By BERNADETTE SUKLEY

Special to The Press

Artist Lydia Panas, her husband, Ed Baldrige, and Omar, their 14-year-old Spanish Water Dog, live quietly tucked away in an oasis of forest and field in Greenwich Township, Berks County.

Omar disrupted the tranquility earlier this year when he fell through the ice into the property’s large pond.

His rescue made headlines as two local fire companies Kutztown and Kempton were called in.

Panas and her family had gotten Omar as a puppy.

“He was 6-weeks-old, and we got him after our dog, Hercules, died,” Panas said. “My son wanted his own dog.

“We wanted a dog known for its herding ability and one that was good with people.”

While Omar’s rescue was successful, Panas had to wrestle with some uncomfortable thoughts.

“I was thinking, ‘How were we going to tell the kids?’”

Panas and her husband started their family in New York and later moved near Kutztown to raise their three children.

Though the children are grown and have moved away, they love Omar.

“Losing Omar would have been so hard on them,” she said.

As an artist, so much of what happens to Panas influences her work.

Would Omar’s experience in the icy pond day affect future creations?

“No, not really,” Panas explained. “Ironically, my work centers around fear, longing and triumph - which is just what happened with Omar.”

But don’t expect to see a lovable fuzzball in any of Panas’ creations.

“I look around at society at large and see so much adversity and sadness, as well as joy,” she said. “I’m interested in how we can make positive change.”

She said the beauty and the difficulty sit side-by-side in her work as in life.

Panas is a visual artist using photography and videography.

“I work with large and medium film photography and also video,” she explained. “I don’t see my work as documenting or illustrating my subjects.

“I use the camera differently, more like a paintbrush or a text,” Panas said. “The images say what I want them to say, not the other way around. I don’t see myself as a photographer, but as a visual artist who uses photography and video to state my case.”

Her work has been exhibited in the Allentown Art Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College Chicago, and the Museum of Photographic Arts in San Diego’s Balboa Park among others.

She is the recipient of a Whitney Museum Independent Study Fellowship, as well as a Center for Emerging Visual Artists Fellowship.

She has two monographs, but one, “The Mark of Abel” (Kehrer Verlag, 2012) was named a best coffee table book by the Daily Beast.

“I’ve had an interest in art and literature, and how the mind works since I was a child,” Panas said. “I earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology, with an emphasis on literature and art.”

Since then she’s shared her love of art with others.

“I’ve been an artist and taught photography at the college level for over 30 years,” she said.

Early on, Panas had learned to draw and paint somewhat classically but her photography training pivoted toward the theoretical.

“I’ve always been more interested in the conceptual aspects of photography,” she stated.

Born in Athens, Greece, Panas’ parents came to the U.S. to finish their medical degrees and then returned to their native land.

“After a few years, my parents changed their minds and we moved back,” she said. “My parents settled in Allentown where I finished high school before departing for college.

“I went to school in Boston for psychology.”

She then moved to New York City and earned a second Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in photography when she found she could directly express herself with the camera.

The converted barn on their property serves as her studio.