Artist Biographies for Ivy Hill's 2008 Live Art Auction

Judy Alderfer resides in Harleysville, Montgomery County, PA. She has studied with many different instructors over the years, gleaning their various methods and techniques.

She enjoys using different types of watercolor paper, as well as mixing other media with watercolor paint. Planning the composition, applying the paint, watching the colors mix and run - is exciting and can be breath-taking! Creating a painting can be a wonderful time of relaxation, filled with surprises. She believes we should never stop trying new techniques, methods and searching out new ideas.

She loves sharing her knowledge with others and does so by teaching an adult evening watercolor class for the Souderton Area Adult Evening School.
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Merrill Brown has lived in and around Souderton all his life. He has been drawing and painting as long as he can remember. Basically a self taught artist, however, he has studied with a number of notable artists over the years. On occasion, he has taught evening classes and in the past have had a number of shows. Merrill has also entered his work in local art exhibits and won numerous awards.

He basically paint landscapes within the surrounding counties, which he finds rich with subject matter, as well as in those areas wherever his vacation trips take him. His current medium of choice is Acrylic; however, he has worked with Oils and Watercolors in the past.

His basic aim has always been to convey the feelings and moods he experiences in nature, through observing the world around him. To be at the right place at the right time provides the inspiration for yet another painting. Thus, to convey this experience to others through his paintings has become Meriil's ultimate goal and satisfaction.
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Sylvia Z. Brunner began painting at the age of 21 when she took an evening oil painting class at a local high school. Her first two teachers were Myrtle Scholl and Fern Fried. She enjoyed painting a great deal, but with four sons and a husband, found it difficult at times to find time. Landscapes and still life are still her favorite subjects, but due to a developing allergy to oils, she began water color painting. My, what a challenge it was for her to learn to think backwards and do a great deal of planning. Instead of working from dark to light by adding highlights last; she had to work from light to dark by leaving the highlights in tact while painting layers of color around them. It has been a good discipline for her.

She studied under John Roberts' direction in the 80's and then took some "Life-long" learner classes at Montgomery County Community College under Diane Maurer. She continues to do watercolors today and works at developing a style which is freer.

She lives in Perkiomenville with her husband and youngest son. There's a special place in her heart for all those who struggle in this life. Because of God's grace and His enablement in her life, she wants everyone to know that whatever she does that is right and good is by God's grace and for His glory. Whatever is not good or right is a result of trying to do things in her own strength.
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William Jachwak was born in Philadelphia, 1954. He is a Pennsylvania Impressionist, who resides in Franconia Township. Active in the Eastern Pennsylvania, he is a plein-air painter focused on landscape painting, particularly in the Bucks County area.

Mostly self-taught, he studied for two years with artist, Ray Overpeck (whom is also donating a piece of art for this auction). His influences include Daniel Garber and members of the Bucks County School of Impressionism.

Jachwak first gained attention, and is still best known, for his luminous winter landscapes.
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Ray Overpeck lives in Bucks County, PA, where he was born in 1933. His formal training included studying at the Philadelphia Museum College of Art and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art.

As a young boy he way always fond of drawing and during his early youth was fascinated with the paintings of Walter Baum, which were displayed in the halls of his school. These paintings, and later the works of the French Impressionists, have always been an inspiration to him.

Through the years his work has evolved from painting in both oil and watercolor to eventually painting oils in an impressionistic style, which was his first love.

For a change of scene, Ray enjoys painting in Stonington, ME., but his greatest source of subject matter has always been Bucks County and its surrounding areas. Ray's work has been shown in many group exhibitions and juried shows. He has received many awards for his work, the most recent being the award for "Traditional Painting in the style of the New Hope School" at the 74th Phillips' Mill Show.
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P. David Rauschenberger was born in Sellersville in 1919 and has lived there most of his life, as well as in Perkasie. He admired the work of the Pennsylvania Impressionists, especially Walter Emerson Baum, also a native of Sellersville. Baum was a great inspiration for David.

