THE ARTFUL MIND
NOVEMBER 2014 MONTHLY BERKSHIRE ARTZINE
Artist Jennifer Pazienza
Photographed by Joy Cummings
THE SOURCE FOR PROMOTING ART SINCE 1994
RENAISSANCE ARTS CENTER 420 STOCKBRIDGE RD. GREAT BARRINGTON, MA 413. 528. 9600
Time for Art!
• Print-making • Mobiles • Mosaic designing (Pique Assiette) Puppets • T-shirt silk screen & more! n • Learn to make arts n’crafts that have been cherished for 100’s of years. n • Make art gifts in a sound, safe and comfortable envirnonment n • Charming artistic setting for children and adults n Your Instructor: Harryet Candee BFA ART ED DEGREE / NYU n Call the school and ask for ‘The-Artful-Mind-Harryet-discount!!’
8 week course ~ weekends and weekdays
413.528.9600
renaissanceartscenter.org
N Calendar of Events N November 2014
museums & galleries
510 WARREN STREET GALLERY Hudson, NY • 518-822-0510 Kate Knapp featured artist for November. “Manhattan” show
A.P.E. GALLERY 126 Main St. Northampton, MA • 413-896-6812 www.apearts.org The Diorama Show: 8 Artists: Judith Abraham, Kathy Couch, Sally Curcio, Beckie Kravetz, Jane Lund, Lindsay Palermo, Elizabeth Stone, and Michael Tillyer, Nov. 7-Dec. 7, 2014 Tues.-Sun. 12-5, Fri. 12-8. Reception: Fri, Nov. 14, 2014, 5-8 p.m.
BACKYARD HEIRLOOMS 525 South Main St, Gt Barrington, MA • 413 528-3095 Architectural Sculpture for the home and garden. Featuring custom birdhouses, tree houses, kid scapes & natural functional art BRILL GALLERY 243 Union St., Eclipse Mill, studio 109, North Adams, MA • 413664-4353 / brillgallery109.com / info@brillgallery109.com The Mohawk Trail Nude Tattoo Project (this is awesome!)
CHAIWALLA TEA HOUSE 1 Main St, Salisbury, CT Marguerite Bride’s paintings from her winter scenes, and those from her trip to Ireland will be in the gallery to be enjoyed the month of November
2 • NOvEMBER 2014 THE ARTFUL MIND
FRONT STREET GALLERY 129 Front St., Housatonic, MA • 413-274-6607 / 413-528-9546, or cell at 413-429-7141 Housatonic Gallery for students and artists. Featuring watercolors by Kate Knapp (Saturday and Sunday 12-5pm or by appointment)
GOOD PURPOSE GALLERY 40 Main St., Lee, MA Jennifer Pazienza, Un-Earthed Selected Works, Oct 2 - Nov 17. There will be an Artist Talk on Saturday, November 8, 10 11:30am, at the gallery
HAMPDEN GALLERY AT THE UNIvERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS AMHERST Main Gallery South: The Meek Shall Inherit co-curated by BERNARD LEIBOv & ELIZABETH KEITHLINE Nov 9 - Dec 2, 2014, Reception: Sun, Nov 9, 2 to 4pm & HAMPDEN MAIN GALLERY north: ELIZABETH KEITHLINE: Only The Strong Survive Nov 9 - December 2, 2014. Reception: Sun, Nov 9, 2 to 4pm JANET COOPER www.janetcooperdesigns.com Fabric sculpture “Waiting for Judah” on display, thru Nov 8, Barrett Art Gallery, Poughkeepie, NY
JOHN DAVIS GALLERY 362½ Warren Street • Hudson, New York 518.828.5907 / art@johndavisgallery.com Theodore Roszak Lithographs Thurs Nov 6: solo exhibition of lithographs from the estate of
Theodore Roszak in the Main Galleries. The work will be on display through November 30th with a reception for the artist on the second Sat of the show, Sat Nov 15, 6-8:00pm KUNST GALLERY 21 Park Place, Hudson, NY• 917733-8598 www.steverosenzweig.com Steven Rosensweig, artist, solo show of new paintings. Gallery is open on weekends and by appointment
LAUREN CLARK FINE ART 25 Railroad Street, Great Barrington, MA • 413-528-0432 / www.LaurenClarkFineArt.com; Lauren@LaurenClarkFineArt.com “New Beginnings” Collection, art exhibit by FreshStart Brands. Nov 8 - Nov 16, opening Sat Nov 8, 5-7pm; folowed by “Small Works in Several Dimensions, 2014”, more than 20 artists, Nov 22 - Jan 11. Reception Sat Nov 22, 4-7pm. MARGUERITE BRIDE NUarts Studios, Studio #9, 311 North St., Pittsfield, MA margebride-paintings.com • 413-841-1659 Original Watercolors, house portraits, commissions, lessons THE IMPORIUM 319 Main St, Gt Barrington, MA 413 528-1660 Exhibit in Art, come see!
MORGAN LEHMAN GALLERY 535 West 22nd St, New York, NY • 212.268.6699 morganlehmangallery.com
LAURA BALL: Endlings: thru Nov 15, 2014, Rob Carter: thru 16 - Nov 15 THE MORRISON GALLERY 208 Old Barn Road near the inters. Rts 7 & 341 in Kent, CT. • 860-927-4501 / wm@morrisongallery.com / www.morrisongallery.com George-Ann Gowan, til Nov 16. NO. SIX DEPOT ROASTERY AND CAFÉ 6 Depot Street in West Stockbridge, MA • www.sixdepot.com See full schedule on website
NORMAN ROCKWELL MUSEUM Rte 183, Stockbridge, MA • 413-298-4100 Mort Künstler: The Art of Adventure: Nov 8 - March 8, 2015. Sat, Nov 15, 6 to 8:30 p.m. Meet acclaimed artist Mort Künstler, known for his meticulously researched historical paintings and illustrations. Original artworks created for such popular twentieth century publications as Men's Story, Sports Afield, Outdoor Life, American Weekly, and The Saturday Evening Post, as well as movie posters, book jackets, advertisements, and history paintings reflect diverse artistic genres and the evolution of a distinguished sixty year career. Artist commentary at 6:30 p.m., followed by a reception and cash bar. Books and prints signed by Mr. Künstler will be available in the Museum store. Admission $20; free for Museum members. RSvP by November 7 by contacting the Museum at rsvp@nrm.org. SAMUEL DORSKY MUSEUM OF ART State University of New York at New Paltz 1 Hawk Drive, New Paltz, NY • 845-257-3844 Hours: Wednesday-Sunday: 11 am - 5 pm Dick Polich: Transforming Metal into Art. Curated by Daniel Belasco. Morgan Anderson Gallery, Howard Greenberg Family Gallery, and Corridor, thru December 14, 2014 SANDISFIELD ART CENTER 5 Hammertown Rd, Sandisfield, MA Isabeth Hardy, “Joy”, Oct 4 - Dec 14. Reception Oct 4, 2-4pm.
SCHANTZ GALLERIES 3 Elm St, Stockbridge, MA • 413-298-3044 www.schantzgalleries.com A destination for those seeking premier artists working in glass. (11 - 5 daily) SIENNA PATTI CONTEMPORARY 80 Main St, Lenox, MA CARINA CHITSAZ-SHOSHTARY: Where Blue Hides After Dark: Oct 18 - Nov 16 ST. FRANCIS GALLERY Rt 102, South Lee, MA (2 mi. east from the Red Lion Inn) “If Walls Could Talk”, thru Nov. 24 THE HARRISON GALLERY 39 Spring Street, Williamstown, MA • 413.458.1700 Gracia Dayton: Wet on Wet, Nov 1 - 30, 2014 (Mon - Sat 10-5:30, Sun 11-4)
music/theatre
CLOSE ENCOUNTERS WITH MUSIC The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, Gt. Barrington, MA • 413-528-0100 / www.cewm.org Best of the Baroque, Saturday, December 6, 6PM
POINT OF VIEW PLAYERS 440 Whitehall Rd, Albany, NY St. Sophia Greek Church (auditorium) “Always A Bridesmaid”. Comedy. Nov 21, 7pm, Nov 22, 2:30, Sun, Nov 23, 2:30, Fri, Sat & Sun. Tix sold at door, $15.
SPOTTY DOG 440 Warren St, Hudson, NY Quiet in the Head, Nov 8, 8pm. Influences from Middle Eastern and Eastern European music.
WILLIAM BACZEK FINE ARTS 36 MAIN ST., NORTHAMPTON, MA• 413-587-9880 www.wbfinearts.com / info@wbfinearts.com Anne Lilly will be showing a collection of stainless steel kinetic sculptures and Carrie Seid will be exhibiting new abstract works constructed from aluminum, mylar, acrylic and silk. The exhibitions will run concurrently, and will be on display from Wed, Nov 12 - Sat, Dec 13, 2014. Reception on Sat , Nov 15, 5 - 7pm
WAM Shakespeare & Company’s Elayne P. Bernstein Center, in the Berry Family Studio (Studio 3), 70 Kemble Street, Lenox, MA • 413-637-3353 In Darfur, a play by Winter Miller, will receive its New England premiere as WAM Theatre’s fifth annual fall production. October 30 – November 16, 2014 Sunday, Nov 2, 2:30 pm, Fri, Nov 7, 7 pm, Sat, Nov 8, 7 pm, Sun, Nov 9, 7pm, Fri, Nov 14, 7pm, Sat, Nov 15, 7pm, Sun, Nov 16, 2:30pm
workshops
BLUE HORSE REPETORY COMPANY Loralee@Bluehorserep.com • 845 721-2493 The Theatre Institute At Sage College, in Troy NY Fall classes are now forming at the Capital Districts premier acting school. Perfect your craft and study with the Blue Horse Repertory Company IS183 ART SCHOOL OF THE BERKSHIRES 13 Willard Hill Rd.,Stockbridge, MA • 413-298-5252 -The Potter's Wheel w/Ben Evans, Wednesdays from 6 - 9 pm, 10/29 - 12/3; -Jewelry Design & Metal Smithing w/ James Kennedy, Mondays from 6 - 9 pm, 11/3 - 12/1; -Introduction to Watercolor w/Paula Gottlieb Saturday 11/15, 10 am - 4 pm -Dyeing Party w/Jeanne Marklin Sunday 11/16, 1 - 4 pm
SABINE VOLLMER VON FALKEN PHOTOGRAPHIC WORKSHOPS • 413-298-4933 www.sabinephotoart.com, info@sabinephotoart.com Nov. 18 and 19th. view Light with a Critical Eye - explore the beautiful light of the Berkshires by taking a weekend photography workshop.
