The Mather Gallery at Case Western Reserve University will conclude its 2002-2003 season with "A Study of Light," an exhibit of landscape and portrait paintings by artist Patricia Rohrbacher of Copley.

The exhibit opens April 11 with a reception for the artist at 5 p.m. in the gallery. The show continues through May 19. Gallery hours are noon to 5 p.m. weekdays.

Rohrbacher is an award-winning and accomplished painter, who studied art at the Arts Student League of New York under the direction of League instructors David Leffel and Harry Dinerstein. She also spent two summers at the Ecole Albert DeFois, learning painting with Ted Seth Jacobs.

Through her paintings of landscapes and portraits, Rohrbacher explores the difference between light and dark.

"I love the mystery and intrigue of shadow and the drama of form," she said.

Rohrbacher paints her portraits in a studio with the north light that lends to the long shadows of the early morning or late afternoon. Her landscape works are taken from her plein air (fresh air) sketches.

Influenced by the "Boston School" of impressionist artists, Rohrbacher has included among her paintings a copied work of Dennis Miller Bunker's painting, "Lamor," with a scene from an early morning in a village in Brittany. She calls the work, "Homage to Dennis Miller Bunker."

Other artists from this era-but from the Barbizon School (a group of landscape artists from the Barbizon region in France)-are Jean Francois Millet and Charles-Francois Daubigny, who also have inspired her as a landscape artist.

Recently she has had works in exhibits for the Oil Painters of America, the Society of Illustrators, the Union League Club in New York City and the Hilligoss Gallery in Chicago. Her work also will appear in the upcoming Oil Painters of America national exhibit at the Nichols Gallery in Taos, N.M.

Rohrbacher is originally from New York. For several years has made her home in Northeast Ohio. As a member of the Akron Society of Artists, she can be found painting with the society's artists at such scenic places as the Cuyahoga Valley National Park or in the English-style gardens of the Stan Hywet Hall in Akron.

She is a member of the Hudson Valley Artists, Pastel Society of America, Audubon Artists, American Artists Professional League and the National Museum of Women in the Arts and is listed in Who's Who in American Art.

For information about the exhibit, call 216-368-2679.