Gumenick Family Gallery
 Hours: Monday-Saturday 9am-9pm; Sunday 12-5pm
Artwork exhibited in the Gumenick Family Gallery and
Slantwall Gallery is available for sale.

"For years now, I have worked primarily as a hustling commissioned
portrait and landscape artist driven by the whim and need of my many
devoted clients. Being an unapologetic Capitalist, I see no shame in
such work, and actually credit some of the more bizarre requests with
pushing the envelope of my ability to more profound depths. As a
 result, I have been able to enjoy a level of commercial success which
many artists do not experience in their lifetimes. My work has taken
me all over the world, and I have a list of clients including some of
the most gifted and successful individuals and businesses of our
time. I owe ALL of my success to my fabulously supportive clients
who have taken chances, some very large, on me over the years... I
merely did the work."

"That being said, I have been looking forward to this show, aptly
titled 'Looking Forward' for some time. It has given me a chance to
get back to the roots of my craft and unite a series of paintings and
drawings never viewed together in one grouping... even by me. Each
piece is united, not by subject matter, but by aesthetic merit and
grace of craft."

"Although I have chosen to include some very special commissioned
pieces, I have also selected a diverse group of paintings and
drawings which were not commissioned and were created as a result of
a deeply personal attraction I had to the subject matter. Each of
these works were created in response to a natural and abstract beauty
that struck a chord with me, having less to do literally with the
subject matter depicted and more to do with the mesmerizing dance of
color, pattern, light, and space that surrounds us everyday. The
subject matter ranges from the humble, unadorned human form to the
magnificent Na Pali Coast of Kauai. The common denominator shared by
all of these carefully selected pieces is that they appear
'effortless' in their creation. Nothing could be further from the
truth. True, in the end, what the viewer sees literally fell from my
brush in a flurry of gracefully interwoven strokes, but what you see
as the viewer is the result of day after day of painting, painting,
and repainting the same subject matter over and over until I
discovered 'the way' to render it with apparent ease. Each piece is
a journey unto itself... I learn something new about my craft every
time I attempt a new piece, and the techniques I draw upon to create
the myriad effects run the historical gamut from the Old Masters, to
the Abstract Expressionists, to my proprietary techniques which fuse
into a brand of approachable Contemporary Realism that is completely
my own."

Lee Baskerville

  Slantwall Gallery

 Swarm
Artwork by Chris Semtner


Infestation 2, acrylic on wood panel, $750

Chris Semtner is an internationally exhibited artist living in Virginia and currently serves as Curator of the Edgar Allan Poe Museum as well as Co-Chair of the Exhibitions Committee at Artspace Gallery in Richmond.  His paintings have entered many private and public collections including those of the University of Maryland Department of Entomology and the City of Baltimore's Poe House and Museum.  His photographs have appeared in several publications including the London Daily Telegraph (U.K.) and Rue Morgue Magazine (Canada).  Semtner has served as Content Editor for two biographies of Poe and has published numerous short stories.  He has spoken before several arts and civic groups on the subjects of art and literature and has taught a class on Poe at the Lifelong Learning Institute in Midlothian, Virginia.  He has been interviewed multiple times for television and radio in the United States and Canada. 


Digger, Acrylic on wood panel, $225

In addition to his curatorial work, Semtner continues to exhibit his paintings several times a year.  Although his primary subject is the beautiful woman, Semtner also paints images of dead insects.

 Statement about Insect Show
Roaches scurry out from under our bed.  Ants invade our cupboards.  The sky is blackened by the shadow of a million cicadas. In Semtner’s paintings, the insects are invading.  These seemingly commonplace creatures seem like alien beings when seen close-up in the classically painted detail of these images.

The insect paintings are meant to neither educate nor edify their audience but to stimulate it.  In these pictures the emphasis is on the drama of these strange creatures fighting, eating, and struggling for survival. 

 Selected works for sale. Purchases can be done at the
information desk (804) 261-2787or gift shop (804) 261-6204.
Purchase unique artwork for your home or office!