PICTORIAL FOUNDATION | NAOMI BERKERY

NAOMI BERKERY

Newburgh NY UNITED STATES

I am a multidisciplinary mixed media artist whose practice bridges fine art, graffiti, and emotionally charged portraiture. My work is grounded in an unapologetic commitment to emotional truth, autonomy, and presence, exploring the tension between opposites — urban grit and spiritual softness, vulnerability and strength—while embracing complexity oversimplification. Deeply informed by pride in womanhood, my practice celebrates, supports, and gives voice to the layered realities of being a woman.

Centered in feminine energy and resilience, my work gives form to internalized experiences such as anxiety, memory, desire, grief, and transformation through layered textures, expressive color, and intentional mark-making. My portraits function as emotional landscapes, capturing fleeting moments of inner dialogue while asserting presence without apology.

I am a graduate of Pratt Institute, where I earned an MFA in Art and Design Education and Special Education with a concentration in Art Therapy. I lived and worked in New York City for more than two decades, exhibiting throughout the five boroughs and the Tri-State Area. Since 2003, I have taught visual art to neurodivergent students in NYC. As a certified art therapist and department head, I approach art and education as interconnected practices of healing, identity formation, and empowerment. I currently work from my studios at Safe Harbors on the Hudson and Ann Street Gallery in Newburgh.

My practice is intuition, materiality, and emotional response. Working primarily in mixed media, I collect and archive papers of all kinds, stickers, weathered fragments, book pages, manuscripts, magazine clippings, and found textures that carry both history and atmosphere. Inspired by shifting seasons, environments, inner dialogue, and the complexity of emotion, I use layers of paint, collage, spray paint, graphite, oil pastel, and acrylic marker to translate the intangible into something physical and deeply felt. Each piece begins with only a loose direction, often a color palette, symbolic element, botanical form, or emotional tone and evolves instinctively through process and reaction.

I work alone, often in silence, allowing painting to access a part of myself that exists only within the act of creation. My compositions are built through both methodical and energetic mark-making and layered surfaces before emerging into sketch-like female figures and gestural faces that balance both internal and external perspectives. The work continuously shifts as I add, remove, and rework imagery, collage, and detail. A defining part of my process is what I call the “dress rehearsal,” where materials and papers are temporarily placed, moved, and reconsidered over several days until the composition settles into its final form. The finished surface is then sealed in gloss or resin, preserving both the vulnerability and intensity embedded within the layers.

ARTWORKS

Total Package (2024)

NAOMI BERKERY

mixed media, wheat paste on canvas
24H x 24W in (61H x 61W cm)
$2300

“This work reimagines the traditional postage stamp as a site of identity, movement, and visibility, merging the language of street art with intimate portraiture. By enlarging and disrupting the format of an “old school” stamp, the piece challenges systems of value, circulation, and who is deemed worthy of being seen, sent, or remembered. The female figure, layered with gestural marks, collage, and expressive line, exists within and beyond the boundaries of the stamp suggesting both containment and resistance. Elements such as postal markings, graffiti-inspired mark making, and textured overlays evoke the passage of time, travel, and lived experience, while also referencing the public voice of the street. In this context, the woman becomes both Message and Messenger. Her presence asserts that women’s stories, bodies, and identities are not only worthy of distribution, but powerful enough to disrupt the systems that attempt to frame them. The work celebrates visibility, agency, and the unapologetic imprint of women in both personal and public spaces.”

Unleashing the Lion (2021)

NAOMI BERKERY

mixed media on canvas
24H x 24W in (61H x 61W cm)
$2100

“This work explores the layered strength of womanhood through a fusion of portraiture, collage, and expressive mark-making. The central figure emerges from fragmented environments, brick, lace, and pattern, symbolizing the structures, histories, and expectations that both confine and shape women’s identities. The use of torn materials and textured surfaces reflects resilience through rupture, while the bold, unapologetic gaze of the subject asserts presence, autonomy, and emotional depth. Graffiti-inspired line work and vibrant color accents disrupt traditional notions of femininity, reclaiming space with urgency and confidence. By juxtaposing softness and strength, lace against brick, delicacy against rawness. The piece honors the complexity of women’s experiences. It is both a celebration of identity and a declaration of power: women as creators, survivors, and forces of transformation.”

Code Girl

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NAOMI BERKERY

Newburgh NY UNITED STATES

ARTWORKS

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