Helene Berson
Helene Berson is a long time resident of the East Village. After two fulfilling and nurturing careers – as a social worker and later as a professional chef – she is experiencing a creative re-invention. Starting at her kitchen table in late 2005, she discovered that cutting, tearing, arranging and gluing various papers and images was the compelling and life-affirming experience she now needed. Her use of the lively color of acrylic paint proved an exciting added dimension to the emotional emphasis of her message.
Primarily self-taught, Helene works from an intuitive place inspired by her historical perspective. Her still evolving exploration of family photographs lead her to coin the term biollage – the marriage of biography and collage. She strives to give shape to the historical and biological relationship with people and places of her genealogy. This narrative style evokes a deeply personal expression which reflects universal implications.
Presently her work has expanded to exploration of mixed media, abstraction, discards, distressed papers, and recyclables. Thematically the work continues to comment on themes of identity, memory and imagination.
