My first solo show, way back in 2001, was titled, Vernissage.
Wiki defines it thusly…A vernissage (varnishing, from French) is a term used for a preview of an art exhibition, which may be private, before the formal opening.Guests may be served canapés and wine as they discuss with artists and others the works in the exhibition.
Right about now I’d love to serve you up some canapes and wine but, since we are here in cyberspace, this will be a Virtual Vernissage.
You are cordially invited to preview the new paintings which will be exhibited two weeks from tonight at the Granary Gallery !
This year I am going to launch the new work in groups.
As I sat last winter, with sketchbook in hand and snowflakes flying outside the studio, and began to pare down the list of compositions, some distinct and new series began to take shape. Try as I might to fit them all under the umbrella of one theme, they pushed back and up and out and I gave up worrying about it and just kept painting.
What emerged after several months of work were a few smaller grouped ideas with the occasional common thread. I’m not sure if anyone but me will see those threads, but I’ll point them out along the way.
We start, yes, at the beginning.
The first three paintings I did were studies of barns, and wood, animals and earth.
So…from the ground up…here we go
Stable Light – 24 x 30
Click on this logo below each painting to read their Painter’s Notes –
The Hay Whisperers – 24 x 36
Angle of Repose – 60 x 40
Time now for a bit of my own repose…
tomorrow the journey continues…
The exhibition of summer shows at the Granary Gallery opens tomorrow night…and I’m sending all manner of good art vibes to my pals who will start the season off with a bang…
Ken Vincent – Morning Has Broken 24 x 8 Oil on Panel
David Wallis – Morgan Whaleboat 28 x 39 Watercolor
Alison Shaw – Whaleboat, Gannon & Benjamin Boat Yard 2013
Dan West – Kingfisher 12×10 x 7 Sculpture
And a nod to our fellow art night pal John Hagen whose work is on display at the Granary and who will hopefully be ready to show new work very soon…
John Hagen – Plein Air Path to Edgartown Light 14 x 11 Oil on Canvas
Not sure if this is true for you but as time marches on I struggle less for independence and tug more on the threads that pull us all together… Travel safe this weekend my friends…
Ted and Pete have made quite a splash in their Cover debut on the American Art Collector Magazine this month, and I thought you would like to see some of their other inspirations as Muses.
Over the years, they each gave me the great gift of seeing the island of Martha’s Vineyard through their eyes. Both had DNA spread liberally across generations and rolling fields and they had an eager student of island history in my eager ears.
Ted and his wife Polly sent me wandering down many a sandy trail through brambles and over rocky rutted roads in pursuit of hidden landmarks and relics of island lore. After Polly left us, Ted rode shotgun on those adventures and navigated us to some seriously back-of-the-beyond treasures.
One such romp was to find the elusive Gay Head Lily. We ended up announcing ourselves in this lovely woman’s yard at the end of a long lane and out Ted, the celebrated head of the island garden club, waltzed to her dock along the pond to show me the flowers. Stunning. As I look back today, his hand seems far more delicate than those petals, but oh the wonders, that magician that he was, our Ted, could pull out of his hat.
Here’s a link to the original blog entry describing this painting…Click Here.
Another fine day found Ted and PG Harris and I bouncing along an old carriage path in my truck in search of The Brickyard. Ted thought it would be sorta fun to see it, and introduced me to PG whose family owned the property, and, after a couple hours of historical lecture on the area…off we three drove…I mean there we were in the middle of three glorious old fields surrounded by ancient stone walls and PG points to a small break in the stone and says, “Just drive over and through there and we’ll see.”
The Painter’s Notes give the rest of the story…click here… but suffice it to say, now that they are both floating somewhere high above that island…that adventure was one of my all time favorite memories.