SCOVILLE LIBRARY 38 Main Street, Salisbury Ct • 860-435-3828 www.scovillelibrary.org Scoville Film Society Thanksgiving Special, Julie and Julia, Thursday November 28. 7:00 p.m. Julie & Julia was written and directed by Nora Ephron starring Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci. The film contrasts the life of chef Julia Child in the early years of her culinary career with the life of young New Yorker Julie Powell, who aspires to cook all 524 recipes in Child's cookbook in 365 days.(2009)
UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST CONGREGATION OF THE CATSKILLS 320 Sawkill Road, Kingston, NY Friday, Nov. 7 Films of Palestine Series presents “To See If I’m Smiling” from 7:00 - 8:30pm. This film is the personal account of six women in the Israeli Defense Force who served in the Occupied Territories. The documentary explores the moral challenges female soldiers face in being part of the oppression of the Palestinian people. Writer and director, Tamar Yarom, studied film at the London Film School and psychology at the Hebrew University. Winner of six festival awards for best documentary. Send in your calendar submissions by 10th of the month prior to publication ...
see us on ISSUU.COM
film
HISTORIC NORTHAMPTON 46 Bridge Street, Northampton, MA • 413.584.6011 www.historic-northampton.org Fast Forward Film Series, November 16th, 3pm at Historic Northampton, "OUR NORTHAMPTON, THEIR NORTHAMPTON" Our November 16th program will present excerpts from six major feature films made in Northampton. After the screening, former Northwestern District Attorney and local historian W. Michael Ryan will lead a discussion and show contemporary still images of the filming locations THE ARTFUL MIND NOVEMBER 2014 •3
Isabeth Hardy
JOY
October 4 - December 14 SanDiSfielD art Center
EUNICE AGAR
Eunice Agar, Blueberry Fields, Maine
PAINTINGS, DRAWING, PRINTS www.euniceagar.com
5 Hammertown road, Sandisfield, Ma isabeth.art@gmail.com www.isabethhardy.com
FroNT STrEET GAllEry
KATE KNAPP The Manhattan Paintings AT
510 WArrEN STrEET GAllEry, HudSoN, N.y
November 1 - 31
FRONT STREET GALLERY Painting Classes on Monday and Wednesday mornings 10 - 1pm at the Studio and Thursday mornings 10am - 1pm out in the field. Open to all
4 • NOvEMBER 2014
THE ARTFUL MIND
413-274-6607 413-429-7141 (cell) 413-528-9546 Gallery Hours: Saturday and Sunday 12-5 or by appointment FRONT STREET, downtown HOUSATONIC, MA
Artist
Eleanor Lord
One of many at...
510 WARREN STREET, HUDSON, NY
WWW.510WARRENSTREETGALLERY.COM
518-822-0510
lAurEN ClArK FiNE ArT presents
if Walls Can Talk
“Small Works in Several dimensions, 2014” 20+ Artists from the Berkshires and Beyond Nov 22, 2014 - Jan 11, 2015
Reception for the Artists Saturday, November 22 from 4-7 pm
LAUREN CLARK FINE ART
25 railroad Street, Great Barrington, MA 413.528.0432
LaurenClarkFineArt.com
THru NovEMBEr 24, 2014 J. Ciolfi, Field and Sky
Saint Francis Gallery LEE. MA (next to fire dept.) complete schedule: www.saintfrancisgallery.com 413.717. 5199 open fri-mon 10-5 pm
1370 Pleasant street. route 102
THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014 •5
THE ARTFUL MIND ARTZINE NOVEMBER 2014
Life is about using the whole box of crayons. ~RuPaul
Jennifer Pazienza Photographs by Joy Cummings
Michael Lavin Flower Photographer Eunice Agar... 10 Planet Waves for NOVEMBER Eric Francis.....12 Jennifer Pazienza Artist Harryet Candee ...14
The Tree Fort Part I & II Richard Britell ... 20
Simply Sasha Delicious handed down recipe! Sasha Seymour...20 Contributing Writers and Monthly Columnists Eunice Agar, Richard Britell, Jane Feldman, Eric Francis, Sasha Seymour, Amy Tanner Photographers Cassandra Sohn, Jane Feldman Joy Cummings. Sabine Vollmer von Falken Publisher Harryet Candee
Copy Editor Marguerite Bride
Advertising and Graphic Design Harryet Candee
Box 985, Great Barrington, MA 01230 artfulmind@yahoo.com
READ THE ARTFUL MIND on ISSUU.COM at this link: http://issuu.com/theartfulmindartzine/docs/the_artful_mind_f or_issuu.com_aug_2/0
413 854 4400
ALL MATERIAL due the 10th of the month prior to publication
FYI: ©Copyright laws in effect throughout The Artful Mind for logo & all graphics including text material. Copyright laws for photographers and writers throughout The Artful Mind. Permission to reprint is required in all instances. In any case the issue does not appear on the stands as planned due to unforeseeable circumstances beyond our control, advertisers will be compensated on a one to one basis. Disclaimer rights available upon request. Serving the Art community with the intention of enhancing communication and sharing positive creativity in all aspects of our lives.
6 • NOvEMBER 2014 THE ARTFUL MIND
MUSIC STORE
Why Music? Why local? Why play? Because it matters. The Music Store has begun its fifteenth year in business in Great Barrington. Helping the community, near and far, make music has been an enjoyable and productive enterprise for us. And we look forward to continuing this mission into the second half of our second decade. Some of the fun includes: • Composite Acoustic guitars (the forever guitar!) and their peerless travel guitar, the Cargo, made of carbon graphite and impervious to most changes of temperature and humidity • 50+ models of Ukulele: Soprano, Concert, Tenor and Baritone, acoustic and acoustic/electric, six string, resonator and the remarkable U-Bass! • How about a Cordoba Cuatro? • Or a West African Djembe? • Try Takamine for a guitar to suit almost any budget (Limited Editions and GREAT SALES, too)! And so many more brands and types from $150-$5000. • Ever heard of Dr. Easy’s Drunk Bay Cigar Boxes? Acoustic/electric cigar box guitars which bring the past into the present with a delightful punch, acoustically AND plugged in! • Harmonicas, in (almost) every key • Picks (exotic, too!), strings (!!), sticks and reeds • violins, Mandolins, Dulcimers, Banjos • Handmade and international percussion instruments • Native American and locally made bamboo and wooden flutes We remain your neighborhood music store, where advice and help are free and music is the universal language. Working with local luthiers and repairmen we offer stringed and band instrument repair. And we just may have something you haven’t seen before (an acoustic/electric Kalimba, perhaps?). We match (or beat) most on-line prices for the merchandise that we sell, and do so in person, for the most part cheerfully (though we reserve the right to glower a little when asked if we can ‘do better’ on the price of a pick!)! Come and see us soon and help us celebrate our 15th year!!! Your patronage helps the community and makes it a more tuneful and happy place! The Music Store, located at 87 Railroad Street in Great Barrington, is open Wednesdays through Sundays and by appointment. Call us at 413-528-2460, or visit us on line at www.themusicstoreplus.com
SAINT FRANCIS GALLERY LONNY KALFUS
IF WALLS COULD TALK
Since prehistoric time man has made his mark on the “walls” of his surroundings communicating his vision and experiences to others in unique ways to have them understand what he sees in his “mind’s eye.” Works of art have continued throughout time with a creative vision and a prophetic message, yet what they speak of is difficult to translate into language. Sometimes it can only be expressed in poetry another art form that lies outside of the boundaries of language itself. The artists in this new show, “If Walls Could Talk,” use the gallery walls to create windows into what they experience. Everything that is contained in their work even the written word, letters, symbols, shapes, color ….the drawn line itself escapes its boundaries on the paper or canvas, the wall itself. There is a magic in how their meaning is revealed. All of the artworks together are a vibrant collection of imaginative “conversations” that will speak to you in ways that words often cannot. It is a vibrant collection and our gallery walls are transformed by the art. Our walls have unique expressions on them. They provoke personal inquiry. Some speak loudly, some speak softly yet eloquently thru pattern, line, color, figure, ground, and in multiple mediums. These works are not about something. They are something, something that provides a corridor into your mind where thoughts and visions mingle. Each of these poetic performances is personal yet they also carry our culture and the fabric of our existence with them as well. We need to leave our mark somewhere it can be seen by others. It is a way of being alive – present - in front of anyone who dares to engage with genuine curiosity and continue the exploration. This show continues the tradition of having artists from our community present to speak to us in their own creative ways. Their work tells you how they continue to grow, evolve and explore their world and also what their special vision is. Our artists have a mastery in controlling “the expressive silence” on these walls. This is the experience of St. Francis Gallery. St. Francis Gallery - Rt 102, South Lee just 2 miles east from the Red Lion Inn. Gallery hours: November show open each Friday thru Monday 10-5pm.
BLUE HORSE REPETORY COMPANY Loralee@Bluehorserep.com • 845 721-2493 The Theatre Institute At Sage College, in Troy NY
Fall classes are now forming at the Capital Districts premier acting school.