His very first art lessons were taken at The Baum School of Art in Allentown. David attended demonstration classes there on Saturday afternoons, in the late 1940's. The Pennsylvania Impressionist influence is evident in David's style and subject matter. He paints mostly landscapes in the Bucks and Lehigh County areas. He has taken art lessons from a variety of local art teachers including, James Schucker, Jack Eagle, Carol Barany, Kass Morin-Freeman, Joan B. Bitzer and Ray Overpeck. As a member of the Doylestown Art League, David has exhibited at their 2004, 2005, and 2006 Annual Membership Exhibitions and 2003 Member's Juried Exhibition where he won First Place in the Oil/Acrylic Category, and 2006 Member's Juried Exhibition where he was awarded an Honorable Mention. David enjoys painting rural scenes of Bucks and other local counties. He admits particularly to enjoying the old mills and spring houses as subjects in his paintings.

He presently resides in Telford, PA with is wife, Alice, where they have lived for several years. David worked as an officer of a local bank for many years, he retired in 1982.They have a daughter, and two sons, and four grandchildren.
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Linda Bohlman Trauger was born and raised in Pipersville, Bucks County. She graduated from Kutztown University with a B.S. in art education. She spent 31 years teaching art in the Pennridge School District. She retired in 1999. Since her retirement, she has studied with several fine teachers at the Greater Norristown Art League, among them, James McFarlane, Kass Morin Freeman, Chris McCauley, Susan Ketcham and Gwen Kovach. She has participated in many shows and has received many awards including 3rd place in the 2005 Tinicum Arts Festival, an Honorable Mention, also in 2005, at the Norristown Art League's Member's Show, and the Perkiomen Art League's 2006 Mennonite Heritage Award. Her art has been shown locally at the Indian Valley Library, Frame Carriage Gallery in Frenchtown, NJ, Lehigh Valley Medical Center and the Peter Becker Community in Harleysville, PA.

When not painting, she enjoys spending time in Cape May, traveling and gardening. She resides in Souderton with her husband, Ray and Simba, their cat.
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R. Louisa Wismer lives in Silverdale, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. She is a graduate of Moore College of Art and Design in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She majored in textile design and worked in New York City as a designer.

After marriage and a move to the country, she decided to try oil painting. She discovered a love for this medium. Friends and associates began asking her to help them learn to draw and paint. So, for over thirty years, she has shared her knowledge of drawing and painting with others. Instruction started in her own studio and then moved to evening classes in the Souderton and Pennridge school districts.

Now Louisa shares her talent with two senior centers. Here she enjoys the weekly task of explaining and demonstrating the joys of painting and having others experience the special awareness that comes with painting. She also instructs a Saturday morning class involving a variety of other mediums.

Louisa's passion for gardening has earned her four first place awards and translates itself to the canvases of her wonderful floral and garden scenes. Louisa says, "I love to take a flat, white surface and give it depth and a story to tell-even if it's only for me."

She has taken many three-dimensional objects and turned them into a piece of art. She decorated six horses on the restored Perkasie Menlo Park Carousel. Sometimes it can be an old watering can, a door, or a window.

She was involved in the Summer of the Mules project in 2003. Her original design was selected by None Such Farm in Buckingham, Pennsylvania, and adapted to fit their farm preservation theme. The mule still resides at the market. An upcoming project is to restore three religious figures for St. Cyrils of Jerusalem Church in Jamison, Pennsylvania. Louisa will do a mural of the Good Shepherd when the new church is completed. In 2004, and since then, she has completed another 7' x 12' mural of "Jesus and the Children."

Her interest in preserving open space and keeping Bucks beautiful has led Louisa, for 10 years, to serve as a volunteer on the Pennridge Area Coordinating Committee. She has contributed her works to raise funds for many local organizations. Louisa was awarded the Pennridge Chamber of Commerce Arts Award which recognized her service on many committees and her donation of talent to worthwhile art and teaching projects. A board member of the Doylestown Art League, Inc., she has served as education chairperson for the last 14 years.

Louisa was pleased when told Out of the Morning Mist, her painting of a field of sunflowers at Maximuck's Bird Seed Farm in Buckingham, was chosen for the Bucks Beautiful Garden Fair 2004 Poster! With all of this, Louisa loves being a homemaker and a grandmother of eight.
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