Unseen and Fragments of the Imagination Now Exhibiting at Jessup Cellars
At Jessup Cellars, we believe great art—like great wine—moves you, disrupts you, and invites you into a deeper conversation with the world around you. This season, we are honored to present two extraordinary solo exhibitions that do just that: “Unseen” by Marty Balogh and “Fragments of the Imagination” by Thomas Ramey – curated by Julie Eppich of EppichArts, Jessup Cellars’ resident curator. Though distinct in medium and method, both artists offer work that explores transformation, perception, and the search for meaning through personal and material metamorphosis.
Marty Balogh | Unseen
From Stroke to Sight: A Journey Reimagined in Abstract Photography
On an ordinary Monday in 2019, Marty Balogh’s life changed in an instant. A sudden stroke rerouted not just his health—but his entire perception of reality. That pivotal experience would ultimately give rise to Unseen, a body of work rooted in vulnerability, discovery, and the enigmatic beauty of altered perception.
What began as expressive painting—a primal attempt to scream at the world—evolved into something more introspective. Using advanced photographic tools, Balogh began capturing the ghostly afterimages of his paintings, revealing hidden forms, colors, and dimensions that even he could not anticipate. This alchemical process turned canvas into catalyst, opening portals to what he describes as “mystical spaces, vibrant landscapes, and mysterious entities.”
From his San Francisco studio, each evening begins with a personal invocation: “Show me something that I can’t see.” The resulting photographs—printed on high-gloss metal plates—transform light and pigment into surreal topographies. Their layered surfaces shimmer with narrative potential, pulling viewers into moments of uncertainty, awe, and revelation.
Balogh’s background in literature, music, and advertising quietly informs his visual storytelling. There is structure beneath the spontaneity. His images read like dream fragments unearthed from memory—at once personal and universal, grounded and otherworldly.
Thomas Ramey | Fragments of the Imagination
Sculpting Chaos Into Form: The Geometry of Emotion and Design
If Balogh’s work dwells in the ethereal, Thomas Ramey roots his in steel, fire, and force. A veteran metal artist with over 25 years of experience, Ramey’s exhibition Fragments of the Imagination channels the full weight of industrial craftsmanship into elegant, evocative form.
Ramey’s journey began in an IndyCar machine shop, where he shaped steel scraps into sculpture between shifts. From there, he wove together a path that included fine art study, a decade as a touring musician, and numerous television appearances showcasing his bold, high-concept work on Discovery Channel and beyond. Despite this high-profile résumé, Ramey has always returned to the studio—a place where sketches become sculpture and chaos is forged into geometric harmony.
His large-scale installations, some standing over 16 feet tall, are feats of engineering and emotional articulation. Ramey’s favored material, mild steel, is worked with obsessive attention to precision, texture, and balance. The result is sculpture that feels simultaneously ancient and modern, grounded in the tactile reality of its medium yet brimming with poetic resonance.
In Fragments of the Imagination, Ramey explores the tension between industrial order and organic spontaneity. These works—clean yet complex, balanced yet bursting with kinetic energy—demand engagement. They ask the viewer to consider the fragments of their own imagination, the way form and function coexist in life as in art.
A Dual Exhibition of Vision and Transformation
Though their approaches differ—one born of internal reawakening, the other of structural mastery—Balogh and Ramey share a deep reverence for the act of creation as a means of navigating and understanding personal experience. Unseen and Fragments of the Imagination are exhibitions that push boundaries: of vision, of medium, and of expectation.
We invite you to explore these two powerful bodies of work at the Jessup Cellars Gallery in Yountville. Whether you are drawn to the mystical layers of Balogh’s photographic revelations or the muscular geometry of Ramey’s sculptural forms, this is an exhibition that speaks to transformation—of material, memory, and meaning.
Walk-ins are always welcome, or you can reserve a seated tasting experience to fully immerse yourself in the art, wine, and atmosphere that define Jessup Cellars.