Summer exhibition highlights homegrown works

Aug 27, 2021

For the next three weeks, the Dartmouth Cultural center is hosting 49 paintings, prints, and portraits from 18 area artists as part of its inaugural member-guest summer exhibition.

The exhibition includes a variety of artistic styles such as acrylic, oil, and charcoal paintings hung along the walls of the Old Southworth Library’s Reading Room Gallery.

“Everything’s so different,” DCC President Pauline Santos said. “And the gallery is so full!”

The exhibit was set up by Gallery Coordinator Jill Law, who said she was “very excited” to hang the paintings around the Cultural Center's Reading Room Gallery. 

“I was really just awestruck by some of them,” Law said. “The sunny harbor next to ‘Ferro and Plaits’ — just two amazing works.”

Westport-based artist Catherine Hafer drew the “Ferro and Plaits” portrait that Law was fond of. 

Hafer noted that the piece was simply a portrait of an old high school friend who is now a jazz guitarist in New York City.

“He came to visit me while I recovered from surgery and I told him that he can’t get out of here without sitting for a portrait,” she said.

Another work Hafer had displayed was a drawing of a basset hound.

Both were done using pastels and charcoal.

“Normally I work in oils,” Hafer noted. “Oddly enough, I have two pieces here that are not.”

Dartmouth acrylic painter Beth Russo had a couple of her abstract paintings hung in the reading room.

“That’s all I know how to do,” she laughed. 

Fellow Dartmouth artist Mary Hurwitz also had a couple abstracts on display.  

One of the pieces she submitted was a black and white painting she made during the pandemic titled “Isolation.”

Rather than paint with a brush, the Dartmouth painter opted to instead use pieces of cardboard to add textures to the painting. There were also some humanoid/alien shapes that Hurwitz said she accidentally created during the artistic process.

“I usually don’t put any figures,” she laughed. “But things always appear, which is so much fun in painting.”

Law was very pleased to see so many of the Cultural Center’s members turn out for what she said is hopefully the first of many summer shows.

“The first year we had a members show, we barely had any members — the shows were very shallow,” she said. “We’ve come a long way.”

The exhibition runs through Sept. 18. Hours are 11 a.m. through 3 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.