Show Preview | Schmid, Guzik & Anderson

Boston, MA
St. Botolph Club, November 15-16

Kathy Anderson, Fall’s Late Roses, oil, 9 x 12.

Kathy Anderson, Fall’s Late Roses, oil, 9 x 12.

This story was featured in the November 2014 issue of Southwest Art magazine. Get the Southwest Art November 2014 print issue or digital download now–then subscribe to Southwest Art and never miss another story!

The historic St. Botolph Club, founded in 1880, numbered among its first members Boston’s leading cultural luminaries, from authors and historians to artists including John Singer Sargent and Daniel Chester French. So the club is an auspicious venue for West Wind Fine Art’s presentation of recent works by three virtuosos among today’s most respected representational artists.

“This show will be a celebration,” says West Wind co-founder and curator Kristen Thies. Indeed, guests at the artists’ reception from 3 to 5 p.m. on Saturday, November 15, as well as anyone attending the weekend-long show, will find manifold reasons to celebrate.

On view within the comfortable setting are three figurative and two floral works by Richard Schmid, who is wide-ly regarded as a leading force behind the resurgence of traditional representational painting across America over the past half-century. Sharing the venue with him are two other distinguished artists whose own respected careers have been inspired and guided by Schmid. His wife, Nancy Guzik, with whom he formed the Putney Painters group centered on their rural Vermont home and studio, brings five figurative and four still-life works. Kathy Anderson, a longtime friend and student of Schmid and Guzik, presents three garden scenes and four floral still lifes.

Richard Schmid, Kaytrina: Ukrainian Dancer, oil, 25 x 18.

Richard Schmid, Kaytrina: Ukrainian Dancer, oil, 25 x 18.

So visitors can expect to witness 21 pieces of exceptional quality. “We three painters want to put our best on display, which is why we always try to push the limits when we paint,” explains Guzik. “We reach for higher and richer dimensions.” That depth and richness is certainly evident in works like Guzik’s FAIRY TALES, anenchanting scene of a flower-thronged young girl lost in reverie; Anderson’s lush and colorful geranium harmony; and Schmid’s KAYTRINA: UKRAINIAN DANCER, a deeply evocative portrait that Thies sums up as “a masterwork.” Adds Anderson, “I can’t wait to see what all of our paintings look like together.”

The presence of the master himself, who turned 80 on October 5, makes the weekend even more memorable. Schmid autographs copies of the recently published Alla Prima II: Everything I Know About Painting, and More, the revised and expanded edition of a work that, since 1998, has inspired and educated representational painters everywhere. “We’ve been bringing back high skill and more thoughtful meaning in art,” says Schmid.

He also looks forward to the Boston premiere of “The Senator & the Artist,” screening at the St. Botolph Club starting at 12 noon on the Sunday of the exhibition. The documentary records the occasion on September 9, 2001, when Schmid, working before a live audience, painted a portrait of Vermont’s U.S. Senator James Jeffords, who passed away just three months ago. “I felt that to do Jim Jeffords’ portrait was a historic occasion,” says the artist. “He was quite an exception among politicians and had never opened up like that in public before in his life.”

Yet another cause for celebration. —Norman Kolpas

contact information
508.566.9463
www.westwindfineart.com

Featured in the November 2014 issue of Southwest Art magazine–click below to purchase:
Southwest Art November 2014 print issue or digital download Or subscribe to Southwest Art and never miss a story!

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