Meet Three Lambertville Creatives
by Merle Citron
This article was originally written for Icon Magazine.
Gwenn Seemel, Artist
Lambertville artist, writer, illustrator, muralist, video producer, and public speaker, Gwenn Seemel, is a human dynamo. Gwenn has been creating art every day for more than 22 years.
“It began this way,” Gwenn explained. “My brother encouraged me to become an artist, when he told me that my drawing of him as the captain of a spaceship ‘wasn’t bad.’”
In school, Gwenn took a class in intaglio printmaking and intaglio has made all the difference in Gwenn’s art, which is filled with bold color and crosshatching.
“The tiny dynamic marks that make up my art, give it its unique look and my main purpose as an artist. They’re a reminder that at the atomic level, matter is energy. My brushstrokes emphasize that movement.”
Since 2012, Gwenn has written and illustrated seven books. “These books represent my thoughts about mental health, literacy, creativity, copyright, queerness, and science. In 2014, I spoke at a conference about the role of imitation in creativity and then produced a book entitled You Share Good, which reveals why my art is not copyrighted. You could call me child-free, meat-free, god-free, and gender-free, but only if you remember that I’m not a negation.”
Gwenn—who prefers the use of non-binary pronouns like they, their, and them—loves painting portraits, filled with layers of color and geometric patterns, which Gwenn explained, are a touchstone for who that person wants to be. Much of their art is an attempt to reframe misapprehensions and intervene in injustice.
Gwenn’s art has appeared in Newsweek, the cover of an Oxford University Press Book. Gwenn has exhibited their art in numerous solo and group exhibitions worldwide, and is in many public collections including: Bibliotheque Nationale de France, Paris, France, and the City of Portland‘s Public works collection, Willamette University, Salem, OR.
A public speaker about the beliefs and purpose of their art, Gwenn has been interviewed by NJarts.net, and many local newspapers and publications. Gwenn also received a 2026 Fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.
Currently, Gwenn is participating in the 2026 creation of Philadelphia’s 52 Weeks of Firsts, a yearlong celebration of the nation’s 250th anniversary, with 52 weeks of first events, which historically occurred in Philadelphia.
Gwenn is creating three of the 52 “firsts” sculptures, which are three foot tall, hard-coated polystyrene sculptures, shaped as the number one, and will be placed around the city. Gwenn’s #1 creations depict the first steamboat for passengers and freight, the first zoo, and the First Continental Congress.
Visit Gwenn’s website: GwennSeemel.com
Kate Gallison, Writer
Kate Gallison, mystery book writer, has lived in Lambertville for 40 years, and has been writing for 60 years. Kate is gifted with a quick wit, loves to sew, collects miniatures, and worked in computer programming, and civil service for 20 years. She stated, “I write to help lift people’s spirits with humor, absurdity, and to take their minds off of whatever is bothering them.”
Kate began writing in kindergarten and wrote her first short piece, a sci-fi story in 1st grade. Kate’s first mystery novel, Unbalanced Accounts, published by Little Brown, was favorably reviewed by the New York Times. Kate has published 16 novels, two of which she wrote under the pseudonym, Irene Fleming.
Many of her mysteries take place in small towns, carved from Lambertville. Her historical novels required that Kate do a great deal of research, especially Freddie Zorn and the Dark Invaders: a novel of WWI.
Kate has written a series of books featuring Nick Magaracz, a Trenton private detective, as well as five traditional murder mysteries about a woman priest in the Episcopal Church. Kate’s Emily Daggett Weiss mysteries take place during the days of the silent movies. The first of these, The Edge of Ruin, won the New Jersey Studies Academic Alliance prize for fiction. Her current series, The Witches of Washington, contains biting satire depicting the ongoing battle between seven women with assorted paranormal powers, their husbands, and Washington, D.C. enemies.
Her newest book, The Return of the Toad, is the sequel to The Witches of Washington. Most of Kate’s novels are currently available on Amazon.
Visit Kate’s website: KateGallison.wordpress.com/books
Matt DeProspero, Artist
Lambertville artist and teacher, Matt DeProspero, is the owner of MADE Gallery, a recent addition to a blossoming Church Street. “Art is my way of communicating with the world,” Matt explained. “My father wanted me to go to school, get an education, and work in an office, where I could meet pretty girls.”
Matt wanted to be an artist. As a young student, Matt’s teachers realized that he liked to draw. He chose to go to Hussian College of Art in Philadelphia, where he studied illustration and design, as well as working from live models. Matt also received a certificate in painting and drawing from the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts. For 20 years he worked in advertising and graphic design.
Although some of Matt’s oil paintings are large, he always begins by painting his vision of the outside world in a small sketch pad, creating miniature paintings. His sketch book is filled with whatever Lambertville offers him. Sometimes it’s the river, the ripples, reflections, and the light. His Lambertville cityscapes involve his love of architecture. Best of all, Matt loves to paint plein air.
“A camera can never pick up the color of the sensitivity of your eye, as well as value and composition,” he noted. Matt is also a drummer and knows that music and art are all about rhythms, repetitions, and variations. “In my art I like to have forms that echo things, but they’re not exactly the same.”
Matt strives to capture a fleeting sense of time and place by interpreting the atmosphere, color and light of each scene, whether a landscape, interior or still-life. His work has been in many group exhibitions, plein air painting competitions and festivals around the country.
Visit Matt’s website: MattDeprospero.com
Hey, you rule! Please leave a tip.