Now, Peter Darling, well…he was just Pete. We called him the Admiral because he always had binoculars around his neck and was ever watchful from his deck. Not nothing, not no one, got past his old farm house on Greenhouse Lane without Pete knowin’ about it. Many a stranded sailor was rescued by the coast guard that Pete had hailed after spying their distress from his perch on top of those bluff steps. And every feather of the nesting osprey was monitored by their stalwart steward of a neighbor.
There is a tiny knoll in the long lane, right by his house, and I took to honking my horn with each passage so as to let oncoming traffic be wary, (and just between you and me…to keep the Admiral on his toes !). The very last time I heard from Pete, he had brought out a great big foghorn to his porch and answered my heralding call with his own. I really loved that.
These two views of Pete’s house give you an idea of the depth of beauty that surrounds the Darling’s farmhouse. His wife Della is there now and I’m eager to see her next week to give her a big hug and hear how life on the lane is faring this season. Della is a great fisherman and a lover of walks. In her travels, she has worn a path all along the perimeter of those old stone walls. I hear that some daisies grow there to welcome her in the late spring. She has earned them.
A couple of years ago…the year of the Apple Series, I spent the winter listening to the double trouble musings of Ted and Pete.
Pete was a tremendous trove of knowledge of Up Island lore and indeed history of all flavors. He loaned me a couple old tin coffee pots, the kind that were used over campfires by campers and travelers to cook up the early morning brew. The dear little one that made it into the Skillet Apple Pie painting was my favorite. Looking back, I should have blown some smoke out of that thing. Pete woulda loved that.
The core of this series, (written before the pun hit me, sorry), was the modeling session with Ted in the Magnuson’s Tiasquin Orchard…which all started with Chris’s suggestion…and the rest of that story is in these Painter’s Notes…click here.
And the man himself…
who sits in this chair across from my easel
and reminds me, every day,
that I am all the better
for knowing that twinkle
in his mishcievous
and loving eye.
Never trust a man, who when left alone in a room with a teacozy, does’t try it on.
As in, my painting of The Captains, is on the Cover of this month’s American Art Collector Magazine…
Blog readers will remember the recent entry about my pals Ted and Pete leaving the planet this winter. Being left here without them was not an option, so I took a couple days off from the gallery work I was producing to do a painting of them, on the bluff, looking out over the ocean, on a distant afternoon, when we all shared some sweet simple time together.
Thanks to gallery owner Micheal Sugarman (Sugarman Peterson Gallery in Santa Fe), the magazine tasked John O’Hern to write an article on my work. In talking with Micheal, and then John, interesting questions arose about what an artist paints “just for themselves”.
I have been working up to taking the challenge of figurative paintings, and when I looked around the studio it turns out that I have already begun that process. The ones which John features in the article are all very personal studies. My Captains leans just to the left of my easel where those two can continue to keep me on my toes.
I’m still shaking my head at the certainty that Ted and Pete had everything to do with nudging the painting on to the cover. It’s a very big deal for any artist and I am completely humbled, but oh how I shake my head in wonder each time I walk by the mag (which I have perched on a weaver’s chair in front of the other painting I did of Ted, The Teacozy)…just shake my head and smile from ear to ear at the folly of those pals working their magic from beyond.
The magazine should hit the newsstands soon. Here’s a link to their website, AAC Magazine.
Here’s an excerpt of John’s writing for the piece, Neill’s paintings of props, fishermen’s shacks and the landscape are finely rendered and often full of humor and subtle associations that enrich the viewer’s experience. She paint’s her emotional response to her subjects. Full figures and portraits, however, have only appeared recently in paintings that she painted “just for me,” paintings that are “very personal and straight from the heart.” Her partner Pat Lackey has been urging her to show the paintings. When her Santa Fe dealer Michael Sugarman asked her about the paintings she is most proud of she replied, “I have rarely taken the time to do work that is just for me. It is interesting because if I had to answer honestly, these portraits are the ones I am most proud of because they are all about love at the deepest part of my soul.” Aren’t we aging well is a carefully composed double portrait of the artist and her partner. They vacation on Martha’s Vineyard every summer. The bluff overlooking the ocean has always been a favorite spot. It has eroded away but remains significant in their memories.
