The Artful Mind this is January issue 2025

THE ARTFUL MIND

JASON BARD YARMOSKY

Photograph by Jessica Strother

Erika Larskaya

"As an abstract artist, I search for ways to represent the invisible, subtle, and unexpressed. I am driven to lay out fleeting and intangible experiences on physical surfaces". —Erika Larskaya

Erika Larskaya Studio at 79 Main St. Torrington, CT www.erikalarskaya.art

“Confessions” Mixed media, on 24x24 canvas

JANUARY 2025

the ARTFUL MIND

IN PRINT SINCE 1994

This year, we are excited to celebrate the 30th Anniversary of The Artful Mind! This milestone presents a wonderful opportunity for us to reflect on the diverse world of art and the passionate individuals who contribute to it. We encourage everyone to join us in supporting and uplifting one another in our creative endeavors. Thank you for being an integral part of our journey— your contributions have truly made a positive impact! As we enter the new year, let’s continue to inspire each other and make strides in our artistic pursuits! —Harryet Candee, Publisher

Happy New Year to All!

A Conversation with Enid Futterman 14

Jason Bard Yarmosky Visual Artist... 24

Travel Journal Africa 2024

Photographs by John Lipkowitz

Accompanied by Nina Lipkowitz 38

Richard Britell | FICTION

Something for Over the Couch PART 23 “The Abandoned Elks Club” ... 47

Mining My Life

Diaries of Jane Gennaro ... 48

Publisher Harryet Candee

Copy Editor Marguerite Bride

Contributing Photographers

Edward Acker Tasja Keetman Bobby Miller

Contributing Writers

Richard Britell Jane Gennaro

Third Eye Jeff Bynack

Distribution Ruby Aver

Advertising / Editorial inquiries and Subscriptions by mail: 413 - 645 - 4114 artfulmind@yahoo.com

Read the online version: ISSUU.COM FB group: ARTFUL MIND GALLERY for Artful Minds 23

THE ARTFUL MIND PO Box 985, Great Barrington, MA 01230

FYI—

JOANE CORNELL

A single, 18kt yellow gold flower, at the top of the earring is set with a single, fine, white diamond in the center. A cascade of Argentium silver flowers, that are black acid dipped, form the body of this lightweight earring. An 18kt gold ear wire Is fashioned to allow this earring to sit right up into the hole of your lobe. Dimensions; 3.75” L x 2.25” W

Hand Forged Designs

RICHARD TALBERT

Opt 125, (c), Acrylic and Mixed Media on Paper, 24” x 34”, 2022

“Back to the Future” 1976—2024

510 WARREN STREET GALLERY, Hudson NY now offering Vintage Delevingne silver prints for these times

richtalbert1@gmail.com | Richardtalbertdesign.com

https://www.instagram.com/Lioneldelevingne http://www.lioneldelevingne.com/ http://www.510WarrenStreetGallery.com

PETER ALVAREZ

Paintings Collage Constructions

CLOCK TOWER ARTISTS

75 South Church St, Pittsfield, MA 3rd Floor

914. 260. 7413 instagram@mellinger3301 markmellinger680@gmail.com

Permafrost. Triptych. Acrylic and tissue on canvas. 64" x 70"

C'è la Luna? 60 inches D Oil on canvas

JAYE ALISON MOSCARIELLO

Jaye Alison Moscariello harnesses water-based mediums like acrylic and watercolor, influenced by a creative upbringing and artistic journey. Through abstraction and intuitive color selection, she captures the interplay between forms, with lines that articulate deep-seated emotions. Her art resonates with joy and upliftment, transforming personal and worldly complexities into visual harmony.

The artist is passionate about creating art, painting on flat, smooth surfaces, and using materials that are environmentally friendly.

Moscariello’s work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally, and has appeared in print, film, television, the web and Off Off Broadway.

Transforming personal and worldly complexities into visual harmony. In celebration of her new studio, enjoy 10% off large paintings and 30% off small paintings.

“Abstract Memories”, Knox Gallery, January 31 - March 8, 2025. 452 Main st, Monterey, MA. Reception: January 31, 5:30 - 7pm.

Jaye Alison MoscarielloStudio VisitsBy Appointment Only: Pond Shed (behind the Buggy Whip Factory), 208 Norfolk Road, Southfield, Massachusetts. 310-970-4517, jayealison.com, jaye.alison.art@gmail.com

BRUCE PANOCK

I am a visual artist using photography as the platform to begin a journey of exploration. My journey began in earnest almost 14 years ago when I retired due to health issues and began devoting myself to the informal study of art, artists and particularly photography. Before retiring I had begun studying photography as a hobby. After my retirement, the effort took on a greater intensity.

My world had changed for reasons outside of my control and I looked for something different in my work. I wanted to do more than document what was around me. I wanted to create something that the viewers might join with me and experience. Due to my health issues, I found myself confined with my activities generally restricted. For the first time I began looking inward, to the world that I experienced, though not always through physical interaction. It is a world where I spend more time trying to understand what I previously took for granted and did not think about enough. The ideas ranged from pleasure and beauty to pain and loss; from isolation to abandonment; to walking past what is uncomfortable to see. During this period of isolation, I began thinking about what is isolation, how it can transition to abandonment and then into being forgotten. The simplest display of this idea is abandoned buildings. They were once beautiful, then allowed to run down and abandoned, soon to be forgotten. After a while they disappear. Either mankind knocks down these forgotten once beautiful structures, or remediates them, or Nature reclaims the space. Doesn’t mankind do the same with its own?

My work employs references to other photographers, painters, as well as sculptors. The brushwork of Chinese and Japanese artists is appealing for both its simplicity and beauty. Abstract art has its own ways of sharing ideas which are jarring and beautiful at the same time. Black and white and color works each add their own dynamic. My work is influenced by these art forms, often using many of them in a single composited image.

Bruce PanockPanockphotography.com bruce@panockphotography.com Instagram @brucepanock

TOP: RED X

BELOW: LAST SUPPER

LEONARDO SIDERI DRAWALL

I’m Leonardo Sideri: artist, interior industrial designer, inventor. I’m the creator and maker of ‘drawall.net’, a product devised in the 1980s. At the time, I was drawing, drafting my own design projects using a Mayline straight edge on a traditional horizontal drafting surface. There were times as a designer when I wanted to draw something full size, large format.

I don’t recall when the idea to adapt the Mayline concept to a wall application occurred but at the time, I had a project involving pulleys and belt drives, so I had an assortment of pulleys lying around my studio. The process involved assembling the odd parts to create this new drawing device: pulleys, sash cord, counterweights, a straight edge. Surprisingly, it worked quite well. Who knew 40 years later I would offer it to the art world.

Due to changing life circumstances, Drawall went into storage. Until one day, at age 75, I viewed a room size ‘Sol Lewitt’ pencil drawn installation at the DIA Museum. It was all I needed for inspiration lasting the next 11 years. I started drawing using what’s now known as Drawall and referring to myself as an artist. I’ve produced what I consider a small modest body of work based on my mystical X theme.

I’m offering Drawall to the ‘art world’ as a new tool to explore, to hopefully resurrect drafting and mechanical drawing to a new ‘art genre’. It’s not every day a new analogue tool is introduced to the art world.

Leonardo Siderileonardosideri.com

TREE AND SHRUBS

PATAGONIA

ACRYLIC, LATEX, GRAPHITE ON CRESCENT BOARD, 40”X30”

BETWEEN THE LINES 2023, ACRYLIC ON CANVAS, 36.5” X31.5”

This art collage was part of a line of greeting cards created for the Nassau County Museum of Art's exhibit: La Belle Epoque

elizabeth cassidy

Artist, Illustrator, Writer, Poet, Peace Lover elizabethcassidyatudioworks.com elizabethcassidyart@gmail.com

MARY ANN YARMOSKY

17.5 X 21.5 Framed

maryannyarmosky.com | maryannyarmoskyart.shop

TRIUMVIRATE, CLAY, CRYSTAL, QUARTZ, MARBLE, PAINT

PHOTO: JANE GENNARO

JANE GENNARO

Jane Gennaro is an artist, writer, and performer. Solo exhibitions include the Fashion Institute of Technology, Klapper Center for Fine Arts at Adelphi University, World Monuments Fund Gallery, and The Claverack Free Library. Time & Space has championed Jane’s work since 2007, most recently in Reliquaries

Gennaro’s solo plays have been produced by the American Place Theatre, the Culture Project Impact Festival, and the Toyota Comedy Festival. Her work has been reviewed in the New York Times and featured in New York Magazine, and The Artful Mind. Gennaro’s commentaries aired on NPR’s All Things Considered.

Jane Gennarowww.janegennaro.com

SALLY TISKA RICE BERKSHIRE ROLLING HILLS

Born and raised in the captivating Berkshires, Sally Tiska Rice possesses artistic prowess that breathes life into her canvases. As a versatile multimedia artist, Sally seamlessly employs a tapestry of techniques, working in acrylics, watercolors, oil paints, pastels, collages containing botanicals and mixed media elements. Her creative spirit draws inspiration from the idyllic surroundings of her rural hometown, where she resides with her husband Mark and cherished pets.

Sally's artistic process is a dance of spontaneity and intention. With each stroke of her brush, she composes artwork that reflects her unique perspective. Beyond her personal creations, Sally also welcomes commissioned projects, turning heartfelt visions into tangible realities. Whether it's capturing the essence of individuals, beloved pets, cherished homes, or sacred churches, she pours her soul into each personalized masterpiece.

