Curator as Artist lV

November 15- December 7
Gallery Hours: Saturdays & Sundays, 1:00-5:00pm, or by appointment

Spencertown Academy Arts Center presents the “Curator as Artist IV” exhibit, featuring paintings, collages, metalwork, and jewelry by members of the Academy curatorial committee, including artists Karen Andrews, Munya Avigail Upin, Norma Cohen, Meryl Enerson, David Lesako, Alice McGowan, and Amelia Toelke. Admission is free and the artworks are for sale, with a portion of the proceeds benefiting the Academy.

“Curator as Artist IV” features art by curators who have been actively involved in mounting exhibits at the Academy during the last two years. “As committee members do not enter any of the juried or open call shows we organize, their artwork is presented as a separate exhibit,” says Curatorial Committee Chair Meryl Enerson. “This show has been curated internally by David Lesako, a talented exhibit designer who has assisted on the layout and hanging of most of the exhibits at the Academy, and we thought he would be the perfect choice to curate our own show.”

“All of the Academy curators are artists,” notes Lesako. “With this show, I have had the pleasure of visiting their studios and helping select the work.”

Karen Andrews is a watercolor artist and photographer based in West Stockbridge, MA, where she runs her fine art gallery, Inner Vision Studio. “What is sacred to me about painting,” she says, “is my intention of recording deep, special moments of authentic feeling and seeing. I cannot deny the influence of 25 years as a photographer, which preceded my life as a watercolor painter. Most of my images are of places and experiences I was able to capture quickly with my camera—the way a stand of trees caught the light, the corner of two buildings, a look on someone’s face or dancers in motion.”

Munya Avigail Upin has been working with metal for over 50 years. She has taught at the University of Wisconsin, Southwest Texas State University, Haystack, Penland, and numerous art centers throughout the United States and she is the recipient of a Mid-America Arts Alliance fellowship and a Niche award, among others. Avigail Upin has exhibited around the world and is in numerous private and public collections, including the Jewish Museum (NYC), Clarion University, and the University of Hawaii. She is represented by Laurie Donovan Designs and Concepts of Art, both in Lenox, MA.

Norma Cohen is a mixed-media artist and painter, working in collage, watercolor, acrylic, graphite, and oil crayon. She creates work based on her studies and interest in art history, frequently collaging media and objects from different sources and timelines into her work. For this exhibit, she presents a variety of work, some abstract, and some representational in nature. Her art has been shown nationally, in New York City, Columbia County, Pennsylvania, California, and internationally, in Paris, where she received a Residency award from the Ministry of Cultural Affairs.

Meryl Enerson, who is both a painter and digital media designer, considers painting to be the perfect antidote to modern life. She is drawn to the tactile nature of paint, especially oil paint, and loves how the process of working from life sharpens her awareness of the present. “When you paint from life, you really have to look at the thing, the place, or the person you’re trying to capture,” she says. “Then every distraction falls away, and suddenly you’re free.” She first developed a passion for painting when she and her husband, Fred, moved from New York City to Columbia County 25 years ago. “The landscapes here just beckon artists,” she says. She will be exhibiting some of her oil landscapes.

David Lesako is a landscape artist who works primarily in pastels. “I love capturing the landscape in all seasons and conditions,” he says. “I see my artworks as documents of time and place. When working ‘en plein air,’ I like to work in pastels, as they are bright and I can work quickly and capture a scene as the light changes.” Lesako has a background in art education, having taught at public schools and the university level. He now teaches drawing, watercolor painting, and lino printing to adults at the Art School of Columbia County in Harlemville, NY, where he also serves as the gallery curator.

Alice McGowan is a still life painter who works in oils and pastels. Her favorite subject matter are the fruits and vegetables she grows in her own gardens in North Egremont, MA, where she lives with her husband, Brian. “My paintings often reference personal history,” says McGowan. “…my grandmother’s and my own canned peaches, the larger-than-life vegetables that sat in the shadows of postwar Japan where I was born. And they are also about the tomatoes and pumpkins ripening on the counter today.”

Amelia Toelke is an accomplished metalsmith, jeweler, and visual artist. Her 2D mixed-media work for this exhibit incorporates 24K gold leaf, drawing on her jewelry practice. Adornment is a recurring motif in her work. “Ornament is far from supplemental,” she says. “We adorn ourselves, our spaces, our lives to communicate who we are.” Toelke has exhibited widely, and her work can be found in many prominent collections. She teaches art in the Metal and Foundations area at SUNY New Paltz, and is a frequent presenter and workshop leader.