017. Graphite, gouache, permanent ink, hose water spray, pastel on paper.
16" x 16"
2015. Graphite, gouache, permanent ink, watercolor, water pressure wash, on paper. Time.
15" x 30"
2015. Found objects, wire, altered paper, Damar varnish, beeswax.
12.25" x 12"
2015. Graphite, gouache on paper.
16" x 16"
2015. Watercolor, pastel, gouache, graphite on paper.
16" x 16"
2015. Pastel, water on paper.
15" x 15"
2011, continuing
My work explores impermanence. Now you see it now you don’t. My artworks are artifacts that remain after spending time in a physical art space while in an art state of mind.
Most of the pieces in the Eucalyptus House body of work — as well as in the series Pentimento — incorporate found objects from “urban beach combing” or “thing finding” expeditions walking around town, noticing, into constructions. Hardware cloth and houses are playing starring roles at the moment. That house thing again.
It has been great fun to create works for the Art From Scrap fundraiser in Santa Barbara: One Night Stand. Exposed Attachments, 2010, was first, ginkgo leaves and inks entered the picture for All Fall Down, 2011, and my old pal rust showed up again for Fandango, 2012.
2017. Salvaged resonator guitar cones, tuning gears and harmonicas, found armiture, telephone wire, fishing swivels, paper straws, wind.
50" x 52"
2011. Oil on canvas.
An homage to a photograph by Jay Doing
18” x 18”
Private Collection
2013. Wood substrate, rag paper, walnut ink, drawing ink, neutral adhesive, found objects, wire, polymer varnish, rust.
10" x 10"
Private Collection
One Night Stand Exhibition
2012. Mixed media. Repurposed wood substrate (provided), 70# rag paper, walnut ink, India ink, neutral adhesive, found objects, wire, epoxy, matte polymer varnish, rust.
9" x 9"
Private collection
One Night Stand Exhibition
2011. Mixed media. Found: redwood, objects, wire, Ginkgo biloba leaves, wood substrate (provided); wood stain, hardware cloth, wire, acrylic paint, 70# rag paper, waterproof ink, graphite, wood glue, matte polymer varnish.
9" x 9"
Private collection
One Night Stand Exhibition
2011. Found objects, hardware cloth, cedar pedestal, wood stain, Teak oil.
4.5” x 9” x 7”
2011. Found objects, hardware cloth, wire, eucalyptus leaves, cedar pedestal, wood stain, Teak oil.
2011. Found objects, hardware cloth, wire, eucalyptus leaves, cedar pedestal, wood stain, Teak oil.
4.5" x 10" x 4.5"
2011. Found objects, hardware cloth, wire, Chickadee nest, eucalyptus leaves, organic produce twist ties.
5.5" x 8" x 5.5"
2011. Pastel, charcoal on paper.
11.5" x 12"
2003, continuing
Several of these constructions in this series begin with “urban beachcombing” or “thing finding” on walks in and around Seattle and the Pacific Northwest.
The smaller Pentimento pieces — Spirit House, Sparky Rascal, Fleur-de-Lis, Petal to the Metal, Here Now — rest on altered watercolor paper ground. The paper is altered by using the garden as a printing press of a sort: saturating the paper with water, then burying it beneath compost and soil for a time; in some cases pigment, green tea, tea leaves, coffee and coffee grounds are added to the mix. The result is either intact paper, or paper pieces suitable for collage. Found urban bits are then either tied or cemented in place. (The paper is 140 lb. Canson cold press watercolor paper. The altered paper is affixed to a rag mat background with Lineco neutral pH adhesive.)
The larger Pentimento pieces — As She Flies, Circle Game, Why? — are built using hardware cloth attached to found wooden card tables.
2017. Hudson Point driftwood, found objects, copper brads, wood glue, wire. Private Collection.
12" x 9" x 3"
2017. Found objects, wire. Private Collection
10" x 9" x 2"
2017. Book cover art. Found objects and Murano paper.
For Jeanie Murphy, author of Donna Cody: A Tall Tale
2017. Book cover art. Found objects and Murano paper.
For Jeanie Murphy, author of Donna Cody: A Tall Tale
Cover design by Isabel Bay Design.
2015. Found objects, wire.
13" x 14" x 2"
2009. Found objects including a street sweeper blade, steel wire. The blue "topknot" was on a curb in Ketchikan, Alaska.
12" x 10"
2006. Found objects from “urban beachcombing” including a gas cap, Altoids container, Illy coffee container lid, copper garden tags, steel wire.
2006. Mixed Media
2005. Found objects including tin can, street cleaner blades, rubber ring, vintage guitar tuners, rust.
2005. Found objects including tin can, street cleaner blades, rust.
Private Collection.
