Bernard C. Meyers (b.1955) is an American abstract contemporary artist. With an MFA from Rochester Institute of Technology in traditional printmaking the work explores the intersections of photographic realism and abstract expressionism. His work has been featured in gallery, museum and institutional solo exhibitions in addition to numerous group shows throughout his career. His work is held in museum, library and private collections nationwide. He is an artist within Utah DeMarcation Portfolio of Contemporary Photography published by Granary Arts, 2019. In 2021-2022 he is an artist in residence at the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art for 2021 & 2022. 2023 Monson Arts Abbott Watts Resident for Photography. Meyers is represented by Maine Museum of Photographic Arts.

In 1982 Bernard C. Meyers founded Portland Photographics, a full service analog photo lab offering exhibition and portfolio master printing. He specialized in Cibachrome color prints. It quickly became the go to operation for many of the worlds best photojournalists and fine art photographers. Clients included the National Geographic, Magnum, ICP, Kodak and Nikon. Photographers included Sam Abell, William Allard, James Nachtway, Alex Webb, Burk Uzzle, Ernst Haas, Paul Caponigro and Todd Webb.


Bernard Meyers certainly sees the same things we do, but plays with the contextual cues, so that we are unsure of what is making the world look the way it does in his photographs. Over the last three years he has persisted in pushing the edges of the architectural envelope. First, to show us only barely recognizable architectural elements, to a point, now, where only a slight whiff of rational geometry remains. Surfaces collide like scenes from Blade Runner, where those surfaces are not what they seem. We feel like we are experiencing a kind of vertigo that keeps making us have to reset our visual mechanism, looking for a more rational world, but never quite getting there…not with any certainty. But the effect is thrilling, consciousness raising, and certainly rewards our extra efforts, necessary to get there.

Alan Klotz
Photo Historian, Gallerist & founding member of AIPAD


BYTES, UTAH'S ART MAGAZINE SINCE 2001 Between Worlds: Bernard C. Meyers at Alice Gallery by Geoff Wichert on Oct 20, 2014

excerpt from Geoff Wichert review

…. instead of scenes that appear in our minds as if immediately present, the sensuous textures, rhythmic patterns, and copious details in Bernard Meyers’ prints, while they let us feel their visual music, challenge our minds to penetrate the represented spaces and suss out the arrangement of the parts. Along the way, we discover new meanings and significance in what we see. As with life itself, the more information revealed in Meyers’ photos, the less unified and simple the world appears, and the more aware we become of the limits of mere perception to take us behind the veil of material reality.





News, Anouncements

I am very pleased to be part of the artist in residence program at the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art. I am making good progress on the Salt Lake City project. The newest are often posted on Instagram, @bernardcmeyers The show will open at the museum on August 12, Through October 1st.

About


 

Bernard C. Meyers (b.1955) is an American abstract contemporary artist. With an MFA from Rochester Institute of Technology in traditional printmaking the work explores the intersections of photographic realism and abstract expressionism. His work has been featured in gallery, museum and institutional solo exhibitions in addition to numerous group shows throughout his career. His work is held in museum, library and private collections nationwide. He is an artist within Utah DeMarcation Portfolio of Contemporary Photography published by Granary Arts, 2019. In 2021-2022 he is an artist in residence at the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art for 2021 & 2022. 2023 Monson Arts Abbott Watts Resident for Photography. Meyers is represented by Maine Museum of Photographic Arts.

In 1982 Bernard C. Meyers founded Portland Photographics, a full service analog photo lab offering exhibition and portfolio master printing. He specialized in Cibachrome color prints. It quickly became the go to operation for many of the worlds best photojournalists and fine art photographers. Clients included the National Geographic, Magnum, ICP, Kodak and Nikon. Photographers included Sam Abell, William Allard, James Nachtway, Alex Webb, Burk Uzzle, Ernst Haas, Paul Caponigro and Todd Webb.


Bernard Meyers certainly sees the same things we do, but plays with the contextual cues, so that we are unsure of what is making the world look the way it does in his photographs. Over the last three years he has persisted in pushing the edges of the architectural envelope. First, to show us only barely recognizable architectural elements, to a point, now, where only a slight whiff of rational geometry remains. Surfaces collide like scenes from Blade Runner, where those surfaces are not what they seem. We feel like we are experiencing a kind of vertigo that keeps making us have to reset our visual mechanism, looking for a more rational world, but never quite getting there…not with any certainty. But the effect is thrilling, consciousness raising, and certainly rewards our extra efforts, necessary to get there.

Alan Klotz
Photo Historian, Gallerist & founding member of AIPAD


BYTES, UTAH'S ART MAGAZINE SINCE 2001 Between Worlds: Bernard C. Meyers at Alice Gallery by Geoff Wichert on Oct 20, 2014

excerpt from Geoff Wichert review

…. instead of scenes that appear in our minds as if immediately present, the sensuous textures, rhythmic patterns, and copious details in Bernard Meyers’ prints, while they let us feel their visual music, challenge our minds to penetrate the represented spaces and suss out the arrangement of the parts. Along the way, we discover new meanings and significance in what we see. As with life itself, the more information revealed in Meyers’ photos, the less unified and simple the world appears, and the more aware we become of the limits of mere perception to take us behind the veil of material reality.