John O’Hern
We will be up there soon. And I know it won’t be the same. There are many friends from that island who have gone on to other shores of late. But holding them close is part of growing up and growing old and we are doing both.
Grab a cup of coffee, I’m on my third, this one is a catch up long in coming…
After a week of storms, and a Friday the 13th wherein another storm featured prominently…especially, but not exclusively, the part wherein Anita, the wonderful helper at Snyder’s Sew and Vac, exclaimed that the torrential deluge, which we were all marveling at through the shop window, was POURING in to some poor fools’ open truck windows…yep, that’d be me…
anyway back to the point of entry…the stormy week…
has passed and this morning dawns cool and clear and absolutely blissful. An early walk around the garden reveals that the infant veggies have pulled off their raincoats and are quite ready to get back to the business of growing. Snow peas didn’t need no stinking slickers…they just kept right on and the first real batch was plucked into my t-shirt.
Then I walked under the arbor and was thrilled to see that we actually, after five or six years of waiting, have something resembling a real concord grape ! You will notice the avian anti-theft devices twirling in the background which seem to work just dandy to have kept the hungry spring beaks from plucking away the all important, and yes probably tasty, buds. Look hard, there are grapes there, dozens of clusters.
But seriously, the main event, for which I interrupted Herself’s bowl of cereal to insist she run to see…
MIMA’s Sour Cherry tree, “Sweet Lorraine”, has…or make that had…the first crop of sour cherries to bless this garden. Last time I had looked, there were some tiny green bobbles and the other tree, which was loaded with blossoms had none…so I wasn’t keeping close watch. I love those kind of surprises and they happen every day here in June.
So…if my garden is producing ripe cherries, the orchard just over the hill should ? Some Ritz ready made and rolled pie crusts were added to Pat’s grocery list…just in case. And a very tiny scrap of dough will be ceremonially wrapped around the tinier handful of Mima’s sour cherries for the inaugural bake. Maybe I’ll freeze them so Zoe can taste. These trees are for her after all.
OK – do you remember me mentioning Anita ? I’ll swing back around to her in a minute.
First, if we can focus on the day job…painting…
The long season of longer days and well into the late nights, as I worked to put together the paintings for the Granary Gallery Show…which opens July 20th…was wrapped up this week with the last brush strokes, on the last painting. It felt like months of straight on brush lifting but when I looked back in my daily journal it was exactly one month to the day, of 12-16 hour daily sessions, begun on May 9th and completed on the 9th of June.
Just a couple glimpses here as I wait for Mr. Corcoran to do his photographic magic for the big reveal…
The curve balls which were hurled at the studio over the winter do have me running about three weeks behind where I would like to be coming into the show season, and I have added an exciting adventure to the schedule …a real live show out in Santa Fe in October complete with the artiste in residence for the opening. More on that later…but keep your head up…that’s just the beginning.
The resulting creative intensity has correspondingly been escalating around here. And I have promised Herself and Myself to slow down enough to enjoy each other and every garden grace, and all the other mischief that my hands enjoy getting up to while they still can.
After watching the latest episode of PBS’s Craft in America, speaking of treasures, I have been studying the quilts made by the women of Gee’s Bend.( Here’s quick link, Quilts of Gee’s Bend but you can all do your own googling and I encourage you to dip away.) They are glorious, spectacular, and humbling works of art and the works by Joe Cunningham, who was featured on the show…mind blowing.
Like that…I have to quilt. No, I didn’t drag out any of the three or four projects “in progress”. Those bags are for later. I am too suggestible and, after seeing a tiny photo of some new fabric which Kaffe Fassett has produced, I ordered a fat bundle. You can see it in the background here but stop and smell my garden roses along the way.
