I drove up to New Hampshire today to visit with the founders of Artstream, Susan and Rainer Schwake. Susan had always wanted to open a private art school and she and her husband have made this dream come true in Rochester, New Hampshire. In fact, they have done more than that. Artstream is a wonderful school, gallery and inspirational destination that brings art to the community in many ways. For the past five years Susan and her husband Rainer have offered diverse workshops and classes including home school classes, a day program for disabled adults and guest artist workshops. The gallery is also a resource for graphic design services. Rainer has a masters degree in design and offers his services in web, media and graphic design.

The gallery is a light and airy space that is the perfect showcase for contemporary art. There is a range of local and non regional exhibiting artists represented here including Ashley Goldberg, Megan Bogonovich, Heather Smith Jones, Mary O’malley, Hadley Hutton and Alena Hennessy. I am personally looking forward to the July showing of Lisa Congdon’s and Lisa Solomon’s work.

Artstream promotes their artists to individuals and collectors with a portion of original art work also being sold to corporations. They have a wonderful online gallery and are happy to ship art to just about anywhere in the world. Look at their online shop right here. There really is something for everyone in terms of price and one of their main goals is for original art work to be accessible to everyone.

They also leave shows up for two months instead of the standard monthly exhibitions of most galleries. It’s a great idea to give people a little extra time to decide on a piece and make it to a show before it comes down.

Susan is an artist herself; of course! She paints in all mediums and does printmaking. She is currently enjoying a more illustrative style of painting. This is highlighted this summer as part of the Overnight Art exhibition in Portsmouth, NH. Read more about it here.

Susan will also be teaching a printmaking class at Squam Art Workshops in Holderness, NH this summer. For more information check out their beautiful website.