2012. Mixed media on paper on board
15" x 24"
2012. Mixed media on paper on board
15" x 24"
2005. Oil pastel and India ink on Canson Paper.
Image: 8.75" x 11.5"
2011. Found objects on altered paper, pastel.
12.5” x 13’
2011. Wooden card tables, found objects, hardware cloth, wire.
29” x 29” x 2”
2011. Wooden card tables, found objects, hardware cloth, wire.
29” x 29” x 2”
2011. Wooden card tables, found objects, hardware cloth, wire.
29” x 29” x 2”
2009. A work in progress. Children’s picture book and tool for parents: Time for Happy Leaving!
2015. Acrylic on board.
10" x 10"
Private Collection
2009. Eucalyptus bark, oak leaves, beeswax, turpentine, steel wire.
(An interior jar is provided if this serves as a garden vase in the home or landscape; an interior corrugated cardboard receptacle is provided should it serve as a repository for cremains.)
2009. Eucalyptus bark, eucalyptus sprigs, rose hips, beeswax, turpentine, steel wire.
(An interior jar is provided if this serves as a garden vase or interior bough pot; an interior corrugated cardboard receptacle is provided should it serve as a repository for cremains.)
2008. Mixed media: Papers (various), papier-mâché paste (organic whole wheat flour, sea salt, water), found steel washers, hemp twine, grapevines, pastel color, losta love. (The plastic jug that was for filling the containers and the cardboard mailing boxes were recycled.)
In the top image are individual containers and love-letter closers for a commission to design and make biodegradable, organic containers for the cremains of three beloved friends. On a road trip from Los Angeles to Minneapolis, their remains left “a trail of bread crumbs” along the way, as family history and love were caringly deposited in various scenic landscapes. The two images below are the project “kit” that includes nine pear-shaped receptacles, paper bag bundles and grapevine wish holders. All materials are biodegradable.
2001. Oil paint and gesso on QFC paper bag.
2003, continuing
These ‘Tin Sisters’ are decorative constructions for interior wall or garden post. Components include: tin cans with inked-on labels, cans from the kitchen pantry, reused candy tins, discarded dental floss plastic boxes (for hidden water containers beneath fresh flowers), acoustic musical instrument tuners, found objects, rivets, wire and, eventually, rust.
Many titles derive from Beatles tune lyrics.
'Sisters' featured in the site gallery are in private collections.
2015. Found objects, wire, acryllic paint, polymer varnish, love.
10" x 10" x 4"
Private Collection
Ciel Bergman and Nancy Merrill Installation, 1987
Contemporary Arts Forum, Santa Barbara, CA
This installation combined trash collected from Santa Barbara, California, beaches into a temple of sorts as a forum for ecological inquiry. As a result of discussion at the closing ceremony, plastic recycling was instituted in Santa Barbara.
It is featured in The Reenchantment of Art, 1991, by Suzi Gablik (Chapter 10, page 152), and more recently in Art for Life: Authentic Instruction in Art, by Tom Anderson and Melody K. Milbrandt, McGraw-Hill Higher Education (Chapter 12, page 188): MHHE.com/artforlife1
Also mentioned in 2017 documentary, Lives Well Lived, by Sky Bergman (no relationship to Ciel Bergman). Officially debuted in 2017 Santa Barbara International Film Festival.
Santa Barbara, California, 1987
These assemblages were created out of “keeper” beach combing treasures gathered in the process of creating Sea Full of Clouds, What Can I Do, and were first exhibited within that installation. Most incorporated fresh flowers in their design.
They were all later distributed to beloved friends and associates or treasured places in that beach-hugging, coastal California town. The ones the Santa Barbara Parks Department didn’t scoop up still exist.
1987. Beach trash installation.
University of California at Santa Barbara, 1986
This exhibition included oil paintings, a self portrait blueprint, pastel on paper and a collection of hand-drawn postcards — Neurotica Series — sent to the gallery space in the months prior to the show.
College of Creative Studies, June, 1984
University of California at Santa Barbara
Graduating Exhibition and Installation
1986 Exhibition
1986. Pastel on paper.
24" x19"
1986. Pastel on paper.
24" x 19"
Vellum
Installation
1982. Acrylic, graphite on paper.
22" x 30"
"…I finished up a painting the other day. It was a representational view of the front of the Creative Studies building where I attend classes. I gathered up my paints, but left the painting on the easel out in the sun to dry on the grass in front of the building.
I walked up the pink sidewalk, through the purple spots of shade, and in through the windowed orange door I had been trying to capture in paint. I stood inside in the hallway and looked out through the glass from what felt like the inside of my painting. I could see the easel and the back of the canvas and I knew what was on the other side."
2013. Graphite on paper.
9" x 11"
Private Collection
2014. Graphite on paper.
8.5" x 11"
2013. Graphite, watercolor on board.
8" x 10"
2012. Graphite, watercolor on paper.
6" x 12"
2012. Graphite, watercolor on paper.
6" x 12"
2012. Graphite, watercolor on paper.
6" x 12"
1986. Charcoal, pastel on paper.
21" x 25"