Quick trip to Intercourse…no, the village in Amish country north of Lancaster, to the quilt mecca shop, somewhat disappointing as they had none of the notions I was there to collect. It’s just not the same when you have to order a tiny thimble online…but nothing, not even those storms…can stand in the way of this, my latest, obsession, which was held frothing in the starting gates until…the last brush stroke…AND my beloved and I had a wonderful day together, which is after all at the top of the list.
As Joe C. describes in the show, most of the time he has no idea where his quilt compositions will end up. That artistic license is essential to the creative process and it was important, for me, to be reminded of that. Seeing the free form quilts that he and the ladies have sewn, has passed down the “permission” to let loose.
No need for tedious marking and measuring and fussing over precision corners. The stitches should come from the heart. The color should pour from the soul.
My studio loft is the perfect nest for fiber arts and I was happily flying through the piecing stage..
until…the machine froze up.
And this brings us back…again…to Anita ! And Edith !
My newest angels, who are standing behind the fancy new machine which I went home with …in the middle of that storm. I googled “help my sewing machine is broken” and found Snyder’s Sew and Vac.
They all provided me with the best shopping experience I’ve had in this town in years, complete with plastic bags to cover those soaking truck seats (thank you John for that and all your good advice !). I love working with humans who know their stuff and when you thrown kindness and a good sense of humor in the mix…customer for life !
Now a new morning has dawned. The gremlins who taunted me yesterday are dismissed. The skies are clear, the cherries are ripe, the paint is drying, I’m one lucky woman and…your coffee is probably cold.
It’s time to get to work and every which way I turn there is something fun to get my hands into. I hope that is true for you as well.
And that big news… yep it’s coming. Stay tuned, stay frosty and live it large.
When I sit down to start work at the easel each day, one of the things I do to center myself is to check email and facebook before I PUT-DOWN-THE-PHONE .
Today the Granary Gallery had a post with this painting shining back at me…
Her Smalls –
from the painter’s notes…
I believe the origin is British
but that doesn’t matter.
Smalls…it’s just a matter of undergarments.
And the dearness of intimacy.
And the gift of props.
Like the hat box which belonged to John’s grandmother.
The tiny gloves that I wore to the White House.
The delicates which used to live on the shelves in the Muddy Creek General Store.
The leather purse and traveling iron which used to live on the shelf in Jane’s shop.
The coin silver spoon that Ted gave.
The teacup that Sue had to remind me was from her grandmother.
And that whimsical handkerchief of Polly’s which I pulled from the drawer
because of it’s red stripe, and only discovered half way through setting up the still life,
that it’s little girl was, Herself, doing the ironing.
Some of my most favorite paintings come from a single word.
And the gathering round of favorite things.
And the gift of quiet leisure in which to cherish them both.
A nod of thanks to the Granary staff for keeping the work alive and fresh and for all their support…which is no “small” thing.
Just for a few hours
I’d really like to sit on the porch
with my feet up
and almost all of the 15 layers of thermal woolen wear
laying in a pile to my right
and my snow shovel tossed into the weeds nearby
and feel the sun on my face
and have every joint in my hands be…not cold
and just listen to the birds
and the water lapping
on this shore…
I have a lot of things to say about this man…but right now the words are twisted up in my heart.
Last Tuesday, just about the exact time our electricity surged and vanished, so too did his heart.
The ensuing days in the cold and dark were made for the stalwart steadfast Yankee spirited New Englanders, like him. And the distractions of simple survival were just that, distractions.
Only now, as power has been restored and the outside world has followed the newly spliced cables into my studio space,
and the furnace has begun to restore my frozen digits,
and the breath is beginning to return to my soul…
only today am I able to return to the easel,
across from which is this painting,
which I am so glad I didn’t sell when someone pressured me a while back,
because I need him there,
since he is no longer sitting in his Chilmark wingback,
answering my phone call,
and directing the brushes from afar.