SABINE PHOTO ART
ACTING
PAT BONAvITACOLA
COLLINS/EDITIONS formerly BERKSHIRE DIGITAL
After seven years of working for artists and photographers as Berkshire Digital, we have changed our name to collins|editions. We are a fine art reproduction service that offers the highest quality digital photography & reproduction of paintings as well as Giclée printing on archival papers and canvas with sizes up to 42” x 90”. Artists & photographers use us to create limited editions of their images. Private collectors and galleries use us to document their collections. Whether the reproduction needs are for archiving, printing, books, magazines, postcards or internet use, BD adheres to very strict color controls along with delivering stunning detail by using either a large format camera with a Better Light™ digital scanning back for making giclee prints as well as the best DSLR cameras for publication & internet uses. In addition to the photography and printing services, collins|editions also offers graphic design, enabling clients to create show announcements, post cards and brochures. The website, www.CollinsEditions.com has a complete overview, lots of information and pricing. The owner, Fred Collins, has been a commercial photographer for over 30 years having had studios in Boston and Stamford. He offers 20 years of experience with Photoshop™ enabling retouching, restoration and enhancement. The studio is located in Mt Washington but dropoff and PU can be arranged at other locations. Collins|editions studio, 220 East St, Mt Washington, Massachusetts; 413-644-9663, www.CollinsEditions.com
FOR NON-ACTORS AND ACTORS
Patrick Bonavitacola is now offering classes and private coaching for non-actors and actors. Pat received his training at the Lee Strasberg Institute and the world famous Actors Studio. At the Actors Studio he worked under Strasberg’s guidance along with Elia Kazan, Lee Grant, Shelley Winters, Mark Rydell, John Lehne, and William Greaves. William Greaves, Pat’s mentor, described him as follows: “One of the most talented actors I’ve come across in years—He could very well become the next Pacino or DeNiro.” Pat teaches non-actors and actors the craft that was taught to him at the Studio—“Method Acting” techniques for relaxation, concentration, sensory exploration, affective memory, character development, and scene study, along with the mechanics of emotional expression. His students learn to get in touch with their feelings and to express them without inhibitions. Pat works with actors, therapists, people wishing to improve their presentation skills (lawyers, businessmen and women, sales and marketing executives, etc.), along with others whose main concern is personal development and growth. This work will benefit anyone wishing to understand human behavior and motivation as well those wishing to unlock their imagination and creativity. Those interested in classes, private coaching, or further information call 413-637-9913. pjb5@verizon.net
Sabine vollmer von Falken, a published and collected fine art photographer, has a number of specialties. One of these is her collaboration and focus on commercial and editorial portraiture with professionals to provide their publishers and labels with image portfolios. Sabine’s talent lies in both choosing the location and working with the subtleties of lighting. Her eye for the “Yes Moment” results in timeless imagery. She has the talent to bring introspection to the art of life style photography. She is the interviewer, catalyst and image-maker. Her INSIDE and OUT studio is located in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Fine Art Prints are directly available through sabine’s studio. Photographic workshops are scheduled for November: BEHIND THE CAMERA Sabine’s eye for detail provides students with everlasting creative tools. Explore the beautiful Berkshires by taking a weekend photography workshop. In this workshop participants learn how natural light can create dramatic or lyrical images and enjoy the magic of the unplanned. Designed for serious learners who are interested in improving their skills. All participants are asked to bring a digital SLR camera. The hope is to concentrate on the artistic and critical eye. Dates: November 18 and 19, 2014. Sabine is a member of The American Society of Media Photographers asmp. The International Center of Photography ICP, and the Wedding Photojournalist Association, WPJA. For more detailed info please contact Sabine Vollmer von Falken Photography Studio at~ www.sabinephotoart.com, info@sabinephotoart.com, tel. 413-298-4933.
Lying in bed would be an altogether perfect and supreme experience if only one had a colored pencil long enough to draw on the ceiling. ~G.K. Chesterton
If people want to make war they should make a color war, and paint each others’ cities up in the night in pinks and greens. ~Yoko Ono THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014 • 7
LAUREN CLARK FINE ART SMALL WORKS LORRAINE KLAGSBRUN, “BLOCK PARTY”, COLLAGE, 6” x 10”
Lauren Clark Fine Art invites you to the showing of “Small Works in Several Dimensions, 2014”. More than twenty artists from the Berkshires and beyond with work including drawings, etchings, paintings and sculpture from the small to the very small. The show runs from November 22 through January 11, 2015, with a reception for the artists Saturday, November 22 from 4-7 pm. Come, celebrate the season and the many artists who make our lives more wonderful. Lauren Clark Fine Art, 25 Railroad Street, Great Barrington, MA. For more information call the gallery at 413528-0432 or visit the website at LaurenClarkFineArt.com Artists can color the sky red because they know it’s blue. Those of us who aren’t artists must color things the way they really are or people might think we’re stupid. ~Jules Feiffer
8• NOvEMBER 2014 THE ARTFUL MIND
CLOSE ENCOUNTERS WITH MUSIC DANIEL SWENBERG
On Saturday, December 6 at 6 PM, CEWM presents Best of the Baroque — A Holiday Celebration at the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center. From the sublime to the humorous (Telemann’s “Canary Cantata,” the tale of the cat that swallowed the canary — in the spirit of opera buffa), this program has all the elements that make up the music of the era: the extravagance, ornateness, and drama—as in Bach’s secular cantata “Amore Traditore”—Teacherous Love and Handel’s aria from “Ode to St. Cecilia” (“What passion cannot music raise and quell!”). No program on the Baroque would be complete without a vivaldi concerto (for two cellos), and Couperin’s Five Concert Pieces introduces the elegance of the French court. vocal and instrumental dazzle from 18th century Italy, Germany and England. Brilliant arias and cantatas by Telemann, Bach, Handel, Purcell and vivaldi—and arrangements from Mendelssohn’s later-period Messiah. With Assaf Sommer, harpsichord; Mischa Bouvier, baritone; Jennifer Rivera, mezzo-soprano; Yehuda Hanani, cello; and the Consort Chamber Players. (Adriane Post, violin; Jessica Meyer, viola; Daniel Swenberg, theorbo; Paul Dwyer, cello). These six performances are at the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, 14 Castle Street, Great Barrington, MA. A reception with light refreshments follows each concert. Cewm - Tickets, $45 (Orchestra and Mezzanine) and $25 (Balcony), are available at The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center box office, 413-528-0100. Subscriptions are $225 ($195 for seniors) for a series of 6 series concerts PLUS one subscriber-only concert. www.cewm.org
ISABETH HARDY ISABETH HARDY
SANDISFIELD ART CENTER
The Sandisfield Art Center presents an exhibit of new art by Isabeth Hardy. Her upcoming show “Joy” will run from October 4 thru December 14 at the Sandisfield Art Center, 5 Hammertown Road in Sandisfield, Massachusetts. Says Isabeth, “When I paint, I have an encounter with color and with the medium I am using at the moment. I bring with me all I love and want to have around, all I find problematical and want to understand, all I want to confront, and all I want to celebrate and even try to bring into a state of peace and joy. To do this, I begin usually with color and keep putting down color, often till I find out what it is all about at the time. My work is about seeing, listening, and bringing into awareness. It is also about joy, the joy of mark making, of swimming in and with color, of shape and space and just the amazingness of being here and being able to play or search with the material”. An artist and educator, Isabeth Bakke Hardy has a BA in American Literature from Middlebury College, vermont, and a Master’s Degree in Cultural Education from vermont College. She spent more than twenty years involved in the founding of and teaching at the Circle School, in San Antiono Texas. The Circle School, still in operation today, is a creative school for children ages 3-10. The school is based on the inspiration of the painter Nicholas Roerich, who fostered the concept of peace through culture and building education on the arts. Within the last decade, Hardy has been making monoprints, as well as continuing her exploration of oils and watercolors. Hardy’s paintings and prints are in private collections and the Readers’ Digest collection. Isabeth Hardy – email: Isabeth.art@gmail.com; website: www.isabethhardy.com
Color is my day-long obsession, joy and torment. ~Claude Monet
MARGUERITE BRIDE MARGUERITE BRIDE, SLEIGH RALLY IN STOCKBRIDGE
LAUREN CLARK FINE ART FRESH START ART ExHIBIT
CHAIWALLA TEA HOUSE GALLERY
Marguerite Bride will be exhibiting new watercolors at the Chaiwalla Tea House Gallery, 1 Main Street, Salisbury, Connecticut during the entire month of November. On display will be new winter scenes of the region plus some paintings inspired by a recent trip to Ireland. In additional to original framed watercolors, there will also be bins of fine art reproductions for sale. However, you must stay for the food. Mary O’Brien, gallery owner and teahouse chef extraordinaire creates a wonderful variety of delicious breakfast, brunch and lunch dishes. Bride will also be exhibiting at the 6th annual holiday show in Pittsfield sponsored by Alchemy Initiative. The Handmade Holiday Festival will run Saturday, December 6 from 10am to 5pm and Sunday, December 7 from 10am to 3pm at the Paterson Field House at BCC in Pittsfield, MA. You will find incredible foods, high end crafts and pottery, and of course, art, plus so much more. One-stop shopping for all those on your holiday gift list. In addition to private and semi-private lessons in watercolor technique, Bride is writing technique tutorials. Check out her “What’s New” post on her website for her experience and tips while painting on watercolor canvas. And for an extra special discount, visit Bride’s facebook page “Marguerite Bride Watercolors” for the special offer of the week. The “special” lasts only one week and then expires! There’s something different every week. Take a look! Marguerite Bride, NUarts Studios, 311 North Street, Pittsfield, Studio #9, by appointment. Call 413-442-7718, or 413-841-1659 (cell); website: margebride-paintings.com, email: margebride@aol.com
Lauren Clark Fine Art will feature the ongoing exhibition of the “New Beginnings” Collection - An Art Exhibit by FreshStart Brands. The debut of the exhibit took place in Millerton, NY in October. It is scheduled to make the rounds in a different venue each month in Columbia County and the surrounding areas. Lauren Clark will host the show from November 8 through November 16 with an opening reception Saturday, November 8 from 5-7pm. Throughout the artist reception refreshments will be served and FreshStart Music and FreshStart Apparel will be available for purchase. Lauren Clark, owner of her own eponymous gallery since 2006, has a strong connection to her business, her artists, and her community. “I am happy to support FreshStart Brands, and to be able to add this exhibition to my list of artist presentations” says Lauren. FreshStart Art is a partnership between the recently recognized and reviewed FreshStart Brands and independent artists hoping to generate exposure and income for their work, while also raising money for charity. The current show includes 32 designs by former and current art students at the Rhode Island School of Design. In 2012, Marc Rosenthal began giving the students in his illustration class at RISD (Rhode Island School of Design) an assignment, based on FreshStart’s unifying concept of “New Beginnings”. Their work developed into a fun, thought provoking and beautiful body of work. Now officially known as the “New Beginnings” Collection, the assignment has become a yearly event. The artwork is also available for viewing online at the FreshStart website. FreshStart Brands provides marketing and financial support for independent artists, local businesses and charitable resources through their website and newsletter. Their mission is to facilitate creative thought and innovative solutions to personal, community and global, social, environmental and economic issues. Product lines include FreshStart Apparel,FreshStart Art & FreshStart Music. If you have an idea on how FreshStart could help you, how you could help them or how you and FreshStart can help someone else, please visit FreshStartBrands.com or For Non-Actors... and Actors call 518-303-6353. Lauren Clark Fine Art, 25 Railroad Street, Great Barrington, MA. 413-528Patrick Bonavitacola is now 0432, offering classes and Lauren@LaurenClarkFineArt.com www.LaurenClarkFineArt.com private coaching
FRONT STREET GALLERY KATE KNAPP
Pastels, oils, acrylics and watercolors…..abstract and representational…..landscapes, still lifes and portraits….a unique variety of painting technique and styles….you will be transported to another world and see things in a way you never have before…. join us and experience something different. Painting classes continue on Monday and Wednesday mornings 10-1:30pm at the studio and Thursday mornings out in the field. These classes are open to all...come to one or come again if it works for you. All levels and materials welcome. Classes at Front Street are for those wishing to learn, those who just want to be involved in the pure enjoyment of art, and/or those who have some experience under their belt. A teacher for many years, Kate Knapp has a keen sense of each student’s artistic needs to take a step beyond. Perfect setting for setting up still lifes; lighting and space are excellent. Kate Knapp’s paintings are also on display at 510 Warren St. Gallery in Hudson, NY. Please stop by to see all the many works of art by exceptional artists. Front Street Gallery – Front Street, Housatonic, MA. Gallery open by appointment or chance. 413-528-9546 or 413-429-7141 (cell).
