Robin Glynn – General Assignment Reporter –
Artists and non-artists will have the opportunity to see paintings and sculptures and have an open dialogue to discuss what they think of City Gallery’s exhibit at the Lyman Center.
City Gallery serves as a platform for artists to present their work and connect with their audience and fellow artists.
“City Gallery is an artist run gallery,” said Kathy Kane of City Gallery.
Kane said 18 members of the gallery are showing their work at the exhibit. According to the City Gallery website, the gallery features innovative contemporary art. Exhibitions of painting, printmaking, sculpture, photography, paper-making and/or mixed media rotate monthly.
“We do a show every month, except December,” said Kane.
City Gallery first opened in 2003. The gallery’s members represent some of Connecticut’s finest artists, many who have earned numerous awards for their work. Artists include Amy Arledge, Judy Atlas, Meg Bloom, Phyllis Crowley, Jennifer Davies, Nancy Eisenfeld, Freddi Elton, Roberta Friedman, Barbara Harder, Shelby Head, Jane Harris, Sheila Kaczmarek, Kathy Kane, Mary Lesser, Susan Newbold, Tom Peterson, Paulette Rosen and Karen Wheeler.
Kane said that showing the exhibit at Southern is an opportunity to show their work as a group.
“It is a greater awareness to students,” said Kane. “This is an old fashion way to show work.”
It takes time to bring an exhibit to Lyman.
“We got in touch in the fall,” said David Starkey, associate director of the Lyman Center.
Starkey said the Lyman Center looks to host four exhibits a year.
Starkey said that when it comes to exhibits in the Lyman Center, New Haven artists are one of the main groups to come.
“They are good to work with,” said Starkey.
Kane said it was hard to hang paintings because of the cinder block walls, and because it is a large spacing, they requested larger pieces.
Rosen, the City Gallery curator who helped put together the exhibit with a group, makes artists’ books, drawings and dioramic boxes. Rosen’s primary medium is pencil and includes collage with found text. Rosen is fascinated with recording snippets of the natural world and presenting them as idiosyncratic collections.
Wheeler works with multiple media, including drawing, handmade paper, collage, assemblage and digital imagery. Peterson is a photographer, and compiles different works. Kane said his photographs are always contemporary and abstract. Davies makes her own paper and paints. According to City Gallery’s website, Davies creates paper using fibers such as flax, banana leaf and hemp. To make Japanese fiber, she cooks and beats them to make long translucent hangings and webs.
Eisenfeld creates sculptures of found things, such as tree bark, decaying wood, rusted wire, weathered plywood and commercial metal parts from the discard of the streets. Kane is primarily a painter and works with watercolor and acrylic paints.
The City Gallery Exhibit features artwork such as paintings, print makings, sculptures, photography and paper-makings.
According to City Gallery’s website, Friednman’s “watercolor with watercolor collages transform papers and natural found objects into layered paintings that explore and celebrate the wondrous unpredictability of water-based media. Her purpose is to contemplate and re-imagine the natural layering of the landscape-its grandeur and its serenity-through texture, light and color.”
According to City Gallery’s website, their mission is to present professional exhibitions while also serving as a place for dialogue and interaction among artists and the public. The gallery is dedicated to its role in maintaining New Haven as a significant center for the arts.
“We want to show the diversity of City Gallery,” said Kane. “We want to give people the pleasure of our work.”
The exhibit runs through March 10.