Sally's talent has garnered recognition both nationally and internationally. Her career includes a remarkable 25-year tenure at Crane Co., where she lent her hand-painted finesse to crafting exquisite stationery. Sally is a member of the Clock Tower Artists of Pittsfield, Massachusetts, the Guild of Berkshire Artists, the Berkshire Art Association, and the Becket Arts Center. Follow on YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram.

JANET COOPER THE ART OF FIGURING OUT WHAT KIND OF ARTIST I AM

Fabrics, anatomy, stitches, colors and bricologue are words, imbued with intense emotionality for me, a maker, collector and lover of objects and places.

I like to be the right thing in the wrong place and the wrong thing in the right place. Being the right thing in the wrong place and the wrong thing in the right place is worth it because something interesting always happens.

—Andy Warhol

Sally’s work is on the gallery walls of the Clock Tower, Open Monday-Friday 9:00-5:00 pm for self-guided tours. SallyTiskaRice@gmail.com www.sallytiskarice.com https://www.facebook.com/artistsallytiskarice Fine Art Prints (Pixels), Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok

My first love was clay, so basic, earthy and obsessively compelling, I adored making pottery shapes and objects, resembling torsos. A period of fascination with vintage tin cans, bottle caps and junky metal discards followed. Metal was sheared, punched, riveted and assembled into figurative shapes. I began to use fabrics with these works and eventually abandoned metal for hand stitching doll sculptures, totems and collages, all with second hand or recycled fabrics.

Lately I have introduced paint and waxes into my work. I also am using animal bones, those armatures of mammal form. I am recycling old works into the new, a kind of synthesis of who I have been with whom I am now.

I am also returning to jewelry or ornament making. as well as fashioning a collection of garden and street wear art aprons.

Janet Cooperjanetcoop@gmail.com www.janetcooperdesigns.com

BERKSHIRE FALLS WATERCOLOR

JANET COOPER WAS IN THE FIRST ISSUE OF THE ARTFUL MIND IN 1994. “BOTTLE CAP MANIA” STILL ON THE PAGE AND GOING STRONG!

A CONVERSATION WITH ENID FUTTERMAN

“It’s all work in progress — the musicals, Imby, me.”

Enid Futterman's career is a testament to her versatility and adaptability, spanning fields such as musical theater, journalism, fiction writing, and advertising. She has successfully juggled multiple disciplines, showcasing her ability to simultaneously excel in various creative endeavors.

She is a talented lyricist and librettist, produced here and abroad. Her musical theater pieces include Yours Anne, based on the diaries of Anne Frank and two concert pieces based on the same score (I Remember and I am Anne Frank); Portrait of Jennie, based on the novel by Robert Nathan; and An Open Window, a ten-minute musical based on the short story by Saki.

Enid's literary work includes a visually stunning novel titled Bittersweet Journey: A Modestly Erotic Novel of Love, Longing, and Chocolate, which includes her own photographs of chocolate as emotional subtext.

As a journalist, she was co-editor/publisher, with her partner John Isaacs, of Our Town, a local quarterly, for nine years, and she is now cofounder, with Isaacs, and editorial director, of IMBY (imby.com) a hyperlocal news network.

There are many layers to Enid and I had questions I hoped would illuminate some of them. I enjoyed our meeting the other day at your home. We settled into your living room, with the stunning view of the Catskill mountain range in the distance. Over a cup of bone broth, our conversation flowed from the house itself to your late partner, Richard Levenson, and one of his striking sculptures, a crucifix made from cordage, wood, and clay.

Before you took me to see John’s studio, next to your house, you shared a recurring theme in your work in all mediums — the pursuit of balance between the feminine and masculine principles. The studio is organized, stylish, and has a vibe

that seems perfect for creative collaboration. John showed me some of his own work, which includes numerous art books and catalogs, that while different from each other, are all designed cleanly with contemporary fonts. John’s studio is also the heart of IMBY, an exciting collaborative project.

I am thinking about the dessert named after the Brooklyn Bridge, at the restaurant under the actual bridge, the setting for the final chapter of Bittersweet Journey. I’m sitting down at the computer with a bag full of chocolate, and the memory of our meeting, to raise questions.

What was it like, Enid, growing up in Brooklyn in the ’50s?

Insular. PS 238, was, of course, a public school (also Ruth Bader Ginsberg’s school), but the children were virtually all Jewish, like the children on our block and in our building. I knew about the po-

Interview by Harryet Candee

Photographs Courtesy of the Artist

grom that killed my grandfather in Ukraine, but didn’t realize that we were a minority group here until one Christmas when I noticed the carols playing relentlessly on the radio.

Junior high and high school were much more diverse. In junior high, I had a brilliant, beautiful, Black English teacher all the girls in our class crushed on, including me. He encouraged me to write.

We lived on a very wide street with a bicycle path and a bridle path and benches and trees that met in an overhead arch. You could drive from Prospect Park to Brighton Beach on it and I see it now through the sweet, innocent scrim of nostalgia, but I couldn’t wait to get to Manhattan.

In what ways did the current events of the time shape your experiences?

I don’t know that they did, although I remember the McCarthy hearings and getting under our desks for air raid drills and the polio vaccine, but it was the culture of the time, the music, the theater, and especially the musical theater that shaped me. My first LP was the soundtrack of the movie version of Carousel. I was too young to have seen Carousel or Oklahoma on Broadway, but the hit shows were performed at camp, and I was taken to see Damn Yankees, and The Pajama Game in New York,

which is what Brooklynites called Manhattan, for good reason. They were the current events in my small world, although I had an Elvis poster on the wall of the bedroom I shared with my grandmother.

Did you engage in any performing or visual arts during your youth?

I choreographed a dance for Sing in high school, and always had the dancing parts in musicals at camp.

How did you typically spend your summers?

I spent every summer from the age of six to nineteen at Camp Swatonah, as camper, CIT, and finally, counselor. It was just across the Delaware River from Sullivan County, which is now almost as vibrant as the Hudson Valley and Berkshires, but was then a real backwater. We loved it, especially the old moviehouse in Callicoon, which still exists, and the general store in Galilee, which doesn’t. The camp itself was beautiful, and my salvation, my refuge from tense, volatile home life.

Did you keep a diary?

Occasionally, but it was childish and unremarkable, unlike Anne Frank’s diary. My stories were better.

At what point have you felt an overwhelming

sense of rebirth through your theatre work?

Sitting in an audience, or standing in the back of a theater, while a show I wrote is onstage. As everyone who has had the experience will tell you, there is nothing like it.

What path did you follow after graduating with a degree in journalism and English from Douglass College at Rutgers University?

I got a job as a copywriter in a big New York ad agency. In retrospect, I should have tried for a job at a newspaper or magazine. But what I really would have liked was to work in the theater, but you can’t get a job as lyricist and/or book writer unless you are well established. You have to create the job by creating the play, and that was far too tall an order at the time.

What did it mean to be a woman while you were coming into your own and approaching life with determination, especially when starting your first real job?

I’m not proud of it, but I enjoyed being the only woman in the room.

During your time in the workforce, you had a passion and a talent for advertising. Where did you work? Continued on next page...

Enid and John’s studio

I never had a passion for advertising. I got fired after working at Grey for twelve years because I hated it. Truly. That’s what he said. I then freelanced at various big New York agencies like DMB&B, Backer & Spielvogel, and Grey too, as well as directly for clients like ADL and a mayoral campaign for David Dinkins.

What conflicts and barriers did you face as a woman?

None that I was aware of. Maybe I just didn’t see it. Maybe getting fired for my bad attitude despite winning all the awards wouldn’t have happened to a man.

How do you look upon that experience, and in what ways does it surface now?

I was very well paid, and I miss that, but the good money doesn’t make up for feeling compromised and unfulfilled. We did, however, do some worthy work for good causes. Friends don’t let friends drive drunk hopefully took the curse off You’re never too old for Kool-Aid. That surfaces when people riff on the former.

During your career in advertising, did you want to discover an untapped well of creativity that you could bring into other endeavors?

The saving grace of advertising was getting to work with talented people — art directors like my future

ex-husband, Alan Kupchick and my late partner Richard Levenson; cinematographers like Haskell Wexler; filmmakers like Albert Maysles; photographers like Phil Marco; and composers like Michael Cohen. I learned about design, film, photography, and music from them, all of which served me later.

How did all of that shape your approach to future projects?

The first lyrics I wrote that weren’t parodies for camp songs were for an NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) campaign i.e. anti-drunk driving songs for PSAs, in collaboration with Michael Cohen, who became my collaborator on Yours, Anne. He was the music director at the agency, but he had a classical and theater music background. I could never and would never have written the piece without him.

When did you first feel inspired by and connected to Anne Frank and her diary?

When I read it. I was her age. I identified with her, as did every girl (and many boys) who read her diary. We were alike, at least on the surface. I too was a thin, dark-haired, green-eyed Jewish girl, who adored her father, couldn’t stand her mother, and wanted to be a writer. But I was shy and quiet while she was outgoing and noisy and full of spunk. And a better writer. And of course I never had to

endure what she did. The differences in our circumstances, which were just a matter of time and place were huge.

After that initial connection, you experienced a significant surge of creative expression related to Anne Frank. Can you share that story with us?

That was the second point of connection, and the real inspiration, but it was more than a decade later. I had started to write lyrics for PSAs at Grey in collaboration with Michael Cohen, and Andrea Marcovicci, the actress and cabaret singer, recorded two of the songs we wrote and asked us to write a musical for her. I didn’t take that seriously until one day she was wearing her hair parted on one side and held with a barrette on the other. It was chin length and made her resemble the only photograph of Anne Frank that was known at the time. It was on the cover of the paperback edition of Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl. It was the lightbulb moment.