ACTING
413. 637. 9913
pjb5@verizon.net THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014 • 9
ARCHITECTURAL STUDY WITH YOUNG BOYS MICHALE L. FLOWER
MICHAEL LAvIN FLOWER By Eunice Agar
PHOTOGRAPHER
What is visual reality? How do our eyes work? One could become very technical about the biological mechanisms of vision – but we still don't know what happens at the moment of perception. What do we see. If several people are placed in the same environment, how will their visual memories differ, as they surely will. If skilled artists paint, draw, or sculpt the same scene at the same time, the style and content of their work will vary, often dramatically. But the same is true of a group of photographers, even with the most elementary point and shoot cameras. When photography was first invented in the nineteenth century,initially many people considered it a miraculous and totally accurate depiction of the real world – which incidentally freed painters to experiment. But very quickly they discovered the photograph could enhance, mystify, or distort reality in may ways. Professional photographers manipulate the technical ingredients of light source, time of day, type of film, lens or camera, angle of vision, darkroom techniques to create an easily recognizable individual style. Michael Flower, a master photographer who has worked and taught in Berkshire County since 1984, speaks of having refined his skills for employing these technical ingredients until they are so automatic – the proverbial ten thousand
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THE ARTFUL MIND
hours – that he can focus on abstracting an original idea from the details of reality. One of his most interesting images in a recent local exhibition depicts the shadows on a figure over life size and focused on a small area. The result is a stunning abstraction that derives its power from its origin in reality. (Picasso did the same thing, especially in his reduction prints.) Explaining his esthetic for an exhibition of his work entitled “Assembled” that was held in Boston in 2007 at the John B. Hynes veteran's Memorial Convention Center, Flower wrote: “Photographs isolate the human experience. They create the false impression of a hierarchical truth captured within their borders. My objective in “Assembled” is to extend the viewer's perception of space provided within the borders of each print. My print must reveal a reinterpreted description of what the camera has captured and my mind has imagined. “My images are the result of combining premeditated and spontaneous experiences into calculated visual statements. They offer the viewer a hyper-reality. My interest is in exploring three dimensional space as rendered on the surface the two dimensional print. I offer my photographs as a window to reveal. “Assembled” is my opportunity to redefine space. Each print should be seen as a short narrative in which photographs are partially formed expressions of a larger sentence.”
Like most creative picture makers, Flower also photographs commercial work, but he describes that objective as highly subjective as its goal is to enhance reality, making the object or activity depicted appear much more interesting, more desirable than it actually is in real life. That, of course, is the function of all advertising. However, one could argue that all depictions of the real world, whatever the style, medium, or purpose, intensify our perception of a motif that has been preselected to focus the viewer's attention. A judgment of truth or falsity enters in when we consider the intrinsic value of the idea or object presented. Does it contribute something worthwhile to our communal life. Flower's family is part of the Cuban diaspora. His mother came to this country in 1946. He was born in Queens in l958, and shortly after his birth the family traveled to Havana where his father was able to photograph the final days of the revolution when Fidel Castro arrived in Havana. The family moved to the Berkshires in l965. His family name is Lavin. His stepfather is the classical guitarist Ed Flower. His mother is the jazz vocalist, composer, arranger and international recording artist Havana Carbo. Flower attended local schools, graduating from Simon's Rock where he studied photography with Arthur Hillman. He then studied at Dartington College of Art in the United Kingdom and earned a BFA in photography at the now Philadel-
TATA & PIPO PROSPECT HILL, MICHAEL L. FLOWER
phia University of the Arts. He studied under Ron Walker, Jerry Greenfield, and Ray Metzker. Then he worked as an assistant to John Condax, photographer for The Philadelphia Ballet, and two years later in Washington, D.C. as photographic assistant for the Cuban-born commercial artist Eduardo Latour. When he returned to the Berkshires in l984, Flower opened Chiaroscuro Fine Art Photographic Gallery in Lenox. In l986 he began photographing commercial assignments, including portraits, social events, editorial assignments, product photography, and architectural projects. He also worked with his brother Robert Flower, owner of Prospect Marketing, a web design and advertising agency. His passion for architecture carried over to his photos of Havana on his first trip to Cuba as an adult in l997. He recorded amazing photographs of the European inspired architecture and the street life of the city. He says that his intentions were not judgmental. He merely tried to capture the
LOST WEEKEND-ASSEMBLED
UNTITLED xIII, MICHAEL L. FLOWER
changes in a very vibrant, rapidly developing society within the beauty of the buildings. He studied four generations of family history through letters, poetry, and photographs of his ancestors and exhibited them with his own photographs in an exhibit at Lascano Gallery in Gt. Barrington in 2007 and smaller photography salons in Manhattan. Family connections are essential to Flower. He cherishes the time he had with his grandparents. They taught him he importance of many of the values he lives by and has passed on to his daughter. Flower has been back to Cuba several times since that first trip as an adult, most recently in late 2000 and 2001 with a group of eighteen students and a professor from Simon's Rock. He considers his teaching assignments important. One of his recent projects was a commission from the Trustees of Reservations to work with a group of photography students from Monument Mountain Regional High School documenting renovations at Naumkeg in Stockbridge.
MICHAEL L. FLOWER
Nature, the man made world and the human figure, including children, whether photographed for personal or commercial reasons, are all transformed by Flower’s innate understanding of light and design into a cohesive body of work. His recent stunning advertisements for Renaissance Art School depict extraordinarily sensitive images of children which, if abstracted from the type design, can stand alone with the best so called “fine art” photography. They illustrate the aforementioned point about the validity of commercial work depending on the intrinsic value of the thing or activity depicted. And they are a clue as to why he has such passion for teaching his craft. Flower can be contacted through his web site www.michaellavinflower.com
THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014 • 11
Planet Waves If you're reading this, you just came through a rather unusual month, including Mercury retrograde, two eclipses and a wild ride of Mars in Sagittarius. The sky in November is less hectic, more focused and has a more serious tone. Serious is good -- the aspects look productive, if you're willing to bear down and maybe stay late at work whenever you need to. We will have a series of conjunctions to Saturn (the Sun, Venus and Mercury) and then something more potent than that: Mars conjunct Pluto and square Uranus. This is the month to get results. It will help immensely if you know in advance the results you want to get.
ARIES (March 20-April 19) Events this month seem destined to reveal the futility of jealousy and the thing it's made of, which is the illusion of control. If you consciously give yourself the opportunity to be submissive to existence, you will find that you have more influence than if you try to run the whole show. I understand that you may be feeling the need, on one level, to exert your power. If you do something gentler, which is to stay in contact with your desires, and responsive to the desires of others, you will be able to get the energy moving in a way that allows a real exchange and also that brings you closer to people. This is subtle territory, and the land of mixed emotions. Stay close to your desire, informed by love. TAURUS (April 19-May 20)
Why are relationships so powerful in your life? That's an honest question you seem to be asking yourself. I think you know that you need to get underneath this, rather than looking at it from the surface level, or from the viewpoint of the usual cultural myths we have about involvements with others. A particular situation or condition that has at times seemed stuck or resistant to change has indeed been a source of progress for you. And you may note the many ways the situation has evolved since it began. The astrology I'm seeing presents you with the following equation: the deeper you go, the more movement you will notice, and the more movement will be possible. You are about to enter a whole new emotional landscape, one where you will see how much freedom you really have.
GEMINI (May 20-June 21) You have collected plenty of information the past couple of months, and now you need to review it all. If this information has involved a health issue, you will probably need to discard most of it and keep the one or two gems that will point you in the direction of actual improvement. I suggest you focus on matters of sexual health: maintaining and nourishing your Scorpio parts, your hormones, your desire. Yes, desire is a vital part of sexual health, because where the sex organs are concerned, life really is a matter of use it or lose it. Some people love to hear this and others cannot stand to. It is, however, a matter of elementary biology to which we are all subject. And when the biological aspect of living critters is happy, there's a good chance the rest of them will be too. It also works the other way.
CANCER (June 21-July 22) Sexuality is at the creative core of who a person is. What is politely called socialization is often a process of conditioning natural sexuality and creativity out of a person, usually when they are young. What is left is someone who finds change and motion difficult to experience; someone who is calcified. Your ability to feel, to create, to be sexual and to change are all related. They are related to both inner and outer movement, and you have the choice to encourage or discourage these qualities in yourself. I suggest you keep your life moving any way you
12 • NOvEMBER 2014 THE ARTFUL MIND
Eric Francis
November 2014
can, in any way that feels appealing and even one or two ways that feel daunting.
LEO (July 22-Aug. 23)
What is it that creates confidence? Some people are born with it; but for most people, it's cultivated through experience. If you were to say to a young person, all the things you would prefer to avoid are the ones that will give you the most confidence. I am here to tell you that you've already built up that particular strength, and any challenges you might experience over the next month or so are things you've already been through in some form. As such you can draw on your wisdom and strength and come out feeling like you are indeed strong and wise. Note that when authentic, mixed with that will often be a touch of insecurity, which is designed to keep you on your toes.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sep. 22)
Your chart strongly suggests that this is the time to practice speaking from your feelings. You have a lot of feelings to speak about, and you could just as easily, indeed more easily, retreat into silence. But that would only reinforce the illusion that you are in this all alone. And silence is a form of attempted control, and provides the conditions necessary for self-deception. The way to stay honest and in truth to remind yourself that you're free is to share with others what you think and how you feel. You may have many reasons not to. I assure you there are several very good reasons to be bold and live as if your life depends on being true to your word about how you feel, especially when it counts the most.
