Dark Light Matter

Artworks by ELISHA BROCKENBERRY and ELIANA MESA

Elisha Brockenberry - Family Barbecue - oil paint
and foil on wood 20” x 24”
Eliana Mesa - Blue Meanie - oil on canvas 7 ft x 8 ft

(Opening Reception: Sunday May 17, 2026, 3 to 7 pm)

Closing Reception: Sunday June 21, 2026, 3 to 6 pm

BRIGHTWORKS GALLERY, 38 Rusling Place, Bridgeport, CT 06604

Co-Curator: JOHN ANTHONY BRIGHT Brightworks Gallery john.works101@gmail.com
Co-Curator: JOHNES RUTA AzothGallery.com azothgallery@comcast.net
   
 


Elisha Brockenberry - My own private demolition - Acrylic coffee filter,
concrete outside materials on wood, 48" x 40" 2024

   
  Elisha Brockenberry lives in the world of becoming. This is reflected in her art-making, the choice of found objects that she incorporates into her work, her process, and her passion for urban farming. (During the pandemic shutdown she appropriated an unstewarded patch of a community garden that became a haven for creating and gathering for local youth.) Her understanding and fascination for the biology of flux is combined with her musings and preoccupation with the connection between the astral present, past and future and wonder of her ancestral roots. She is a picker of stuff. She admires the design, potential and intrinsic qualities of found detritus. Elisha has a Puck-like nature, she pushes boundaries and doesn’t accept things or situations as conventionally established. She plays with symbolism and ‘reality’ and challenges the viewer with intimate subject matter or illogical pairings like a hammer and fabric epoxied onto large flat charcoal-black board of insulation.

Elisha exhibited an assemblage that was primarily a painting, with a Dali-esque surrealism. Light blue painting of drapery transitions to a patch of sky, then to a tear. She also includes an actual piece of fabric to further exploit the tension between reality and conceptual. She plays with portraiture: painted, collaged, and missing from where the viewer would conventionally ‘expect’ a face to be.
 
 
Video: Johnes Ruta
 
 
 
Eliana Mesa - Kali - oil on canvas 5x 4 ft
 
 
 

Eliana Mesa is a painter and multidisciplinary artist based at the NEST ARTS FACTORY in Bridgeport, CT. her practice centers on sculpture and oil painting. Her practice is rooted in experimentation allowing intuition and material response to guide her work across disciplines.

She states: “My work explores themes of consciousness, duality, and the human search for meaning and the divine. I am drawn to the tension between good and evil, and the ways in which these opposing forces coexist within both the individual and the universe. Rooted in personal experience and emotion, my work begins with a question or feeling. I am deeply inspired by the nature of reality itself, drawing from religion, quantum physics, and the patterns found in nature, incorporating ideas of electromagnetism and light as both scientific phenomena and symbolic elements, representing unseen forces that shape perception, energy, and existence. My process is fluid and intuitive, shifting with each piece while remaining grounded in exploration. Through layered materials and varied forms, I attempt to give shape to what cannot be easily seen—thought, energy, and the space between the physical and the metaphysical. – Ultimately, my work is an invitation. I aim to take viewers on the same journey I experience during creation, encouraging them to question, reflect, and engage with the deeper uncertainties and understanding of reality.”
 
 

Eliana Mesa - Space Boy - oil on canvas, 5 x 6 ft
 

Exhibition on view by appointment 917.886.8214 : February 15 to April 15, 2026

Co-Curator: JOHN ANTHONY BRIGHT Brightworks Gallery john.works101@gmail.com
Co-Curator: JOHNES RUTA AzothGallery.com azothgallery@comcast.net

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