In what ways does writing lyrics come naturally to you?

Because it is natural, and instinctive, it’s hard to describe. I’m not a musician; I don’t play an instrument and I can’t even sing, which is a frustration. It means I can’t sing my own songs, even to present them to potential collaborators and producers, but

Je-Anne, Entire cast by Roy Beusker

I seem to have an ear, and a sense of rhythm, and I know a good melody when I hear one.

You knew Anne Frank's father. How did that connection come about? What influence did he have on the work?

When Michael and I sought to obtain the underlying rights to the diary so we could get the piece produced, we were introduced to Frances Goodrich and Albert Hackett, who wrote the play The Diary of Anne Frank. They liked the demo we made and introduced us to Kermit Bloomgarden, who produced their play on Broadway, and Kermit, and Frances and Albert all wrote letters to Otto Frank recommending our work. (The situation was highly unusual. The play and the diary were merged legally; in order to get the dramatic rights to the diary, you had to also get the rights to the play.)

Otto replied to say that he could only see the diary onstage as opera, written, perhaps, by Leonard Bernstein. They all wrote back to urge him to hear what they had heard, and so we all converged in London on August 4, 1975, which was the anniversary of the arrest. It was a terrifying, but ultimately gratifying experience; he gave us his blessing minutes after he heard the score.

He had two notes, which, of course, I took. I had written the lyric for a lullaby in Yiddish. He asked me to translate it into German, as western European Jews didn’t speak Yiddish. He also asked me to

write a song based on his favorite diary entry. I later spent a day in Basel, Switzerland, with Otto and his second wife Fritzi, who had lost her husband and son in the Holocaust. That was when he told me what he has told many others. He hadn’t really known his daughter until he read her diary, after her death.

He also told me something I haven’t seen elsewhere. I knew, because it’s the diary, that he had promised Anne that she could take her diary with her if they had to leave the hiding place. But I didn’t know that after the arresting officer took Otto’s briefcase, where the original diary, Anne’s notebooks, and loose pages were kept, and dumped the contents on the floor so the briefcase could be used to hold the jewelry taken from the women, Anne walked back and forth across the floor to gather the few things she could pack in a rucksack and ignored the diary, the notebooks and the papers. I’m convinced that she knew, probably not consciously, that if she took them, they would be lost.

What touches you about her?

Her ability to see herself, the good and the bad, very clearly.

I find these lyrics from your score to be an apt description of you, as well as Anne: I can recapture everything

As long as I know I can write

I know I can write

I know who I am

I see myself whole

As good as my heart

As bad as my dreams

As old as my soul

I can imagine anything

As long as I know I'm alive

I still love life

Thank you. But my need to write doesn’t have the same urgency as hers, for the obvious reason.

You have to relate to yourself before applying it to someone else, and I think you got that. What, at this point, would you be changing for upcoming productions?

The piece has been evolving toward realization of its potential as a true musical and theatrical translation of the diary. I know what I mean by that, but until I achieve it, probably in collaboration with a director, I don’t want to say more than that, except that the latest version, produced in the Netherlands this year, got close and was very well received. Sorry. I can’t resist including an excerpt from my favorite review: Can you turn a compelling diary into a musical without crushing it, without detracting from the writer’s strength and the horror of the war? The answer is yes, you can. In fact Je, Anne is perhaps the most compelling rendition of the diary available. Continued on next page...

Je-Anne, Sem Konijn & Silvana Rocha by Roy Beusker

It has such a penetrating authenticity that a masterpiece has been created here.

Tell us about the making of your book, Bittersweet Journey.

It just happened. A friend was about to embark on publishing a series of small books all called A Passion for … and asked me to write one. I immediately thought “Chocolate”, i.e. A Passion for Chocolate. For one thing, it was an excuse to take a self-guided chocolate tour of Europe and eat all the chocolate I wanted. But while on that trip, I realized that I was unconsciously constructing a narrative, in part from the stops along the way — Vienna, Munich, Brussels, London, Paris — and I changed course and started to write and photograph a work of fiction, based in part, on some of my own experiences.

And the meaning? What were you trying to say?

I didn’t know until I was far along in the writing, the tasting, the photography, when I understood why I and so many other women have an intense but fraught relationship with chocolate. Chocolate — good chocolate — has a dark, primal, mythical quality, the quality we learn to suppress in ourselves very early, because we’re trying to be good girls. Later, we crave something outside of ourselves that has that quality, like good chocolate and/or bad boys. Which satisfies the craving, but

not for long. We don’t realize that something essential, something inherent, is missing.

I love these words that accompany a pivotal moment in the story. Charlotte buys a box of Burdick’s iconic chocolate mice and bites off their heads, while naming each one after a bad boy. And then … The boys who made her wait. The boys who made her want. The man who promised her love and gave her chocolate. Were the bad boys all that bad?

They were unavailable, either circumstantially or existentially or, more often, both. One of them fell at my feet with desire, until I succumbed. And then, poof. I wanted to name them with their real names — that would have been cathartic — but the publisher’s lawyer said not to. Richard, my late partner, who was not one, liked to call me the queen of longing.

Did you find it challenging to merge reality and fantasy?

There is really only one fantastical chapter, and it isn’t so much merged as inserted. It was time for Charlotte to transcend her addictions and she needed something big and magical to happen to her.

Why have you cut back on eating chocolate, your closest ally?

Chocolate was never my ally. It was my subject and

my substance of choice. I cut back because I transcended my obsession when Charlotte transcended hers.

What inspired you to set the final chapter in that café under the Brooklyn Bridge?

I wanted Charlotte, to come full circle back to Brooklyn, where the journey begins, and the River Café had a delicious and photogenic dessert called Brooklyn Bridge.

Who were the lucky ones to get the first hot offthe-press book?

My mother, of course.

In what ways do you find that your work overlaps, and when do you specifically need to keep each separate?

They don’t really overlap so much as intersect. They’re connected by the subtext of my unconscious intention to restore the balance between the Feminine and the Masculine. By that I mean the Jungian definition, the principles, not the genders.

What is the mission, goal, and description you can give for your current work on IMBY?

It has that subtext in common with the rest, but to answer your question in reverse order, it’s a hyperlocal digital network of, thus far, 32 community sites for citizen journalism in the Hudson Valley

Imby Daily / Enid’s review on Leopoldstadt for Imby

and Berkshires. The goal is to use the scalability of both the platform and the network to build a national network of communities that are given the means to create their own digital newspaper. The mission is to help save local journalism and build real community.

What helps maintain a balanced working relationship with your partner, John Isaacs? Do you sometimes find it challenging to collaborate so closely with someone on multiple levels?

Well, yes, there’s more to argue about. On the other hand, there’s more to argue about. Thankfully, we each have our own work in addition to IMBY, so we’re not totally symbiotic. But IMBY is our child together, and it’s important to us, in part because of its potential for real change.

You practice meditation. How does it benefit you, and in what specific moments do you find it essential to meditate?

When I’m too tired to keep going. It picks me right up. Its benefits are many, but for me, there is something, well … transcendent, about being in a place of absolute stillness, which isn’t easy to get to otherwise. It’s a state of consciousness that is easy to achieve with TM.

Would you say your entire life has been your work?

God, I hope not, and don’t think so, although sometimes it feels that way.

What message do you want to convey that expresses what is important to you as a woman, artist, and visionary?

I can’t claim to be a visionary, but there are things I’d like to see in the world — women truly equal to men in every way, which is not to say that men and women are the same. I love and trust the esoteric view that we are on a trajectory toward that balance between the Masculine and Feminine, which doesn’t necessarily mean equality between men and women, but I don’t think you can have equality without that balance.

And because the quest for that balance, that harmony, seems to undergird everything I write, I feel a sense of belonging to the effort. With the Anne Frank pieces, I see the diary and our musical theatrical expression of it, as the story of an inner life, a literary, spiritual, and sexual journey of becoming — writer, Jew, woman — in only two years. She was still only fifteen when she died in BergenBelsen, and in the eighty years since, has become an icon, a symbol of transcendence, of spiritual survival in the face of physical death. That to me is evidence of the growing light and power of the Feminine. or as some of us call it, the Divine Feminine.

But it’s also true of Bittersweet Journey and Por-

trait of Jennie, a musical adaptation of the novel, which is about a painter who is disconnected from his inner Feminine, when a little girl shows up to say that she hopes he will wait for her to grow up. Even IMBY.

You are a woman on fire. Your visions in many disciplines have come to fruition. What do you think is the force behind all of this? And what is left to create?

I’m not actually prolific. In theater, I keep working on the same two pieces, because in my view — and my view is the one that counts — they’re not finished. If your next question is “How will you know when they’re finished?”, I have two answers: “I’ll know.” And “When I see a performance and have no notes for myself or the director.”

I am, however, writing something new. A memoir with photographs about my difficult relationship with my body.

What challenges do you still face?

There has been a lot of ‘close but no cigar’. Deciphering that is a challenge, but there’s something I like about still striving at this stage. It flies in the face of death, and retirement, which to me is dangerously close to death.

enid@imby.com, https://imby.com

Enid and John Photo: David-Mcintyre

MARGUERITE BRIDE

INSPIRED BY NATURE

Many of my paintings recently have been “Inspired by Nature”. It is hard to imagine more beautiful scenes in any season to capture in a painting. I even have a special page devoted to this type of painting on my website….take a look, many of the originals are still available.

In the not-too-distant future (May 2025) I will be moving from the Berkshires to another beautiful New England area….the Lakes Region of New Hampshire. After 30 years in paradise, another adventure is calling me.

How will this affect my art career? My living and working space will be considerably smaller compared to what I have here. But I expect to still be painting and teaching….those details are still unknown for now.

