Why, hello there. I make pictures and stories. I love to invent little situations, illustrate them with paintings and drawings, and (sometimes) write songs about them. Most of my songs/pictures/stories take place in imaginary and desolate northern settings and explore relationships between people, animals, the weather, and other elements of nature such as water, wind, smoke, rocks, etc. I’m also drawn to ghosts, monsters, spirits and other aspects of the supernatural, as well as angst-y themes of love, loss, and mortality.

Lately I have also been exploring various influences including folklore and science fiction stories, ethnographica, and my experience of growing up near an Amish community in rural Western Pennsylvania. My most recent drawings involve simplified and stylized Pennsylvania Dutch hex signs. These striking and often symmetrical designs, frequently used as decorations on barns, made a big impression on me as a child–they seemed powerful and a bit frightening. The “hex dancer” series re-imagines these emblems as masks used in ceremonies and performances.

Contact: carrie@bergmansbear.com

Selected Exhibitions:
2005 Small Works Invitational, Last Minute Gallery, Northampton, MA
2006 12×12, The Bromfield Gallery, Boston, MA
2006 The Mountain and the Garden, A.P.E. Gallery, Northampton, MA
2010 My Etsy Art Collection, be@schermerhorn, Brooklyn, NY
2011 Something Small, Something Big, Hope & Feathers, Amherst, MA
2011 3rd Annual Small Works Show, ECA+ Gallery, Easthampton, MA
2011 Carrie Bergman: Drawings and Paintings, White Square Fine Books and Art, Easthampton, MA

Misc.:
1999 Neilson C. Bridger Memorial Art Prize, Dickinson College
2006 Residency, The Contemporary Artist’s Center, North Adams, MA

Education:
BA (Fine Arts and Anthropology), Dickinson College