art exhibitions

The Cornwall Library is pleased to present Plein Air, an elegant selection of watercolors by artist and writer Dorothy Spears.

Her watercolors evoke the natural delights of the northwest corner of Connecticut, sometimes explicitly, as in Warren Town Beach, Autumn, but always with fine restraint. This painting consists of a suggestion of two Adirondack chairs facing a hint of shoreline in muted fall color. The rest, including land, water, and sky, is only blank white watercolor paper, but the effect is eloquently seasonal and lake-like.

Spears says about her work, “For me, as a writer and an artist, it’s what remains unsaid or unseen—in my watercolors, for example, the white of the page—that gives shape to everything else.”

Her passion for art dates back to high school when she first saw Georgia O’Keefe’s watercolors. At Brown University and Rhode Island School of Design, she studied art and art history. After graduation, she attended Parsons School of Design in Paris and SUNY Purchase.

Later, she worked at Leo Castelli Gallery and wrote a memoir, Art Tarts: An Indiscreet Tour of the 1980’s Art World, about coming of age at that time. She writes regularly about art for the New York Times and many other magazines and newspapers. She edited the anthology Flight Patterns: A Century of Stories About Flying, published by Open City Books/Grove Press in 2009. After a lifetime of contributions to the art world, with her show at the Cornwall Library she is realizing a dream that began when she was 16: an exhibit of her own watercolors.

The watercolors in this show will be available for purchase.

Dorothy Spears lives with her husband, artist Alexis Rockman, in Warren, Connecticut.

The Cornwall Library is delighted to present Traces, Places, and Faces, an intriguing exhibition of photography and watercolor painting by Sari Goodfriend and Eddie Watkins. They are life partners, and exhibit their shared passion for people, nature, and art in this joint show.

From an early age, New Yorker Sari Goodfriend happily spent her childhood summers in Cornwall with her sister Jenny and her art dealer parents, Carol and Jim. For a few years after college she lived in East Cornwall, photographing for local newspapers from New Milford to Salisbury. Todd Piker (of Cornwall Bridge Pottery) provided her a first opportunity to exhibit (and sell!) her personal photos in a show he curated at the Silo Gallery in New Milford.

Moving back to New York, Sari has since worked as a commercial photographer, shooting assignments for corporations, magazines, non-profits, universities, and private individuals. She now does mostly portraits and events, but her youthful Cornwall summers are apparent in the landscape and nature-inspired images she is exhibiting at the library. Her part of the show also features some abstract photographs inspired by what she terms “bleak winter beauty” and “the wild, chaotic, post-tornado woods”. Many of her photographs are in frames that once held old master prints from her parents’ art dealership, C&J Goodfriend, Drawings and Prints.

Eddie Watkins is from Pittsburgh. After four years in the Navy stationed in Cuba and Newfoundland as a proud member of the Seabees (Construction Battalion), he moved to New York City and became a photographer of fine artwork. His clientele includes museums such as The Frick Collection, The Museum of Arts and Design, private art dealers, well known artists, and collectors. He also photographed the permanent collection of The Art Students League.

Eddie has been the drummer for many rock and blues bands, a sideline that provides subjects for personal photography seen in this show. When on the move, from 1980s city streets to rural landscapes, Eddie always carries either a camera or a set of watercolors. His painting style ranges from loose and interpretive to detailed and exacting, inspired by his naval engineering background. This show includes both his photography and watercolors.

While Sari’s professional photography consists mostly of portraits and events, her personal work (exhibited in this show) reflects her interest in landscape, the details of nature, abstract elements, and street photography. This exhibition includes both Eddie’s paintings and his photographs. The show will remain on exhibit until June 7.

Registration is requested for the opening reception.