Exhibit by Emma Bergman
The Quiet Mundane celebrates the beauty of everyday life, elevating small moments, ordinary routines, and familiar scenes into something precious and worth cherishing.
Jessie Wilber Gallery
September 12 – November 26, 2025
Reception
Artist reception during the Art Walk on Friday, September 12th from 5:00-8:00pm.
Artist Statement
I create textured oil paintings depicting what I like to call The Quiet Mundane. Over a bright underpainting, I apply a combination of paint and cold wax with palette knives and brushes. In the initial stages, I focus on large shapes, color, and energetic brushwork. Later I refine the areas that I feel are most important. I selectively choose which areas to re-work, allowing the history of the process to remain visible. I love each stage of painting, and want to maintain each moment of the process in the final work.
The Quiet Mundane captures everyday moments, creatures, and people from my life. My process is as much an approach to living as it is a body of work. Rather than viewing my life as a series of monumental moments, I am learning to appreciate the mundane, the repetitive, and the beauty of small things. Rather than letting the mundane slip by, I am attempting to bring the viewer’s focus to the little corner of the world that I inhabit. I believe by observing this, sit- ting with it for hours, and translating it into paint, I am elevating the mundane to something of importance, as some- thing precious to be savored.
Through painting, I am grounded in my observance of the small and the ordinary while the world is at each other’s throats. The Quiet Mundane is universal. While my neighbors live different lives, with different people, events, and beliefs than my own, they might still find a surprising familiarity in my work. They might find that we share many mundane moments, if not in actuality, then in spirit. In the larger world we are all different, but in many small ways, we are the same. For me, that is quite monumental.
We cannot change world events, the weather, or other people’s beliefs. But we can change ourselves. We can affect the people around us. We can lift someone up. We can contribute something positive, in small ways, each day. We can be decisive in our actions, our attitudes, and our impact. We can align ourselves with the good in life.
Artist Bio
Emma Bergman is a painter and designer passionate about capturing everyday human moments. She studied graphic design and studio arts at Montana State University. Her work includes murals, installations, large scale oil paintings, and watercolor sketchbook pages, where she explores themes of mundanity, nature, and family. When not painting Emma can be found hanging out with her dog, caring for her plants, and cooking. She is currently taking advantage of the summer by creating a series of plein air pieces inspired by Montana landscapes.