LIBRA (Sep. 22-Oct. 23) I have written many times that self-esteem is the most significant problem in Western society. There are bigger problems where people don't have toilets, but on our side of the tracks, self-esteem is what you might call the plague. You've been onto this one for a while. I think you know what I'm getting at. Self-esteem regulates all other possibilities. There are some people who just naturally feel good about themselves and can live that way, though they are few and far between. You are going through a series of what you might think of as tests or experiments that will help you cultivate respect for, and confidence in, yourself. You have what it takes; you are strong and you have some energy. And you will be happy you passed through this phase of psychological growth -- once you stand up and walk right into the territory. SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 22)
You are bigger than any situation in your life. I would also remind you that no situation is intractable -- everything is subject to movement. Everything is subject to change. That fact of existence is your best friend right now, since you have a tendency to live so much of your life as if certain things will never change. Use your discernment and apply this principle to what you know you want to move on from, but doubted that you could. Remember all the time that growth and change are inseparable; that they are necessary partners. In the midst of this, I would remind you that your capacity to feel is something to embrace as your best navigational tool. Yes, the modern way of life is to eschew feelings and tap on an icon. I would say pause, feel, and be well-guided.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 22) Don't let the pressure get to you -- or rather, you don't have to. You can if you want to, though your situation feels more urgent than it is. The sense that you are approaching some limitation or obstacle is more of an inner reality than an outer one. And there is a corresponding inner development -- that of resolve and determination in a way that you have rarely
ever felt in such a focused way. Yes, you are born under one of the most ambitious signs, capable of marshaling your energy like few others can. Yet as I am sure you've been aware, you must gather your strength in a new way, to meet objectives that you have yet to fully encounter. If you cooperate, the outcome is certain.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 20) Often has it been said that only you have the power to change yourself. Yet this is either too much responsibility for most people to handle, or it defies some other logic that external factors are what really make the difference. This month Mars and Pluto form a conjunction in your birth sign, an indication that you have the ability to rewrite just about any facet of your existence. Yet this cannot be haphazard, left to chance or done with blurry vision. You must focus, you must choose, and most of all you must hold yourself accountable for what you want and what you create. If you think of this as the cost of success, you will see that it's not so high after all, though more than most think they can afford.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 19) You seem more determined than ever to crack through the limitations of the past. The most direct way to do that is to question your own priorities. You have been doing this, though at a glacial pace. You have made changes, though it looks like there are many more that you have, for some reason, held off on. No doubt that is because you have not felt ready, though I suggest you question the role of your attachment to the past. People seem to think it natural that they get 'set in their ways', as if this were some kind of entitlement. That may be true, but you don't want everything to which you are entitled -- which would be a fine way to sum up the astrology of the next four weeks.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20) Clearly you are preparing for something. Yes it's true, life is one long exercise in preparation, though this is unusual and you are in a particularly sensitive phase of that preparation. One element of your life to focus on is ethics. That does not only mean doing right by others; it means making sure you do right by yourself, and that you have taken care of all your necessary plans and details. Make sure that you hold others to the same standard: that we all keep our promises. Be sure you've read the books that you know you're supposed to read, in order to be fully prepared for whatever it is you're about to do. Proceed meticulously, take each step carefully, and gather your strength for the big move. ~ Read Eric Francis daily at PlanetWaves.net
Advertise in The Artful Mind! This is holiday time! Bring in the new art!!! artfulmind@yahoo.com
Apple Tree, Oil on Copper, 10” x 18”Richard Britell
“THE TREE FORT”
SHORT STORY FROM “NO CURE FOR THE MEDIEvAL MIND” RICHARD BRITELL
There has never been a time in my life that I have not been in love. I suppose it is part and parcel of an artistic temperament. Some of my earliest memories are of being in love, and of suffering over it beginning when I was five years old. I was in love with a blond girl named Cynthia. Blond is the best description I can give you because I never saw her close up. She sat in a seat the farthest from me, diagonally across the room in kindergarten. Once, at a great distance, I followed her home, but not all the way to her door. After getting several blocks away from my usual path home I began to feel a rising panic and gave it up, but I was only five. That same night I had a vivid dream about my new love. I dreamt that we were married and that we lived in a tree fort in the back yard of my house. When I awoke it was with a distinctly absurd feeling and I wondered to myself, how could I think that people could be married and live in a tree fort? I felt that the dream indicated a certain level of stupidity on my
part. But the feeling of contented marital bliss, as I now know it is called, would not leave me. When I recall that dream I still can feel that delicious feeling of being in love with someone who I really do not yet know – set apart in some wild and strange place. We were like shipwrecked survivors on a deserted tropical island, for whom courtship, inquiry, fascination and consummation take place without the least possibility of interruption or competition and where even memory and fantasy are silent. The very next morning I set about building a tree fort with the restricted means of a five year old. Our back yard, however, presented a dismal prospect: a piece of dirt perhaps 30 feet square with a few strands of crab grass here and there. It was bordered with cinder block walls on three sides. One of these walls was the back part of a funeral parlor which had one window, its curtain always closed. Another wall was the back of an establishment that rented tuxedos. In the corner of this yard grew a lone sumac tree about seven feet tall with spindly branches and those long leaves that look like the remaining unkempt hair of some balding old man like myself. I spent a long time trying to nail a two-by-four into a branch in that sumac tree but with no success. I remember being stupefied by the problem of how to hold the hammer the nail, and the wood up in the air all at once and still be able to strike with the hammer. Each time I would try the nails would fly off into the dirt of the yard someplace and I would have to hunt around for them. In desperation I resorted to rope. I tied several two-byfours to the branches of the tree with the rope, and then, standing on a chair, I jumped upon them like mounting a startled horse by surprise. The various branches of the sumac tree all broke at once and everything ended up on the ground. I had murdered the sumac tree even though I had not meant it any harm. I was just like Lenny, in Steinbeck’s, Of Mice and Men. My crime did not go unnoticed. My mother confronted me and asked, “Albert, why did you destroy the sumac tree?” I explained, “I was trying to build a tree fort.” “But why would you try to build a tree fort in a sumac tree?” This second question she said more to herself than to me and did not expect me to answer. To me, it sounded more like, “Albert, why are you such a stupid little boy?” I couldn’t even face her apron but stared down at my shoes and the laces I still had not learned to tie. Late in the afternoon I occupied myself with throwing stones at the mortuary wall until, as luck would have it, I
broke their only window. After that I went inside, told my mother about it and said I would be in my room until the police came to take me away. Just a few years after my love affair with Cynthia I fell in love with Jane Russell. This was a love both tragic, and confusing for me. It was especially confusing as I was a child at the time and I had absolutely no idea that I had fallen in love with her. It came about unconsciously, just like an illness with an incubation period. Apparently, when I was seven I saw one of her films by accident. Perhaps it was showing along with one of the westerns I would go to see back then. I can remember that there were two feature films showing together, and because of the Jane Russell film I sat through both movies twice. I soon forgot all about those movies, but several weeks later I had a vivid dream about Ms. Russell. I can’t remember any details of that dream except that we were in love and then she rejected me for someone else. For many days, even weeks after that dream, I was terribly depressed. It was exactly as if it had actually happened, as if it was my own real life experience. This so upset me that I actually began to argue with and ridicule myself. “Albert,” I would say, in a tone of indignant reproach, “you’re only seven years old and she has got to be at least 20. Besides you’ve never even met her, never ever really seen her. I mean you’ve seen her image but that’s just some dots of ink on some paper in a magazine. It would be one thing to fall in love with a movie star, very understandable to suffer the pangs of unrequited love in that situation, but to suffer from rejection? Well, this is just idiotic!” But I discovered at an early age that no amount of verbal logic or reasoning has any power over one’s emotional life. It just roars along under its own steam, and you just wait until it is over. ~ Richard Britell
My skin is kind of sort of brownish Pinkish yellowish white. My eyes are greyish blueish green, But I’m told they look orange in the night. My hair is reddish blondish brown, But it’s silver when it’s wet. And all the colors I am inside Have not been invented yet. ~Shel Silverstein, "Colors"
Simply Sasha
by Sasha Seymour
Let Us Bake!
My grandmother used to make the best cinnamon rolls! These rolls I've created are in her spirit, although her recipe included lard (I don't do lard). Live a little! Indulge a little! Treat your family! You deserve it. Enjoy! Roll each loaf out and spread butter over it within1/2 inch of edges. Combine the sugar and cinnamon and sprinkle over butter Roll up jelly roll style, pinch seams and cut into 6 slices
~ For sauce- in a saucepan bring brown sugar, butter, molasses to a boil ~ Pour into greased 13 by 9” baking dish and place rolls on top ~ Cover and let rise for 30 minutes ! Bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes or until golden
Yum!
THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014 • 13
the Berkshires for nearly twenty-five years. Like a lot of folks, we have our routines, including those in Lee. In January of 2011, we happened upon Good Purpose Gallery. We were delighted to find it! As we entered I was immediately taken by the space, especially the high ceilings, the light streaming into the storefront windows. It seemed like the perfect venue for my work. It was, however, the gallery’s social mandate that sealed it for me. I have been an art educator for nearly forty years, the last twenty-five in Canada as an art education professor at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton. I’ve spent my whole adult life arguing for the vital role the arts play in the landscapes of all our lives, an educational landscape where the arts are valued for their particular content and ways of knowing and doing. Good Purpose Gallery serves a social and educational purpose and I wanted to be a part of it. Lucky for me, they agreed! Your readers may already know that Good Purpose Gallery and the Spectrum Playhouse support the College Internship Program, which prepares young men and women on the autism spectrum with the knowledge and skills to successfully attend college, for a career in the arts or some other fields. As an exhibiting artist I agreed to share my experiences as a painter with a number of the students. In October I was fortunate to meet with a wellness class and to have conducted a painting workshop. The other connection between my artwork and the gallery resides in the very notion of purpose. Like the young men and women in CIP, at sixty I still question my life’s purpose. In a world fraught with polluted politics, global environmental degradation and economic greed—a world where the race to keep up with the next best technological bell and whistle is often run against the well being of its citizenry—I often ask, “What role can a painting practice play in matters of justice, particularly one with an unfashionable eye for beauty and landscape?” How did you meet your husband? Jennifer: He was the Dean of the Faculty of Education at UNB who hired me!
JENNIFER PAZIENZA Interview by Harryet Candee Photographs by Joy Cummings
I met Jennifer at the Starving Artist Cafe in Lee, Massachusetts awhile back where we ate a hearty breakfast together and talked about her paintings that I was fortunate enough to experience first-hand at the adjoining Good Purpose Gallery. I saw a bounty of very large works of art zestfully displayed all around this open, bright and wonderful gallery space. Jennifer’s paintings came across to me as many adventurous stories of root vegetables and landscapes in heaps, mountains casually placed, alive and unfolding. I wanted to jump right into one of her landscapes and run wild and free and then, quickly wanting to say goodbye to Jennifer and race home so I can, like Beatrix Potter, pull out all the raw, crunchy, muddy rooted veggies that were in my-- neighbors garden - well... I had to stop myself, but at least I thought of doing that. However, later that day I opened my box of pastels, the fat, soft ones, and tore out a few sheets of white paper, went to my grocery bag, let loose a tumbling parade of beets, carrots, eggplants, squashes and other veggies, let them roll out where ever they wished, knowing at that point I was not going to do any previously scheduled work. I knew I would be spending the rest of my day sketching at full-throttle these lovely bulbous, ripe roots I was so appreciative of Jennifer for re-introducing me to.
