Abner Hershberger | Portrait of an Artist 

ROOTED IN THE LAND / CULTIVATING AN ARTIST
It is important to take into account an artist’s earliest experiences and influences when assessing a life career.  For Abner Hershberger—painter, printmaker, sculptor, academic teacher, it is of no less value to acquaint the viewer of his work with a childhood spent growing up in a Mennonite farm family on the plains of North Dakota.  Born in Milford, Nebraska in 1934, then moving in 1937 to grow up near Fargo, North Dakota, Hershberger was the youngest son in a family of 10 brothers and sisters.  Life was not easy living without electricity and plumbing, but it was rich and good in many ways and had little distraction except for the regimen of farm life and church.  Nights were spent reading, in conversation with family, doing school work, and making drawings.  This bucolic childhood gave way to more responsibility on the farm—taking care of livestock, growing vegetables, and driving one of the family’s tractors endlessly plowing the fields.  The drawings continued and became a sequestered relief from daily chores. The idea of making marks on paper later transfers to the process of making marks in the earth.  Hours, days and weeks spent alone while furrow after furrow dropped silently behind the John Deere later gave the artist reflective moments about how one makes one’s mark in life.  Looking at the vast expanse of land leading the eye to the horizon with tall shoots of clover, the texture of the earth, and how fields were sectioned and delineated by windbreaks of trees, seemed metaphoric years later.  A journey had begun and would continue with the making of marks on the land and about the land. Abner Hershberger, as the artist has stated, “The challenge for me is to remain honest to a personal aesthetic, pay homage to a nurturing community, and explore a visual arena that is symbolic, iconographic, and spiritual.” 
 - Brian Byrn, Curator of Exhibitions and Education, Midwest Museum of American Art, Elkhart, Indiana (2007)

Abner shares his early interests in art.

Abner explains how growing up in North Dakota influenced his art.

Abner explains his works in sculpture

The Artist's Creative Process

Influences of Hans Hofmann on Hershberger's Works

Abner explains his abstract paintings.

Abner explains how growing up on the family farm influenced his art.

Abner Hershberger's Heritage Works Project

Understanding Abner's Aesthetics

Abner's use of composition, color, and form in his art.