Soon I will be “disassembling” my studio and I have a lot equipment, studio furniture, art materials/supplies, tables, flat files, print storage shelves, chairs, and racks looking for new homes. Please check my website, my watercolor Facebook page, or call/text/email me directly for more details about dates/times of scheduled sales events. I can also set up an appointment for you to visit privately.

In the meantime, besides planning this move, I am also still painting and doing commission work. Marguerite Bride –413-841-1659; margebride-paintings.com margebride-paintings.com/nature-madescenes/margebride@aol.com Facebook: Marguerite Bride Watercolors. Instagram: margebride

RICHARD NELSON AI

The concept of Ai is frightening to me. I’m an avid Horror/SciFi fan; I’ve seen all the movies. The potential for disaster is palpable. Black Mirror fans may recall the Metalhead episode with the rampaging Ai robot dogs. I digress.

The controversy with AI art is that the art is the result of pirated bits of other people’s art. I have a friend whose art was found in an Ai piece. I appreciate and understand the conflict, but curiosity and boredom get the best of me. So I bought into it, downloaded an app and took the plunge.

By entering rather vague written prompts, and shooting to emulate Petr Valek, being as creepy as possible, astounding images were created. Each time you create you can create up to three images at a time. Each image is completely different, each one just a little more ... distorted.

It was fun, unpredictable, I never knew what sort of image would emerge. Honestly, it seems no different from audio sampling. In that sense it seems no more harmful than that. Especially for an artist such as myself.

I don’t make any money on my art, I just like to share my art in a realm of like-minded artists who get the satisfaction of presence without the necessary leg work to get a gallery show. I hesitate to show an image created by Ai that I haven’t manipulated or drawn over in some way. This comes to me at a time when I have been in a slump. One advantage of the iPad format is that it makes it very quick and easy to draw and paint simultaneously, with an endless source of pigments that are bright, colorful and very manipulative.

I created a very large catalog, as well as over two hundred songs on Garage Band. But everything was feeling forced, and that just won’t do. The AI has put some fun, even a little sense of mischief, back into my artistic process. It’s the future and like it or not, it’s only going to get worse. That’s scary. Let’s not forget the two AI computers, on opposite sides of the world, a few years back, that were unplugged because they started a conversation in a coded text.

But check it out as an art tool for yourself before you condemn it. Cheers.

Richard Nelsonnojrevned@hotmail.com

“Nature is not only all that is visible to the eye.. it also includes the inner pictures of the soul.” —Edvard Munch

BACH SUITES FOR CELLO COLIN CARR & YEHUDA HANANI

Six Unaccompanied Bach Suites for cello performed by Colin Carr and Yahuda Hanani will take place on Sunday, February 23, 2025, at 4 PM at Saint James Place, Great Barrington.

Two leading Bach interpreters embark on a journey traversing his Six Suites, the apogee of the cello repertoire. Filled with mystery and beauty, blasted through with rapture, every note is a bold statement. Music that first flowed from the composer’s quill in the early 1700’s, it belongs to no specific time or place. At the same time as it floats in the heavenly spheres, it provides plenty of earthly pleasures—courtly music, riffs, Celtic jigs, the merriment of a tavern musician, and glimpses of modern minimalism.

The title “Unaccompanied” is a bit of a misnomer: a single cellist takes on numerous voices, making the music a drama for three or four characters played by one actor! If angels danced, this is the music that would no doubt accompany them on their gramophone.

Colin Carr has been hailed for his “supreme technique and ebullience” (Boston musical Intelligencer). And Yehuda Hanani has been lauded by, among many other publications, the San Francisco Examiner:

“In this era of the cello, Hanani is among the best. His Bach was absorbing, imaginative, beautiful in all respects.”

Close Encounters With Musichttps://cewm.org

SNOW-SHOEING IN CANOE MEADOWS, WATERCOLOR

FENCES, WATERCOLOR

TOP: COLIN CARR BELOW: YEHUDA HANANI

FRONT STREET GALLERY

Painting classes on Monday and Wednesday Mornings 10-1pm at the studio in Housatonic and Thursday mornings 10am - 1pm out in the field. Also available for private critiques. Open to all. Please come paint with us!

Gallery hours: Open by chance and by appointment anytime 413. 274. 6607 (gallery) 413. 429. 7141 (cell) 413. 528. 9546 (home) www.kateknappartist.com

Front Street, Housatonic, MA

Inspired by Nature

Wide selection of framed and unframed Original Paintings and FIne Art Reproductions 413-841-1659

www.margebride-paintings.com margebride@aol.com

Cottage watercolor on paper, 2024

Silo Abstracted watercolor on paper, 2024

Greenhouse Door watercolor on paper, 2024

JASON BARD YARMOSKY

VISUAL ARTIST

“There is no measuring with time, no year matters, and ten years are nothing. Being an artist means not reckoning and counting, but ripening like a tree which does not force its sap and stands confident in the storms of spring without fear that after them may come no summer. It does come. But it comes only to the patient, who are there as though eternity lay before them, so unconcernedly still and wide. I learn it daily, learn it with pain to which I am grateful: patience is everything!”

—RAINER MARIA RILKE

Jason’s artistic work explores both the physical and psychological aspects of aging, sparking a thought-provoking dialogue that challenges societal views on growing older. Drawing inspiration from the rich techniques of 17th and 18th-century painting, he incorporates elements of costume and childhood into his pieces. This combination weaves together a narrative that examines the complexities of aging. Each artwork invites viewers to reflect on the transformative journey of life, encouraging a deeper understanding of the aging process and challenging preconceived notions.

Okay, you're in your studio with a fresh canvas in front of you...Before you set to work, what pre-flight prep check goes through your mind, letting you know your ready for the canvas? I generally have an idea of what I am going to paint prior to actually painting. I do preliminary work for my figurative portraits prior to painting. I have a

general idea of an image and work out the composition. I look for the costuming or interior space needed. I sketch and take photography references. Then I am ready for the canvas.

Oh, so how is photography used in your work? I take images of my subject with the lighting required for the painting. Lighting is everything. I have a larger than life size screen in my studio that I am able to work from when I don’t have the luxury of having a subject physically sit for a painting. I work from the figure on the screen as I would in real life.

Could you share with us where your journey began? How did you learn to paint and draw? I’ve been drawing for most of my life. I didn’t begin oil painting until 2010 during my last semester at the School of Visual Arts in New York. That was the time I really fell in love with paint. Over the years there has been trial and error. I have

explored areas of painting, even abstract, that have influenced where I am today as a painter. I am amazed in how you can move around color that creates tonal values, ultimately building form that our brains recognize. I like to paint with a sculptural lens. Moving the paint to model a solid shape growing out of and into the canvas. We can see the shape because of how the light reveals it. The fun part is refining that shape. The accents need to be indicated with accurate consideration of their comparative importance. “They are the nails upon which the whole structure depends on for solidity.” -Student of Sargent. This method of painting allows room for spontaneity. I’m interested in the duality of paint, how an image from a distance can feel real in an exacting way, yet almost abstract up close.

Jason, it's clear that your love for art has deep roots in your family. From an early age, your curiosity and eagerness to draw and visualize were nurtured, becoming a mainstay for communi-

Interview by Harryet Candee Photographs Courtesy of the Artist /Cover photograph by Jessica Strother

Photograph by Jessica Strother

cation. Could you share more about your family's influence on your artistic journey?

My grandmother’s uncle was a painter. He was the only visual artist in my family that I know of. My grandfather was a Juilliard educated clarinetist. My maternal grandparents were very cultured. I learned a lot about music, film, and art from them. They, along with my parents, recognized my drawings from a very young age and always supported my interest and ability in the arts. I grew up fascinated with aging and mortality. I wanted to explore these themes in my work. When I graduated from SVA and began painting, my grandparents agreed to be my subjects for my series entitled, “Elder Kinder.” This body of work explored age and challenged our societal perception of its meaning, using costumes as metaphors. Influenced by the paintings of Caravaggio that I had grown up admiring, I implemented the chiaroscuro technique in the portraits of my grandparents, to further emphasize my interest in shedding light on what society has con-

ditioned us to see as dark. From adolescent dress up ideas of cowboys or bunnies to the immortal icons of superheroes, the use of costumes became a leitmotif for metaphors.

What family values or beliefs did you grow up with that supported your artistic expression and creativity?

My parents encouraged my sister and me to pursue what made us happy. Art became that for me. My parents always emphasized hard work and demonstrated it as I grew up. I’m grateful to love what I do which doesn’t make the work feel as hard as it is at times.

What wowed you when you realized you had the gift to create images from those you saw in your head? That could have been the epiphany of knowing you would become an artist. When I was 5 years old I drew a picture of three figures sliding down a slide in perspective. This

really stood out to my parents, especially my mother who was a pre-school teacher. I think I’ve always had a propensity to visually translate what I see. It wasn’t until I got older and began working from observation that I realized everything we see is because of light. Once that was a concept I truly understood, I realized I could best express myself visually with few limitations.

During your SVA years, outside of school hours, when you were free to roam and explore and wander through the city, what do you remember that stands out in your mind that was particularly an inspirational experience that you discovered? I had not realized my studies went as far as observing people on the train as an every day ritual ewould impact me…and you?

When I attended SVA I received an education both in and out of classes. The school had a wide range of academic requirements. Living in New York Continued on next page...