14 • NOvEMBER 2014 THE ARTFUL MIND
Good Purpose Gallery is fortunate to have your artwork in one of their exhibits. They have a keen eye for great artists. Do you think there is something you may have in common with other artists that have shown there? Like, a common thread coming from either the source of inspiration, the medium, the thinking behind the work, maybe the style, the consistency of personal themes, goals… etcetera…. Jennifer Pazienza: Aesthetically, Diane Cournoyer’s stance that “needing to paint is a mystery” is something that absolutely resonates with me. Although William McCarthy and I work a bit differently, I see a connection between my skies, use of colour and light and his paintings. Kimberly Gerry Tucker’s treatment of trees in winter can be seen in several of my paintings and like Michael McManmon, my fascination with trees began in childhood and has persisted throughout my life. The most fundamental thing I have in common with every artist who has shown at Good Purpose is the belief that the arts educate and that everyone, regardless of their particular abilities, is entitled to learn, enjoy and pursue a career in the arts What is the connection between your artwork and Good Purpose Gallery? My husband Gerry and I have been visiting and at times living in
How did you prepare a body of work for this show? Jennifer: From the beginning, Good Purpose Gallery and I both I wanted to show my large-scale paintings from a previous series, Landscape, Love & Longing (L, L&L). How to visually integrate the current root vegetable still life/landscapes with them was the challenge. I chose Summer Skies, the 96 x 144 in. diptych, Early Winter, Redoux, 54 x 72 in. and Early Spring, 72 x 54 in. as well as Bramosia, 96 x 72 in. to lay the groundwork for the relationship between the two series. I often work on pairs of paintings. Since Bramosia’s, original companion, Biancospini, 72 x 96 in. is now housed in the Harriet Irving Library reading room at the University of New Brunswick I sensed a visual imbalance so I made Albero Rosso. I didn’t intend for Albero Rosso to be so red though! Not surprising when you consider I made Albero Rosso after and during the most recent paintings with the reddest beets! How the more obvious landscapes would work with the root vegetables was a concern. In my studio, I would catch glimpses of how the paintings would visually interact. I had a hunch they would work together, but was still a bit unsure until I had the idea to group them together, to scale, in one Power Point slide. Seeing them all in one place, I knew they would work. I think the palette, composition and gestural qualities hold them together formally and conceptually. With a copy of the floor plan and my memory of the gallery space to guide me, I engaged in numerous mental rehearsals about where each painting would be placed, but it wasn’t until we were in the gallery that I made the final decisions. Your have a beautiful last name, Pazienza. Is there any connection between this name and your artwork? Jennifer: Pazienza is the Italian word for patience, and it is my birth name. When I got married, my husband, Gerry, liked the sound of Gerry Pazienza, but didn’t think he could pull it off with his silver blond hair and blues eyes. I suppose there are connections between my artwork and my name, which have little to do with me having patience. I’m known for wanting to know and wanting to know now! However, I do point to my heritage in the Italian titles I give some of my paintings. For example, Bramosia is a word that could be used for yearning, longing or greed. Titles often help folks find their way into making sense of paintings. For many the use of Italian gives no such help. A tension is created. A productive one I hope where the viewer will engage the image and not rely on words to experience and interpret them, but instead will turn to the sensory effect it has on their very being, to consider the associations that arise, or memories that
they may evoke. Of course, should they lose patience, they could always whip out their I-phones and Google the word!
Where did you grow up and what was your childhood like? Jennifer: My childhood was a mix of joy and sadness, calm and volatility. The usual post World War II drama that Happy Days never quite explored. In 1954 I was born in Newark, New Jersey to a southern Italian immigrant family and raised in Bloomfield. My dad and mom died a year apart. I was 8 and 9 years old. I then lived with an aunt and uncle for whom the phrase, out of the frying pan and into the fire, applies. Fortunately, I had an older brother I adored. Still do. An accomplished architect and professor in Raleigh at NC State University, College of Design. Additionally, I had some wonderful teachers and friends that balanced the challenges. In retrospect, it prepared me well for the world and my work as waitress, teacher, researcher, and artist, wife and stepmother.
Have you always been an artist? Jennifer: Have I always been an artist reminds me of the question Maria Laurino asks in her book Were You Always an Italian? Posed to her by Mario Cuomo, it launched her into an investigation of JENN USES A GLASS PALETTE WITH WARM WHITE PAPER BENEATH IT. COLOURS ARE SET OUT IN RITUAL ORDER. ALBERO ROSSO IS THE BACKGROUND. her Italian/American identity. It’s only in the last number of years that I’ve become pelled—not in some surface attempt at humility, or in an “OMG” Penn State in the 80s. He began his painting career at the tale end comfortable with the label artist, labels of any sort really. I have I could fall off of this latter kind of way—to at least consider the of the Harlem Renaissance. He is a glorious painter, a teacher to been making things for as long as I can remember, beginning in possibility and effects of connecting to something bigger, somebe emulated and just a decent human being. He suggested in 1984 my mother’s kitchen. She would tear open brown grocery bags thing more vast. I could have continued with L, L&L as the title, that I remove Payne’s Gray from my palette and to work from a for me to draw on while she used them to blot fried eggplant. An but it didn’t seem to fully carry a fundamental intention of this limited, colourist palette. (Image 4) Attending college in the 70s, enormous peach tree, flower, herb and vegetable garden, grape show. Un-Earthed: Selected Works plants different seeds in viewI was schooled in hard-edged, tonal approaches to painting. If you vines and rose arbor consumed our back yard. That bit of land ers’ minds that I hope grow images, associations, memories, and think about fashion then, it was an Armani style of painting. Mayshielded me from the encroaching urban landscape, gave me the so forth that L, L&L alone might not. Picking the ripest of those hew unleashed my versace soul! (Which by the way connects space I needed to breathe, and opportunities to explore nature. works to best prepare the ground for viewers to read relationships back to Were you Always an Italian. Laurino thought her family Built by my Sicilian grandparents, it was a world built from culbetween them and the root vegetable paintings was tricky. I strugwas Armani only to learn she had southern roots.) For thirty years ture too, in the way that Simon Schama explains in Landscape gled with whether or not to include two of the paintings I was so I’ve been exploring the limitless possibilities reds, yellows, blues and Memory, where landscape is always culture before it is nasure would be in the show. Will including them be too much? Will and a bit of white can produce. I also love Mark Rothko. It’s the ture. Just has he worked to re-create something of the world he omitting them create a deficit? Weeding out our own work is not spiritually saturated colour. One time, a few years ago, I got to left behind in Sicily, I would model my stone mason grandfather easy to do. We don’t always make the best editors. In the end, I sit all alone with his work at the Tate Gallery. I had the work and and mold mud bricks in ice cube trays and build with them. Like brought everything with me and then decided in the gallery. the whole gallery to myself. I’ll never forget it. Also, I love David my mother’s kitchen that yard provided me with endless possiHockney and Edward Hopper. Joan Mitchell for the gestural qualbilities to create worlds in which anything is possible. I suppose What especially brings you joy when you paint? ity of her work. Then there is Gerhard Richter. I was at the Tate it’s where my adult views of creativity as more a matter of re-creJennifer: There are moments when I look at a mark I’ve made Modern in July for the Matisse Cut-Outs, which were wonderful. ativity began—how it is we make new worlds from those already and wonder how it happened. There it is and it’s beautiful. I supI’ve taught them to young students over the years, but it was at hand. What I create in my own kitchen and studio today is no pose it’s in those moments I am filled with joy, which for me is Richter’s early drawings and photographs, figures and skies that different from what I did as a child. I still fry eggplant in the same very close to states of gratitude. There is too the intense meditasurprised and inspired me. I love his current work, but unlike him way my mom did, although brown paper grocery bags are harder tive practice painting can be for me. I’m not a conceptual artist. I want the viewer to recognize the things in my paintings, for exto come, by except when I’m in the Berkshires! Sure, on some level I’m concerned with art theories and practices, ample to have a tree in common, but to also be drawn into and how could I not be with my work as an art education theorist? immersed in the emotionality of the paint itself, so that the expeWhat is the thinking behind your artwork? Are there differBut I don’t begin with an idea and carry it out. I begin with what rience may at once be common and particular. The Netflix Docent explanations for each venue? calls, what gets my attention, or full-fills a perceived need in me. umentary is fantastic by the way. Finally, when I am uncertain Jennifer: The venue doesn’t necessarily change any explanations The root vegetables with their intense colour and how they echo about my love of colour I think of venetian glass artist, Lino I may assign to my work, but different venues contribute their human and landscape forms are a good example. It’s on reflection, Tagliapietra, whose work I visit, at Schantz Gallery in Stockown contextual meanings or associations for what and how work I engage in the interpretive or conceptual work of making sense bridge, every time I’m here. I’ve worked with blown glass in the is shown and seen. Good Purpose Gallery has a particular manof the paintings. I do this by making more paintings and by writpast. What I wouldn’t give to do a workshop with him! date that everyone is made for some good purpose in the world. ing. It’s an interdependent relationship. There is of course another How that bears on what viewers read in my work is not something dimension to the joy painting brings to me. It is the difficulty and Have you been to school for formal art training? Do you reI can predict or control, nor would I want to. By extension, paintchallenge of transforming blobs of colour into something that member which time period that you were in school that you ings are made for some good purpose too. As well, each show has works. Painting is not easy for me. Getting out of my own way got the most knowledge and useful training and skills? Or was a kind of central thesis often hinted at in the title. The paintings (read ego here) long enough to see what is being asked of me can it for you – a totally rounding experience. in L, L&L speak, in part, to my desire to know the world and my get lost in earthly desires to make paintings the art-world, or anyJennifer: Describe a technique you use when painting that you place in it generally and as a painter, through the act of painting one for that matter approve of. Or worse, to wrestle a painting to would consider part of what gives you originality. within the landscape around my home. But they are also paintings the ground with the interest that it ought to adhere to some preYes I have had formal art training/education. I include education informed by a whole host of literal and metaphorical, exterior and conceived notion of what I or anyone else thinks it should be. here because it’s never been just about skill development. In uninterior landscapes I have experienced in my life: NJ, PennsylvaWhen I am successful at leaving myself behind, it is indeed joydergraduate school I took a concentration in drawing, painting nia, Texas, Wisconsin, Sicily and Eastern Canada, as well as the ous. and photography. I was lucky to study with painting instructor, Berkshires and the high Himalayas. The size and shape of the Have you followed and studied other artists? Are you a fan of David Raymond. As future art teachers we were made to take paintings are significant too. Gaston Bachelard in Poetics of a famous artist? What have you specifically learned from every studio possible. My studio focus during grad school was Space, talks about how our experience of different spaces works them that you apply to your own creativity? on our poetic imaginations. I have two very high walls in my stuJennifer: Richard Mayhew is the artist who has had the most didio that called out to me. I couldn’t say no. When I am surrounded Continued on next page... rect impact on my work. I studied with him during grad school at by the Keswick Ridge landscape scaling large canvases I am com-
THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014 • 15
JENNIFER PAZIENZA
Left: BRAMOSIA
Above: MELA’S CARROTS AND BEETS JENNIFER PAZIENZA
shared between painting and photography in the Master’s, while conducting research into a grade five student, blind from birth and in my art class, Mainstreaming in the visual Art: A case of the blind leading the blind. That was 1984. We might use different language today. In my PhD work, how to teach art history to K-5 students without putting them in the dark, not the official title, I took a minor in painting, which is unusual for a PhD. That was when I studied with Richard Mayhew. Theorizing the teaching of art to children made it possible for me to reconceive entrenched notions of creativity and originality, that original ideas have their origins in other ideas and to develop an understanding of re-creativity for curriculum development, but also to name my own painting practice. It is a re-creative practice where I am called by the world around me—it could be a leaf, a tree, or a beetroot—to make it over again in paint.
Aside or in addition to painting have you explored other media? Jennifer: My early work was in graphic design. That led to a brief encounter with children’s book illustration and summer study at the School of visual Arts. I’ve spent a great deal of time with B&W photography. I loved darkroom work. Candid portraits were my interest. I’ve worked with blown glass and was in 2002, artist in residence at Artigianato del Sole, a traditional majolica studio in Sicily. I continue to draw, particularly from the figure. You can find a card with my name on it at IS 183!
How do you feel when you sell a painting that you truly love? Do you get separation blues, or are you ecstatic? Jennifer: Paintings are like puppies. I want them to go to good homes where they will be loved and lived with for a very long time. Selling a painting is such an honour. I’m continually amazed and grateful that someone would want to live with my work! So usually I’m delighted. Interestingly, it’s actually more difficult and emotionally draining for me to sell a painting I’m 16 • THE ARTFUL MIND OCTOBER 2014
not that fond of! Fortunately that doesn’t often happen so I’ll stick with your question and tell you about Winter Sky 1. It was January of 2010, just after the holidays. The kids and grandkids returned home and I to my studio. Two large canvases were waiting for me. Standing in front of the 8 x 6 ft. vertical I asked, as I typically do when I’m unsure about how and where to begin, what do you want from me? (If you think staring at a blank piece of paper or computer screen is tough, try a canvas that size.) Then, trusting the process, I walked to the windows, looked out onto the Keswick Ridge landscape and up at the sky, turned to my palette and loaded a five inch brush with a mix of French ultramarine, a bit of alizarin crimson and titanium white. I climbed onto my scaffolding and the next thing I knew, five hours had passed! Perhaps it was the awkward position I was in that startled me out of my reverie. Roughly 10 inches from the bottom of the canvas, I had yet to lay in the land mass. Like wax on wax off from the Karate Kid of my generation, it took another 2 ½ weeks of paint on paint off before I was able to ground the sky. That was the closest I have ever come to, as the saying goes, losing myself in a painting, or perhaps finding transcendence. The University of New Brunswick acquired Winter Sky 1 for its permanent collection. It hangs in the Wu Centre on a brick wall, in a two story central foyer. Lots of light, lots of folks see it, I couldn’t be happier, but it was tough letting it go.
What are some of the other ways you enjoy marketing your work? Is it via lectures and talks at universities? Can you elaborate and talk a little about this and your experience? Jennifer: Marketing is a word I struggle with. I have been showing work in academic galleries since the 70s, but in recent years, I’ve enjoyed sharing my work through conferences, workshops and guest lectures sometimes in gallery settings. Linking the two is easier now than it was when I was a young artist/educator since arts-based research, in the last number of years or so, is seen as a legitimate form of scholarly activity. Last October, for example,
I delivered Beautiful Dreamer, a keynote address for my alma mater, Penn State University. Hard to believe I was a grad student there thirty years prior! They hosted GRAE, a Graduate Research in Art Education conference for students and faculty from Ohio State and Syracuse Universities and Teacher’s College Columbia. Beautiful Dreamer is a critical reflection where I make sense of contemporary theories of beauty, landscape and justice through my painting practice. In it I explain how the introduction to my lifelong relationship with the beautiful I owe to my short-lived life with my mother. While washing my hair she would rinse away soapy tears with the mantra, Sorry Jennifer, but you have to suffer to be beautiful. At bedtime, her mezzo-soprano voice would lull me to sleep with verses from “Beautiful Dreamer.” Beautiful dreamer, wake unto me, Starlight and dewdrops are waiting for thee; Sounds of the rude world, heard in the day, Lull’d by the moonlight have all pass’d away! I may be delivering a version of Beautiful Dreamer in Sicily next September at the annual Art & Psych Conference, Layers and Liminalities. My intention too is to blog Beautiful Dreamer. So I suppose that is another way I will market, or get my work and ideas out into the world. I also have a website that will connect to the blog.
How does one know where the best place is to sell artwork these days? Jennifer: In some ways, the world is so open to sell anywhere thanks to the web, and other times, it feels that selling art through galleries you have made a personal connection with works best. Where best to sell work varies between artists owing to their own and gallery representatives’ intentions or expectations. For me, I agreed to sell my work through the Ingrid Mueller Art+Concepts Gallery in Fredericton for reasons that may not be common to other artists. I typically exhibited in academic galleries. Ingrid Mueller was the first commercial gallery I joined. I was fifty-two then and believed that the time had come for me to make painting my primary mode of scholarly publication at UNB. This was a personal and political decision. Yes, Art+Concepts is a commercial gallery, but it is one that works to educate the broader community in visual art. Showing with them insured me a fairly regular exhibition, or publication practice. UNB has, in its Collective Agreement between administration and faculty, (we are unionized) a clause in its research requirements that creative work counts as scholarly work. So joining that gallery made it possible for me to show work in solo and group exhibitions,
SUMMER SKIES, JENNIFER PAZIENZA
where I could demonstrate to my colleagues across campus, what publishing visually could look like. Recently, I had been thinking about how to get my work seen outside of New Brunswick. While visiting New Brunswick ceramic artists for a special New Brunswick show, the manager of Jonathan’s Gallery in London, Ontario spoke warmly about a painting of mine he saw in a fellow artist/friend’s house. That friend spoke enthusiastically about her experience working with Jonathan’s and encouraged me to contact them. I now have several works on exhibition there. The gallery represents over 125 of the most respected Canadian ceramic artists from all over the country. So for me, to have my work in their company is amazing. At sixty, my basic criterion, whether or not it feels right in my gut, decides whether I show work in any gallery, commercial or otherwise, like Good Purpose. After visiting Good Purpose, the Curator of Saint Francis Gallery in Lee expressed interest in showing my work. I’d be honoured to work with them. The Gallery supports the Sawa Sawa Foundation.
Can you share a thought about being a successful artist? Jennifer: Am I a successful artist? Is it possible to be successful and never let an artwork out of your studio? Or never sell a work? Is success the result of having been included in a particular gallery or museum show? It’s tricky. Who decides? What are the criteria? Every artist has to come to terms with what constitutes success. For me, success is fluid, dynamic, fleeting. Quite frankly it’s something I prefer not thinking about! But here goes. There are days when I think I am more successful than other days. Maybe it’s the result of a show I’ve been invited into. Maybe it’s one glorious mark that I just can’t stop looking at and wondering about how it is I was so lucky to make it. I do know success is about work, about going to the studio everyday, even if it’s to sweep the floor. It’s about doing your homework and surrounding yourself with people you trust to tell you the truth: family and friends. My husband has great cold eyes! Then there are folks like Canadian Curator Tom Smart. Tom and I worked together during his tenure at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, but usually it was in the context of me writing or speaking about other artists’ work. Finally, recognizing that I couldn’t do it all myself, it was at the start of L, L&L that I wrote to Tom and asked if he would be willing to write about my work. He graciously agreed. (See the PDF of his catalogue essay on my website). Then there is Jennie Malcolm, my sister in law. She is an acknowledged graphic designer, having worked for the North Carolina Art Museum, she agreed to make my website and catalogue. It’s remembering to respect
yourself and your work first. In the end, I think success is about paying attention to your gut. If what you are doing feels right and good, then anything after that is just icing on the cake. Maybe that’s where the phrase sweet success comes from.
What were the stepping-stones that gave you confidence in your artistic endeavors to keep creating new artwork? Jennifer: It’s interesting that you use the word “new” artwork. It speaks to the very thing that can keep me from working, a concern with making “new” work. The new, the new, the new is one of Modernism’s most troubling legacies for me. After an exhibition I have returned to my studio and anxiously asked what’s next?
ALBERO ROSSO, JENNIFER PAZIENZA
As if the work in that exhibition is over and old and I now must re-invent myself and begin with something new. It’s a notion of creativity that for me can cause more harm and suffering than good. I’m not Madonna! Like my ideas about originality, I suppose I don’t see Un-Earthed, this current work, as new in the sense that it is some how different or disconnected from all the work that came before it. It is reminding myself again and again to trust the process of showing up in the studio and getting to work that keeps me going back over and over again.
Continued on next page....
THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014 • 17
JENNIFER PAZIENZA
What is a day in your life like? I mean, also, are you satisfied with the ample time you have to work in your studio? Some of us get so busy we find it hard to find the time to do what we really want. Jennifer: Since kindergarten I have either been in school, taught school or both at the same time while waiting tables besides! While at UNB, my days were indeed eaten up with classes and committee meetings, but I some how managed to maintain my studio practice throughout most of the twenty-five years with one dry spell where I wasn’t in the studio at all. Those years also coincided with getting quite ill. After that experience I realized that I am my healthiest when I am painting. The gift of that illness and recovery was the courage to stand by that realization and stop running over top of my body—to reconcile a mind/body split way of living that has characterized much of the twentieth century. Thank you Descartes. To put what keeps me well central in relations to everything else and everyone else I need to attend to. It’s always a juggling act. It means making difficult choices and some times I’m not that good at it. Fortunately for me I have a husband, family and friends who support me. It’s harder when folks don’t quite get why anyone would make art. July 1 marked my retirement from UNB. That means that I am a fulltime artist for the first time in 55 years! I’m only beginning to experience what it’s like to have a consistent painting practice. My day begins by waking up to the Keswick Ridge landscape. After our morning rituals of dog, great coffee, yoga, breakfast, reading and writing, chatting, checking emails, etc., I head out to the studio where I work ‘til mid afternoon. Then we take an afternoon meal, which I typically cook. In summer I may mow the lawn, take Mela our dog for a swim. Winter, sees me carrying in wood and shoveling. I return to the studio in late afternoon for a couple of hours more. Then it’s time for a glass of wine and supper. Did I mention that I cook? I like to go back afterwards even if it’s to clean my palette or review the day’s work. Gerry and Mela usually come with me. Evenings are usually quiet, reading watching movies or writing. Weekends are spent catching up on chores, attending church and enjoying family and friends.