Senior Prom 2012. Oil on linen. 54 x 36 in. Private collection, Los Angeles

Slide 1992. Pencil on note paper. Artist's collection

Remembrance 2013. Oil on canvas. 36 x 64 in. Artist's collection

Rainbow Body. Oil on canvas 14 x 11 in. Private collection, Palm Beach

City was wonderful. I was surrounded by a melting pot of culture that is hard to find elsewhere. I loved visiting the museums here, especially the MET. I also loved, at that young age, the grittiness the city exuded. It’s hard to gauge if the city inspired me more or distracted me more at times from painting. I wouldn’t be who I am today without the many NY lives I feel I’ve lived.

Your grandparents were a strong force of beautiful energy in your life. The connections were undoubtedly significant for you in many ways. Could you share how you involved them in your art? How did they feel about modeling for you? Did they always have a sense of humor? Did they play into your vision? How did you convince them to participate, such as wearing costumes while modeling for you?

My grandparents were very cultured people with a great sense of humor. I grew up watching films with them such as the Marx Brothers, Chaplin, and early Woody Allen. I realized that humor is a tremendously important quality to maintain. Even as

they aged they never lost their sense of humor. Being the supportive grandparents they were, it wasn’t hard to convince them to put on costumes and sit for my paintings. There was constant laughter throughout the process. They were happy to help me and they also saw the value in what I was trying to say with my work. The decade-long effort of this work not only gave me more than I can express, but it also gave them something at their age to be part of and look forward to. It was an education for all of us.

Please answer, "I remember one time… it was really funny yet powerful for me, was when my grandparents told me, showed me, explained to me….”

I remember when my grandfather once told me what his father once said to him, “I look in the mirror and I don’t recognize who I see. I feel the same way I did when I was 18.” This inspired my first video and series of paintings I made for an exhibition entitled, “Dream Of The Soft Look” in 2013. These works explored the psychological elements

of aging, soon followed by ideas of memory and time.

I am deeply touched by the video you made of your grandmother, Elaine, dancing in front of the kitchen sink and another video singing and dancing as if she was 20 years of age, wearing a Wonder Woman costume. This is what you gave them that I was talking about--Vitality and a sense of newness, even when she was having a bad day--you gave them both so much. Explain the concept of the costumes and how the relationship with your grandparents might have been changed or put into a new light. In 2013 my grandmother began showing early signs of dementia. I wanted to create a portrait of this new chapter in my grandparents' relationship. I decided to paint my grandparents on separate planes as a metaphor. The painting entitled Sleep Walking, presents my grandfather waking up in the night to find my grandmother sleep-walking on the wall. Their gaze meets in the focal point of the canvas. Continued on next page...

Sleep Walking 2013. Oil on canvas. 83 x 73 in. Private collection, Los Angeles

Her shadow, which is behind her, represents the past and is cast over their wedding picture on the wall, emphasizing the distance between when they first met and the present moment. Beside that picture is an oval mirror, which is reflecting my shadow, putting me in the room with them. During this transitional time my grandmother expressed exuberance and humor that came naturally to her. I always saw her dancing.

You honed in on your vision and artistic purpose to capture and taste the period when they were your age. How did you go about your mission? What puzzle pieces did you have to gather before the conceptual piece of art existed?

Michele de Montaigne said, “Every man has within himself the entire human condition.” To truly understand what my grandparents were experiencing I needed to put myself in their predicament with a great deal of empathy. I envisioned myself 60 years forward in their shoes. I watched their transitions and how they responded to them. I also took notice

of how all of this was affecting me.

The question I have for you, Jason, is that you are defying what society tells us is beautiful; if you're young, you're beautiful…. And you are saying – no, every age is beautiful. And you found that out working with your grandparents, other models, etc. Like a flower – you know, a Rose is considered top of the line, and a wild flower, well, that can be pulled. But look closer at it, and you discover the complexities and beauty in that wild, untamed, unappreciated flower and end up tossing that Rose! You see this underrated plant, maybe in some ways leaning on the mysterious and taboo nature of mortality, offers more answers to you and your work rather than the glorified Rose. So, must your artistic mission be somewhat related to this?

I’m fascinated by our society’s fear and avoidance of aging. Yet aging is inevitable. I understand no one wants to lose their mobility, autonomy, or who they love. But the reality is if we’re lucky we will

get old. Life can be hard but it is also beautiful, and aging is a part of it which I believe is worth celebrating. I love meeting elders who share their experiences. Most of the time they haven’t lost the other ages they’ve been, but it’s their bodies that no longer reflect their youthful spirit. I’ve had quite an education over the years between my relationship with my grandparents and others from their generation I’ve met in the city. I’ve learned about what the world was like and what their experiences had been. I relate this to our world and my experiences. This gives me a perspective I couldn’t find elsewhere. I look at the experience of life as an education and we have many lessons to learn.

What art were you producing during COVID 2020?

In the beginning of COVID in 2020 I lost my grandfather, Leonard. I had lost my grandmother, Elaine, two years prior. I took that year creatively to process this loss. Because my grandparents were no longer physically here, I began experimenting

Whispering Grass 2015. Oil on canvas. 84 x 84 in. Private Collection, Brussels

with painting abstraction without the figure. This work broke all of the observational techniques I had previously engaged with. I began a series of paintings, rainbow bodies, that would investigate loss and transcendence. The paintings referenced the Tibetan Buddhist belief of Rainbow Bodies; achieving a level of realization which transforms the physical body into radiant lights.

What poem or literary piece, film, music score, or work of art have you used as a soundboard for your ideas that would eventually turn into art?

In 2015 Whispering Grass was painted in response to a few voices who expressed discomfort with Elaine posing for paintings. At that time I was faced with a moral decision to continue our work or not. My grandmother answered my question when she told me she felt excluded after I took some space and continued working with my grandfather. The significance of our relationship artistically only began to grow from that moment. “Whispering

Grass” depicts Elaine standing in the foreground wearing a Wonder Woman costume. Placed behind her is a vast field with a windswept tree, burdened with external voices of doubt. The painting title was inspired by the song Whispering Grass written by Fred and Doris Fisher in 1940.

Share your experience of the first breakthrough art exhibit, a pivotal moment that demonstrated the significance of your artwork to viewers. How did you perceive people's reactions, and how did those insights help clarify your ongoing artistic direction?

In 2011 and 2012 my “Elder Kinder” exhibitions in New York had a unique way of confronting viewers. The portraits of Leonard and Elaine dressed in costumes reminiscent of youth exuded an unconventional playful humor.

In 2013 my “Dream of The Soft Look” exhibition in New York confronted the viewers with the psychology of aging with a video piece that curated the paintings. I filmed Leonard in black and white wak-

ing up to Chopin’s Nocturne. He slowly moves through his painstaking routine of showering, shaving, etc. I integrated flashes of 8mm color footage that Leonard filmed himself, creating flashbacks of his actual memories to the video. There were 18 paintings in the show, most of them black and white. The film was playing in the back room of the gallery. There were two monitors in the front windows on 25th street. The right window featured video of my grandfather’s face, as he saw it in the reflection of the mirror in black and white. The left window was 8mm footage of my mom as a kid, dancing ballet in chiaroscuro color. Those two videos represented the whole concept of the exhibition. The color paintings with costumes reminiscent of youth represented the past and the black and white portraits the present.

In 2017 I had my first solo museum exhibition entitled “Somewhere” at The University of Maine Museum of Art.

Continued on next page...

The Boxer 2012. Oil on linen. 72 x 60 in. Private collection, Palm Springs

This body of work focused on my grandmother and explored the intangibilities of her experience through paintings, drawings, and video. The video, Somewhere, studies expressions of dementia, confronting the viewer with psychological vulnerability. Elaine responds to the subconscious mind, speaking to a dream-like state of memory- a place intangible to those not experiencing it. The exhibition also featured a painting entitled Wintered Fields. This is one of two 12 foot wide black and white portraits of Elaine. She is wearing a Wonder Woman costume as a symbol of strength where the backgrounds can be viewed as a backdrops mirroring her mental state. This exhibition created an important conversation with the senior community in Maine. The museum programmed a series of lectures including one with the Alzheimer's Foundation.

The arts today are filled with energy and countless opportunities for creativity. Inspiration surrounds us; even a simple walk down the street can spark new ideas. While various influences can be overwhelming, they also offer many possibilities. What recent trends or movements

have you noticed that could inspire you to experiment? Might these experiences encourage you to see your goals in artmaking?

We are living in a truly unique time because of technology. The internet is saturated with information and content of all kinds. I think it is important as an artist to stay focused on your initial goals while allowing for new information. I try to take in information as nutrition for my mind. I draw inspiration from reading about artists or topics that inspire me. I visit related work in museums as well as watch films and documentaries. Inspiration can find you anywhere, but it always finds you while working.

What do you often have to remind your art students about constantly that is based on your experience and knowledge?

I am constantly reminding my students to squint when drawing from the model.

Being an artist enhances our intuitive sensibilities. What does it mean to be an artist from this perspective?

I believe powerful art can enhance our capacity for

empathy. When you view a work of art you are seeing into the mind of the artist.

Where would you go if you were suddenly transported to another time in our world or a moment in our universe?

I’m sure every artist imagines living in another time before the one they are in. There’s a great quote from Woody Allen’s film, Midnight In Paris. “Nostalgia is denial - denial of the painful present. The name for this is golden age thinking - the erroneous notion that a different time period is better than the one one’s living in is a flaw in the romantic imagination of those people who find it difficult to cope with the present.”

You are in an art exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum, and the painting I am seeing is of two sisters sitting in front of their beloved mother's portrait – a painting within a painting. Tell us about this painting, please.

I painted Keys Open Doors with the Brooklyn Museum’s artists show celebrating the 200th anniversary in mind. It is a portrait of memorialization. The portrait of Brooklyn born identical twin daughters

Keys Open Doors 2024. Oil on canvas. 84 x 64 in.