Can you choose one of your paintings to talk about? Jennifer: The story of Mela’s Carrots and Beets begins with a fiery autumn landscape of mine, Alberi Misti, 54x72 inches, oil on canvas hung in a potential collector’s home for some weeks as they tried to decide whether or not to purchase it. Instead they commissioned a work. I spent hours talking with them, reviewing where the painting would hang, determining the size, 48x54 inches in the end. They even sent me pictures of their drapes and wall paint. They claimed to have loved Alberi Misti, but wanted something in a cooler palette, something calm and treed. I set to work and after each session I emailed them generative images. Assuming they would enjoy seeing the process and build quite literally a deeper understanding and relationship with what the painting would eventually become. Mistake! Big Mistake! Initially, I answered their questions, but slowly over time, their questions became directives. “You must take out the reds! I do not want or like reds and oranges!” I realized that she in particular, wanted a painting she would make if she could. Although she loved the perspective in the painting, I couldn’t convince her that it was the reds complimenting the greens and blues that made it possible. This became not just an aesthetic conundrum for me, but a spiritual one about service. Did Christ or the Buddha have boundaries? Does the Dalai Lama? What about Mother Teresa? Where do artists draw the line in accommodating and fulfilling commissioned work? In the end they bought the painting. We delivered and hung it for them, but I left feeling bereft. Had I compromised? I gave them what they wanted, almost. The GRAE conference I mentioned above followed on that experience where there was much talk about one’s roots and the poetry of place in art and art education curricula. Back home I asked Gerry to bring 18 • THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014
But as I explained earlier, I really wanted to immerse myself in colour again, to revitalize myself, and my painting practice. On reflection, it was by re-creating the vitality of the root vegetables that I was able to return to myself and celebrate the health they and I share. Colour made that possible. Leaving them in shades of black and white may have rendered them more aesthetically intriguing and I may explore that in the future, but at the time, that was not what they or I needed. Painted in blacks, grays and white, would have missed the point.
AFTER THE RAIN, JENNIFER PAZIENZA
me a couple of bunches of carrots and beets from our organic farm in Jemseg, New Brunswick. It wasn’t a conscious choice, I just knew I had to get back to colour and the leaves had already faded. Without thinking I placed the veggies on a table in my studio and put up a landscape I had started a year earlier, just a day before Mela was suddenly stricken with a life threatening illness. That was two years ago. Happily she’s still with us.
What is your relationship with farming? Jennifer: Five years ago we became partners in creating Jemseg River Farm. We’re certified organic. We invested in the development and operation of the farm with another family member and a former student of ours, Micheal Carr who is the actual “farmer.” My relationship to the farm has been “they grow it, I cook it or paint it!” I don’t just show up and paint any landscape. For me, there has to be a legitimate and mutually agreed upon reason for me to paint in a place. The carrots and beets have granted me permission so that now I’m ready to paint on site.
What can you share with art students, who are emerging into the art world that would be useful advice for them? Jennifer: I’m not very good at pithy words of wisdom, but always stay true to your own practice. Even when the world may be saying, “real art” looks like this and you think yours doesn’t conform. Study, work more days than not, and surround yourself with friends and family you trust to give you critiques about your work that will move your practice forward. Don’t wait for inspiration to come to you. Work and you will find it. It’s kind of like going to the gym. Just go into your studio and work. “On what?” “On anything.” Pay attention to your process. Don’t be fearful of those fallow times. Artists, like the land need time to rest. As visual artists, attuned to the world around us, we never really stop working. All experience informs what we do, whether realize it or not. Trust yourselves. Just as winter gives way to spring, so too will you find your way back to the studio. I find preliminary drawings fascinating. What moves you to continue in color instead of stopping with the black and white? Jennifer: I love black and white too, but there are certain subjects that compel me to continue with colour. I do not use charcoal or pencil before painting. I draw with a brush loaded with a mix of French ultramarine, alizarin crimson and cadmium yellow. I lay in the darks this way and then move into colour. I did consider leaving some of the Un-Earthed paintings in their early stages.
How did you ready yourself for the great journey from Canada to the Berkshires for this show? Jennifer: Of course there is all the prep work by long distance with the gallery. Then, there were border materials to organize, thumbnail images of the contents of the rented U-Haul we carried them in to present to the authorities. There was all the graphic design work with Jennie and gathering friends and family from Canada and the US to join us for the reception. But the psychic journey between the Berkshires and Keswick Ridge is another matter. Becket like Keswick Ridge provides me endless opportunities to reflect on and make sense of how it is within the context of urban roots my artistic practice, from childhood and young adult life, to the present references the stuff of rural landscape. I wish I had my childhood drawings to show you. They were filled with trees and mountains. Frozen ponds in winter woodlands with children gleefully skating on them. I’m an urban kid. I was born in Newark, NJ and grew up in Bloomfield, exit 148! So, how is that? Over the years, I’ve been inspired by the vibrant Berkshire arts scene, Jacob’s Pillow, Tanglewood, drawing at IS 183. Not to mention the galleries and museums. The Berkshires, the Becket woods in particular, have for nearly twenty-five years, been a home away from home for me, a source of great joy and activity as well as solitude. It is a landscape where I have wonderful opportunities to connect with family and friends and exercise my Italian-American-ness a bit. Keswick Ridge is open and the skies are vast. In Becket I’m sequestered by the close proximity to the woods just outside my window and from the demands of my typical daily routines in New Brunswick. I can come inside if you will. It’s been a great place for me to think and reflect, to just be and I am grateful that, like Keswick Ridge, it is a refuge in my life. What keeps you going, Jennifer, in such a crazy upside down world? Jennifer: In Messenger, poet Mary Oliver writes, “My work is loving the world. Here the sunflowers—there the hummingbird, equal seekers of sweetness.” I don’t know why, but I think I am like them. I seek sweetness. I always have. I was raised in the craziest of family settings and yet, some how, I am blessed with this regard for life. The poem continues, “Are my boots old? Is my coat torn? Am I no longer young, and still half-not perfect? Let me keep my mind on what matters, which is my work, … which is gratitude.” I am fourteen years older than my mother was when she died. I have a great life, family, friends and home. How can I be anything else but grateful? It’s such a privilege to paint. That’s what keeps me going. That’s what I hope you’ll see a bit of in my work. UN-EARTHED SELECTED WORKS will be on display at the Good Purpose Gallery, 40 Main st, Lee MA, until November 17 There will be an Artist Talk on Saturday, November 8, 10 11:30am, at the gallery.
It was Saturday night, December 12, 1981. Kaspar’s beautiful French wife, Paulette, told him with hollow eyes that day that she was pregnant. Kaspar was overwhelmed with joy— even considered abstaining from his regular Saturday night outing to stay home with her and cuddle. She, however, was not happy. She exuded icicles from every pore. This pregnancy threatened to interrupt her ambitions, which never included being a housewife and mother. Besides, Kaspar’s Saturday night excursions allowed her to spend time with her lover, Piotr, a rising Solidarity organizer. She was doubly piqued this night, because Piotr was in Gdansk at some meeting, and she wanted him to commiserate with her. She would be spending the next two hours huddled over the phone with Piotr—who had wandered away from the meeting—until the phone lines from Gdansk were cut. Kaspar, who skillfully ignored his lovely wife’s unhappiness, chuckled to himself—her moods would be unpredictable
for some time! He closed the door behind him and pranced down two flights of stairs, emerging triumphant onto Ulica Zabkowska. He wandered past drab, abandoned storefronts littering both sides of the street with a manic spring in his step. He opened the door to one of the storefronts, but it was not abandoned at all. The establishment was crowded, bursting at the seams with people who were happy to be not at work, happy to be drinking in this old tavern, with their old friends. He joined the crowd, some of whom had just arrived, still able to enjoy the taste of their drink, while others had already begun to slur their words and drool from the corners of their mouths. His friends were seated at, or standing near, or, as in the case of Kaspar’s friend Anselm, lying face down beneath, a long table in the center of the room with benches on either side. Kaspar grinned widely, his face practically splitting with glee. A tall man, he made himself a little taller, calling out, “Drinks for all my friends! And tonight, you are all my friends!” A half second of silence descended on the bar, then flew off in disgust as cheers broke out from all corners, everyone sharing the sense of elation, of something good in the works, although as yet only Kaspar knew what it was. He felt lofty, his back slapped by everyone around him until they pulled him down to sit, Dobry, Godek, Romek, his school friends. They all worked in the factory. Kaspar skirted the line between worker and intellectual because he was a half-decent carpenter, but the Communists paid him to paint, and everyone had to admit he did fairly well at it. And scored the stunning daughter of a French diplomat to boot! But Kaspar was so good-natured, so unassuming, a little unpredictable, true, but generally cheerful and a good drinking partner, so that no one begrudged him his good fortune. Foreigners had been buying his paintings not so long ago. He might still be on his way to the top. “Paulette is having a baby!” he shouted. More people crowded around him, slapping his back, his arms, his head, calling good wishes, congratulations, blessings on his house. He accepted their attentions humbly. Really, what had he done to deserve such bounty? He searched for the barmaid. A little
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ON imperiously (but who would deny him Sa swagger on such a day?) he beckoned to the mp black-haired, dark-eyed Zosia, who’d had her eye ler on him. Most of the women in the bar had their eye on Kaspar. He was the most handsome man in Warsaw, after all. A burden he bore, although he pretended not to notice. Zosia rolled her eyes. Such attitude. But she came over anyway. “Moje najszczersze gratulacje,” she told him, balancing a tray on her shoulder. He cleared his throat. “Drinks,” he said, “drinks all around.” “You’re sure you can handle the cost, Kaspar? There’s a lot of people here…” “Then give them something that doesn’t cost very much!” He grinned at his own cleverness. She shook her head as she turned away, not looking forward to serving the entire bar just so they could toast Kaspar. She felt a little sorry for him, actually. Zosia was one of the few people who knew his wife was having an affair with Piotr Kuniczak. Zosia knew, because Piotr was her lover too. She prayed silently to the virgin that the baby was Kaspar’s as she set out the glasses. Excerpted from The virgin of Hopeless Causes by Amy Tanner, available in electronic and softcover versions on Amazon.com. Visit www.amytanner.net for news and unfounded rumors.
‘A box of new crayons! Now they’re all pointy, lined up in order, bright and perfect. Soon they’ll be a bunch of ground down, rounded, indistinguishable stumps, missing their wrappers and smudged with other colors. Sometimes life seems unbearably tragic.’ ~Bill Watterson
JANE FELDMAN PHOTOGRAPHY JANEFELDMAN.COM
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THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014 • 19
20 • THE ARTFUL MIND NOvEMBER 2014