Waiting 2015. Pencil on paper 24 x 18 in. Collection of Huntington Museum of Art

honoring their mother. Soull and Dynasty sit beside each other in front of large wooden double doors. The twins are adorned with their handmade garments and jewelry layered with key symbols, a leitmotif consistent with their artistry. Behind them is a painting of Josephine, their late mother, resting on the doorknob between the twins as well as joining the doors. The painting is entitled Keys Open Doors, a metaphor for family. Josephine is the key and the doors represent the lives of Soull and Dynasty who honor her.

Where do you wish to see your artwork sometime in your life?

I would love to show one day at the MET.

Being that you work on more than one painting at a time in your studio, how does this way of creating work benefit your creative process?

I work on several works at the same time so I have an escape from one and can return to it with fresh eyes. Although sometimes one painting captures me straight through.

Whenever you are sketching, you are gathering new ideas. What is your latest insight?

Sketching can be helpful to understand what information is good to take and what information should

be discarded. Although my work looks realistic from afar I enjoy the looseness and simplicity of the brushstrokes up close. I like simplifying the forms and not over-painting or over-including information. Miles Davis said, “It’s not the notes you play, it’s the notes you don’t play.”

What do you love about your studio and the neighborhood it's in?

I love that my studio is a place that feels the most private. I can comfortably express myself. I can make mistakes over and over again and yet feel progress simultaneously.

There are many diverse realities to explore, which can greatly enrich your artistic practice in the future. Do you agree? How so?

New York City is a melting pot of culture. I think it is important to experience a myriad of environments, cultures, as well as engage with those of various ages and circumstances.

What are your favorite art supplies and art stores?

I often get supplies online. Jerry’s Artarama has good deals. My studio is close by SOHO Art Supply in case I need something fast. I also really like Kremer Pigments in Chelsea.

So, you turn the lights off in your studio and are ready to leave for now. Walking away from a work in progress is beneficial. Stepping back from your painting is always suggested as well. It allows you to gain a fresh perspective and return with renewed inspiration. What do you think about, or how do you make good use of, this ending time of day at the studio?

When I shut off the lights in the studio I am exhausted. On a good day I feel satisfied. On days where the painting doesn’t go so well I still feel I’ve accomplished something. My artistic practice isn’t dissimilar to an athlete’s training. You don’t always see the hard work you put in immediately. However, hard work finds its way out. Those are the days I leave most satisfied.

www.instagram.com/jasonbardyarmosky @jasonbardyarmosky

www.jasonyarmosky.com

Wintered Fields, 2015 triptych. Oil on canvas. 72 x 144 in. Collection of Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art

ERIKA LARSKAYA

Confinement and Breakaway examine the mental state of struggle to make sense of our environment, both physical and psychological. I incorporate childlike drawing to represent nonconformity; the unadulterated state before we get confined by rules, commitment, insecurities, and other “add-ons.”

“I distress and repair parts of the painting, as we do within ourselves. The drawings of floor plans and elevations, which I use as a starting point, create a sense of enclosure, which I expand by continuing the lines outward, breaking the structural pattern. This alters the sense of confinement, breaking away from the [rigid, static] norm”.

Erika Larskayahttps://www.erikalarskaya.art

LIONEL DELEVINGNE

Lionel Delevingne is a French born photographer and author whose work has taken him all over the world for publications such as the New York Times, Mother Jones, Figaro magazine among many others. His work has been collected and exhibited widely in Europe and the US.

His two most recent books “To The Village Square, from Montague to Fukushima 1975 to 2014” and “X-ING …My Adventures at the Carwash 2022” are emblematic of his commitment to environmental concerns as well as the uncovering the absurdity of today’s reality.

Lionel Delevingne917-496-1863

lioneldelevingne@gmail.com https://www.lioneldelevingne.com https://www.instagram.com/Lioneldelevingne

BRUCE LAIRD

I am an abstract artist whose two- and threedimensional works in mixed media reveal a fascination with geometry, color and juxtapositions. For me it is all about the work which provides surprising results, both playful and thought provoking.

From BCC to UMASS and later to Vermont College to earn my MFA Degree. I have taken many workshops through Art New England, at Bennington College, Hamilton College and an experimental workshop on cyanotypes recently at MCLA. Two international workshops in France and Italy also.I am pleased to have a studio space with an exciting group of artists at the Clocktower Building in Pittsfield.

Bruce LairdClock Tower Business Center, Studio #307 75 South Church Street, Pittsfield, MA

“The color blue symbolizes tranquility and inner peace. It was done at a time when I needed some calmness in my life. The peaceful, tranquil color resonates with me and is often used in my paint‐ings. I added a touch of purple to this one for heal‐ing and enlightenment. When you see it and study it, your mind just relaxes through the chaos. It is the balance of the two emotions I tried to show in this painting.” —DL

©Vintage Delevingne silver prints for in these times …

"SPIRITS" 18" x 24" on canvas wrapped around a 1.5' W wood frame.

Sumo, Blue Mountain Grante, 136 in. x 164 in. x 48 in., 1994, Grounds for Sculpture, Hamilton N.J.

Mnemonic XIX, ht. 22”, Bronze, 1988

DURING THE STORM, MID PANEL FROM SNOWSTORM, ALFORD VILLAGE, TRIPTYCK

STEPHAN MARC KLEIN

I have been sketching and making art for all my adult life, since my undergraduate education as an architect in the late 1950’s. What interests me most at present about creating art, besides the shear visceral pleasure of making things, of putting pencil or pen or brush or all of them to paper, and of manipulating images on the computer, is the aesthetic tension or energy generated in the metaphoric spaces between the abstract and the representational, between individual work and reproduction, and between analog and digital processes. I enjoy creating images that result from working back and forth between the computer and the handmade.

My wife, artist Anna Oliver, and I have made our home in the Berkshires for the past three years and I am still entranced with its beauty. I think much of my work is in part a kind of visual rhapsody to the area. The idea for Snowstorm, Alford Village, came from an interest I have had in exploring the dimension of time in the plastic arts.

Also, I love snowy winters.

Stephan Marc Kleinstephanmarcklein.com smk8378@gmail.com

Member 510 Warren Street Gallery, Hudson, New York

KAREN J. ANDREWS

Karen J. Andrews has been painting in watercolor for the past 20 years and has honed a unique style that expresses her love of movement and form. She sees the “dance” in everything and treats each painting as a unique encounter with the paint medium and the subject. Her approach is always fresh, and she lets herself go right to the edge, creating sometimes unexpected results.

Over the years, Karen has studied briefly with a few of the watercolor masters such as Charles Reid, Josepeh Zbukvich and Marc Folley. Her background was studying Art History at Oberlin College, so she has seen a lot of great art. Karen has devised her own language of brushstrokes and compositions that give her paintings a sense of immediacy and aliveness.

Karen’s subjects range widely from floral to dance, portrait to architecture, and landscape to abstraction.

“To me it’s not so much about the subject but about the encounter with light, form and color, and expressing the delight I feel in discovering the beauty of what I am seeing, one brushstroke at a time. I never know exactly what’s going to happen, so of course there are some “misses”, but the surprises that can occur make it worthwhile.”

Karen’s work will be on display in a solo show at the Dartmouth Hitchcock Hospital in Lebanon, New Hampshire from Jan to April 2025.

Her work may also be seen at her own gallery, Inner Vision Studio in West Stockbridge, MA. Visitors are always welcome with a phone call ahead. InnerVision-Studio.com413-212-1394

17 Cone Hill Rd, West Stockbridge, Massachusetts karen@innervision-studio.com

LESLEE CARSEWELL

My artwork, be it photography, painting or collage embraces a very simple notion: how best to break up space to achieve more serendipity and greater intuition on the page. Though simple in theory, this is not so easy to achieve. I work to make use of both positive and negative space to create interest, lyricism, elegance, and ambiguity. Each element informs the whole. This whole, with luck, is filled with an air of intrigue.

Breaking up space to me has a direct correlation to music. Rhythm, texture, points of emphasis and silence all play their parts. Music that inspires me includes solo piano work by Debussy, Ravel, Mompou and of course, Schubert and Beethoven. Working with limited and unadorned materials, I enhance the initial compositions with color, subtle but emphatic line work and texture. For me, painting abstractly removes restraints. I find the simplicity of line and subsequent forming of shapes quietly liberating.

Lastly, I want my work to feel crafted, the artist’s hand in every endeavor.

Leslee Carsewell413-229-0155 / 413-854-5757 lcarsewellart@icloud.com TOP: STRAND NO.5

413-298-4221

Berkshirescenicphotography.com

Lonny@berkshirescenicphotography.com

Bruce Laird

75 South Church Street, Pittsfield, MA

GHETTA HIRSCH

Winter is here. The snow that surrounds us as I write sends me in a dreamlike state. I can watch snow falling with the same serene concentration I experience observing the movement of gentle waves on a beach. Both involve water elements in different forms and rock my mind similarly to what a baby in the bath must experience.

I am recovering from a very bad fall and surgery to repair broken bones, and I need all the healing I can manage. Of course, I will not have the pleasure of walking in this virgin snow as I am still glued to a wheelchair, but watching the purity of this white blanket covering our Berkshires trees and bushes relaxes my mind and encourages me to meditate peacefully.

In January snow will continue to surprise us some mornings. Kids may be thinking “Snow Day”, but I will marvel at the quietness and the silence that will surround my home and feel inspired to recreate these peaceful views on a canvas.

Did you notice how snow takes on the colors of the atmosphere? I am often surprised to pull out pink, blues and purple oil tubes of paint when I work on a winter scene. It is as if the sky had landed on this white coverage. Yet, when it snows, the weather is grey. A complete mystery - a trick of the light.

I have quite a few snow paintings in my home studio, and you are welcome to visit, especially as I cannot go out due to my accident. Call or text if you are in Williamstown and you can view some interesting winter art. Gallery North, a new Art Gallery in North Adams, is exhibiting quite a few of my paintings as well. Ghetta Hirsch413-597-1716.

Instagram: @ghettahirschpaintings; website: ghetta-hirsch.squarespace.com.

Gallery North, 9 Eagle Street, North Adams - open Tuesday through Friday 3:30-7, Saturday 3-8 and Sunday 11-2. www.gallerynorthadams.com

BERKSHIRE DIGITAL

Since opening in 2005, Berkshire Digital has done Giclée prints/fine art printing and accurate photo-reproductions of paintings, illustrations and photographs.

Giclée prints can be made in many different sizes from 5”x7” to 42”x 80” on a variety of archival paper choices. Berkshire Digital was featured in Photo District News magazine in an article about fine art printing. See the entire article on the BerkshireDigital.com website.

Berkshire Digital does accurate photo-reproductions of paintings and illustrations that can be used for Giclée prints, books, magazines, brochures, cards and websites.

“Fred Collins couldn’t have been more professional or more enjoyable to work with. He did a beautiful job in photographing paintings carefully, efficiently, and so accurately. It’s such a great feeling to know I have these beautiful, useful files on hand anytime I need them. I wish I’d called Fred years ago.” ---- Ann Getsinger

We also offer restoration and repair of damaged or faded photographs. A complete overview of services offered, along with pricing, can be seen on the web at BerkshireDigital.com

The owner, Fred Collins, has been a commercial and fine art photographer for over 30 years having had studios in Boston, Stamford and the Berkshires. He offers over 25 years of experience with Photoshop, enabling retouching, restoration and enhancement to prints and digital files. The studio is located in Mt Washington but drop-off and pick-up is available through Frames On Wheels, 84 Railroad St. in Great Barrington, MA Berkshire Digital413-528-0997 and Gilded Moon Framing 17 John Street in Millerton, NY 518-789-3428 / 413-644-9663, or go online to www.BerkshireDigital.com

There are painters who transform the sun into a yellow spot, but there are others who, thanks to theirart and intelligence, transform a yellow spot into the sun.”

— Pablo Picasso

LONNY JARRETT BERKSHIRE SCENIC PHOTOGRAPHY

My initial memory of awakening to the creative impulse was hearing the first chord of the Beatles, Hard Day’s Night, when I was six years old. I knew something big was happening at that moment, and I had to get on board! I began studying at the Guitar Workshop, the first guitar school in America. I’ve performed music most of my life and play jazz fusion with my band Redshift.

My interest in photography blossomed as an electron-microscopist publishing neuro- and molecular-biological research out of UMASS/Amherst and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx in my early 20s.

As a lifelong meditator, martial artist, musician, and photographer, everything I engage with comes from the same unified intention toward engendering the true, the good, and the beautiful. I endeavor to capture the light that seeps through everything in landscape and nature photography.

Lonny Jarrett -

Community: Nourishingdestiny.com

Books: Spiritpathpress.com

Art: Berkshirescenicphotography.com

Teaching: Lonnyjarrett.com

ASCENDING OIL AND COLD WAX MEDIUM ON CANVAS, 7”X 8”

Travel Journal AFRICA 2024

Photographs by John Lipkowitz / Accompanied by Nina Lipkowitz

I love taking portraits of animals close up but at the same time look for them in context with one another. Those of elephants can convey simultaneously their size, power and intelligence as though they are in conference - and perhaps they are!

JL: On safari we’re always looking for cats and spotted ones are just so beautiful. Crossing the log, just to get a higher perspective, this cheetah, either very well fed or pregnant ( we couldn’t sex it) became one of those images that is simply a gift from on high.

JL:

Have you ever been on safari to Africa? If not and it’s not yet high up on your bucket list perhaps you ought to seriously consider if you can. My wife and I have been to various countries in Southern and Eastern Africa numerous times, most recently to Kenya in the East where I took all of these photographs. On this trip my wife was most interested in seeing one of the reintroducing centers for re-wilding orphaned elephants who grew up in their nursery center and when from three to five years old are transferred to one of The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust’s three such centers. I was most interested in seeing some of the very few remaining supertuskers among wild bulls with a least one tusk weighs at least 100 pounds, and emergents with a chance of becoming one in another ten, fifteen or more years. —John Lipkowitz

JL: We had stopped to watch this rhino and starling riding him. Finally the starling came down and for an instant lined up perfectly with its former host.

Two examples illustrating some of the ways to use

DRAWALL … ‘Invention as art’ … a new drawing medium, a tool, new age mechanical drawing, pencil drawing on a vertical surface, clean drawing surfaces, large format, reviving the art of the ‘draftsman’ … The ‘built world’ has always relied on drawings by draftsmen, I’d like to reclaim that art form to create a new ... art genre. If I’ve been using Drawall to make art, I’m sure other talented types can use Drawall, too.

I’m offering Drawall to the ‘art world’ as a new tool to explore, to hopefully resurrect drafting and mechanical drawing to a new ‘art genre’. It’s not everyday a new analogue tool is introduced to the art world. —Leonardo Sideri

Contact Leonardo Sideri at leonardosideri.com for further information and inquiries

DRAWALL

“Man Alone”, pencil drawing 36” x 36”

Drawall with a 36” x 60” sketch, paint markers on paper

CARLOS CAICEDO

Carlos’ award-winning graphic work has been shown throughout the United States, from Alaska to New York, and from South America to Europe. Museums include Museo La Tertulia in Cali, Colombia, The Anchorage Art Museum in Alaska, The Waterloo Arts Center in Iowa, The Ft. Wayne Museum in Indiana, The Springfield Art Museum in Missouri and the Housatonic Museum of Art in Connecticut.

In 2008 and one more time in 2025, he was invited to participate in the Florence Biennale of Contemporary Art in Florence, Italy. His work includes illustration, painting, and, most currently, photography.

During the last ten years, he has concentrated on exploring photography as an art form. Since 2019, he has won multiple National and International Silver and Gold Awards for his photo work with paper, including the well-known international publication Graphis. During the same consecutive years, he was honored with two Gold medals and two Best Of Show for his Photography series using pencils as a subject, by Trierenberg Super Circuit in Austria, the largest photo Art contest in the world. His photo artworks have also been translated into museum-quality apparel.

As he put it, "Paper and pencil have been lifetime companions for me, not simply tools. In a digital age, these humble objects remain stubbornly useful, and our connection goes back to memory. It’s a physical relationship. A yellow pencil in a child’s fist moving on blue-lined paper. A word is being bo:n, MOM. The weight of a book and the sound of a page as it turns, the curve it makes, and how its shadow moves.These are pleasures that haptics can’t mimic. My photography is a journey of discovery with these old friends to see if we can still surprise each other.

He also published an award-winning book called “paperandpencilsbycarloscaicedo”.

Some of his work can be seen at https://500px.com/p/carloscaicedo1 and has over 75,000 followers. His page has been visited over 20 million times over the last 9 years. Carlos moved from Colombia to The United States in 1981.

Carlos Caicedocarlosart.net /

Apparel: https://www.legaleriste.com/33/carlos.caicedo Prints:

https://www.pictorem.com/profile/carlos.caicedo carloscedo@yahoo.com

Eclipse Mill, 243 Union St North Adams MA

JOANE CORNELL FINE JEWELRY

My designs are derived strictly from an organic process. A portion of my designs come to me in the wee morning hours when sleep evades me. My work studio tables are peppered with different groupings of stones. Tourmalines, corundum, beryl, moonstone, amethyst, etc. Strands of Peruvian pink opals, turquoise, black tumbled tourmaline. Rough tumbled ruby, and green garnet beads.

I enter my studio, walking slowly past these surfaces, absorbing the images/stones for reference. The design comes first, then, what stones will fit the process. And at times, it’s the reverse. A stone will inspire a design.

Every design is a process. From melting the metal and hand forging/forming the “parts” that will eventually become the item. Studio time. My favorite place. Commission orders welcomed.

Joane Cornell Fine Jewelry9 Main St., Chatham, New York; JoaneCornellFineJewelry.com / Instagram

MARY ANN YARMOSKY

My work is a collection of a variety of people, a collection of experiences and expressions. It’s about understanding their history, understanding the power of their history, the power of their power, the power of their vulnerability, the power of transformation, and the power of purpose.

My works are abstract in nature, but aren’t we all pieces put together by our life experiences? Who is to say what is real when we look at a person. Don’t we always project onto them some characteristic we think we see, some fleeting feeling that crosses their face, or some mannerism that indicates their comfort or discomfort?

I work mainly with acrylic on canvas, paper or wood and often add fabric, thread or other artifacts that seem to belong. My process unfolds unintentionally since my characters dictate what needs to be said. I invite you to weave your own story into my works. You can decide what is held in an expression, a certain posture or the clothes they wear. I hope you enjoy the adventure as much as I do.

Mary Ann Yarmoskymarymaryannyarmosky.com maryannyarmoskyart.shop

There is no must in art because art is free.”

—Wassily Kandinsky

ERNEST SHAW

In reality, we don’t get a ‘fixed” and solid thing called a “self”, with a “life”, but rather, in a world of constant change, we get moments to live.

Art speaks of those moments, raises the eloquent ash of artists, birth and death. How we live the moments matters. What we leave behind matters.

Weaving words or images together reveals a story, from the personal to the universal, not as absolute truths, nor certitude, but as an open query, raising possibilities, a way of facing into life’s mystery, and, as Kafka said, “letting the world roll in ecstasy at your feet. It has no choice.”

Ernest Shawernestshaw179@icloud.com ernestshaw.net

FRONT ST. GALLERY

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. Private critiques available. 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. Kate Knapp413-528-9546 at home or 413-429-7141 (cell) Front Street, Housatonic, MA. Gallery open by appointment or chance anytime. www.kateknappartist.com

DEBORAH H. CARTER

Deborah H. Carter is a multi-media artist from Lenox, MA, who creates upcycled sustainable wearable art. Her couture pieces are constructed from post-consumer waste such as food packaging, wine corks, cardboard, books, wire, plastic, and other discarded items and thrifted wares. She manipulates the color, shape, and texture of her materials to compel us to question our assumptions of beauty and worth and ultimately reconsider our habits and attitudes about waste and consumerism.

A sewing enthusiast since the age of 8, Deborah first learned her craft by creating clothing with her mother and grandmothers. Her passion took hold as she began to design and sew apparel and accessories. After graduating with a degree in fashion design from Parsons School of Design in New York City, she worked as a women’s sportswear designer on Seventh Avenue.

Deborah’s art has been exhibited in galleries and art spaces around the US. She was one of 30 designers selected to showcase her work at the FS2020 Fashion Show annually at the University of Saint Andrews, Scotland. She has featured in the Spring 2023 What Women Create magazine.

Deborah H. Carter has been featured in The Artful Mind, Berkshire magazine, What Women Create magazine and was a finalist in the World of WearableArt competition in Wellington, New Zealand 2023.

Deborah H Carter413-441-3220, Clock Tower Artists

75 S. Church St., Studio 315, 3rd floor. Pittsfield, Massachusetts Instagram: @deborah_h_carter Debhcarter@yahoo.com

THE ARTFUL MIND Magazine

In-depth interviews focusing on today’s artists here and beyond.

Thank you for all the support continuously given to the artists and services in this publication. arfulmind@yahoo.com 413. 645. 4114

STILL LIFE, KATE KNAPP

Ernest Shaw’s new book

BOTTLE CAPPED UPCYCLED BOTTLE CAPS

Something For Over The Couch PART 23

“The Abandoned Elks Club”

My new hoodlum friends from Brooklyn and I agreed to meet the following day to exchange my painting for the switchblade knife. I set off with a great many things to do. I had to do a painting to fit the description I had given, but first I had to purchase a suitable second hand frame to put the painting in. It was Saturday afternoon, and I was able to find an adequate frame, complete with glass and a mat in a junk shop on James Street, next to the closed down Rialto Movie Theater. I had often been in that junk shop, and took pleasure in looking at the terribly bad paintings that were hanging on the back wall. Directly in front of the art works there was a pile of frames on the floor, leaning against the wall. Almost all were prints that had lost their color, especially their reds and yellows. They seemed to retain their blue tints even in the pictorial death they found themselves in.

You might consider the significance of those assortments of rejected and abandoned artworks in the mind of some young aspiring artist. Here perhaps is the ultimate destination of a person’s life, sitting on the floor in the back of a junk shop, as opposed to, for example, some special rooms in a museum somewhere. But I was in a hurry that afternoon and did not have any time to ponder my fate.

I went home, went up to my attic studio and in about an hour produced my ‘Voyage of Life,’ painting. When I started, I was worried that it would somehow possess the lying and dishonesty that brought about the commission, but I was wrong. I thought it was a little masterpiece. I had seen some Paul Klee watercolors in the bookstore and I thought there was as much Klee in my little mountain as there was of myself. As for the part that was not Klee there was also some Rothko thrown in. Of myself there was something I think, I am not sure exactly what, but it was an urgent situation and so I had to avail myself of some help from the masters.

Promptly the next day I arrived at the meeting to exchange the painting for the knife. I was punctual, as if for an important business meeting, but it was Sunday, and the convenience store was closed. The convenience store being closed had nothing to do with my business transaction but made me feel that the entire thing was possibly just a fraud. I waited for half an hour, and finally I had to admit that John Pontormo had been just pretending to be interested in my painting. I was being made a fool of over something that was extremely important to me. In short, I was a gullible simpleton, and I was angry

with myself for being so foolish; nevertheless, I managed to go back to that convenience store at noon everyday for a week.

Then three weeks went by and it was the end of August. School was about to begin, and it would be my senior year. I forgot all about the knife, but the knife did not forget about me.

I was walking down Genesee Street on my way to the book store when I heard someone shouting my name. It was not exactly my name, but someone was calling “Ricky, hey Ricky.” I did not look around, but then an old V.W pulled to the curb in front of me and Ivan put his head out of the passenger side window. He didn’t say anything to me, but just looked at me with a thick bruised face. Mr. Pontormo began talking to me from the driver's seat, gesturing and explaining himself from behind Ivan’s shoulder saying, “We’re sorry about last week, we had some difficulties. We had to fix the car.”

They wanted me to join them in the car, but I suddenly began to fear for my life. It was not the claustrophobic smallness of the back seat of their VW, it was the black and blue aspect of Ivan’s face that was frightening. The entire fantastic interaction with these persons had so far been an unreal bit of play acting, but to get into the back of their little car, for no reason at all, was not a possibility. I made an excuse, I was waiting for my girlfriend, she was an imaginary person who was supposed to be in the bookstore.

John, still talking to me over the shoulder of his partner, invited me to come to their house, and to bring the picture. “Bring the painting to 100 Cooper Street,” he said, and he repeated the address a little louder. I replied with a nod, and went into the book store and pretended to look at a book. They sat there in front of the store talking about something for a long time, and finally drove away, their car making a scraping sound.

The following day, about three in the afternoon, I walked to 100 Cooper Street with my painting under my arm. I was familiar with Cooper Street because it was often in the news; mentioned as the location where some crime had been committed. It was a logical location where hoodlums from out of town, up to no good and down on their luck would be living. The city had tried for years to get rid of Cooper Street entirely, but had not succeeded. It had been the target of urban renewal, and much of it had been torn down to make way for the cross town bypass, and what remained were apartment houses with plywood for windows and doors. Number 100 was a brick building of three stories that, according to the stone arch above the entrance, had formerly been an Elks club. Most, but not all of the windows and doors were covered with plywood. Their car was at the back of the driveway, partially covered with a gray tarp.

The abandoned building they were living in and the car covered with a tarp, a tarp whose corner happened to cover the licence plate, told an obvious story of criminal activity of some sort. But regardless of the obvious suspiciousness of the situation I was drawn in with a kind of fearful anticipation. I knocked on the door frame and after a few minutes a face appeared in a window of the porch and I was directed to go around to the back, where I found the back door open. Actually there was no door, just an opening. The door itself was in the yard. The door had been set up as a sort of picnic table with bricks

and cinder blocks for support. Nearby was a fire pit, and next to it a pile of woodwork casings, apparently torn from the house and being used as firewood. All of this obvious cannibalistic destruction of the building was happening in complete privacy because the large lawn was surrounded by brick walls, and the walls were overgrown with every kind of wild vegetation nature can create in twenty years of neglect, especially sumac trees. In short, the yard presented a kind of perfect thieves den of iniquity.

I didn’t enter the building right away but stood on the back steps admiring the yard, and what it signified, and then we went into the building together. The back door opening entered into a kitchen, but not a kitchen for some family with a few kids, it was a kitchen that had at one time prepared meals for grand events. It was a kitchen of the type found in the basements of large churches, along with the out of tune upright piano. It was probably twenty years ago that the kitchen had been used, and everything was broken, and the plumbing disconnected. There were long marble countertops that somebody had broken in various places probably just for sport. The sinks were full of plaster dust from a part of the ceiling that had collapsed. You couldn’t see the floor, as it was covered with dirt and plaster dust, and made a crunching sound under your foot. Two matching doors at each end of the kitchen led to a big formal dining room devoid of furniture, except for a folding card table missing most of its vinyl covering.

I had never been in an abandoned building in my life, but the first few minutes in such a place is capable of overthrowing a lifetime of simple basic assumptions about life, and what it is supposed to be like. It is a moment just as memorable as the first time one sees a dead person. I wanted to be taken on a tour of the entire house, and witness all the things it had to say, but I was there for the transaction, the first sale of a painting to a stranger, and the payment. I handed the painting to my client and he took it and looked at it admiringly. I suppose it is natural in such a situation, to expect some questioning criticism, but John was enraptured by my little painting. He wanted very badly to say something about it, but he did not have any of the vocabulary that the admiration of a painting requires, but his face had the unmistakable expression of the pride of ownership. We were in the dining room, and he had already picked out a place for my painting in the next room, which was the grand smoking room of the old Elks club, a room which still retained some of its leather covered couches and easy chairs, and even a spittoon. The painting was destined for the place of honor, on a little rusted nail on the wall above a magnificent walnut fireplace mantle. My picture was nowhere near big enough to command the space, but nevertheless I was very proud of the painting and the moment. John handed me the knife, and I put it in my pocket. My sale was complete, the knife was illegal, to buy a switchblade knife was illegal, the transaction took place between two trespassers in an abandoned building. I thought to myself, “This will make a good paragraph in my future biography once I am famous, and dead.”

RICHARD BRITELL, DECEMBER, 2024

PARTS 1 - 22 AT SPAZIFINEART COM/SHORT-STORIES/

Broken Glass Portrait

Deborah H Carter

Runaway Bride

Photograph by Korenman.com Model:

Represented by the WIT Gallery Clock Tower Artists