The annual Art Show and Sale at Chadds Ford Elementary School this past weekend was another hit, with 70 professional artists showing their works Friday and Saturday.
Show co-chair Maggie Niemkiewicz was thrilled with the opening night attendance, calling it “splendid.”
“Traffic is wonderful. We’ve heard nothing but positive feedback. I think people are noticing there are new artists that give the show a new feel … There’s a great energy in the room, a lot of excitement,” she said amid the crowd in the bustling school gymnasium.
Some of the visitors thought there might have been fewer artists showing this year, but Niemkiewicz said that feel occurred because the floor plan was modified to give the sense of more space. Also, as in the last few years, another room was set aside for a salon exhibit, this year’s being a room for sculpture.
When the final figures were tallied, Niemkiewicz' pleasure showed through again.
"We had a fantastic show. We are thrilled with the results. We sold somewhere in the area of $75000 worth of artwork that should result in a $22,500-plus donation to the Chadds Ford Elementary PTO. It is one of the more successful years we have ever had," she said in a late Monday afternoon email. The PTO gets 30 percent of the sale price to be used for enrichment programs at the school.
One of the new artists is one who is not new to many art lovers in the Chadds Ford area. Jacalyn Beam has been a well-known and well-received plein air impressionist in the area for years, exhibiting frequently at the Chadds Ford Gallery and being instrumental in launching the Chadds Ford Historical Society’s plein air events.
Beam, a Chester County native, has been painting in the Chadds Ford area since 2003, but was apparently out of the information loop for the show at the elementary school. She said this year Niemkiewicz contacted her, saying she had seen Beam’s work at the Chadds Ford Gallery and invited her to show.
Plein air is French for painting in the open air, or outside. Beam said it was technology that really launched plein air. That technology, which started about 1865, involved getting paints into metal tubes, which allowed many more artists to take their paints outside.
“Prior to that, they would put their paints into the bladder of pigs and other animals, but a lot of people didn’t want to do that. As soon as they invented the metal tube, everybody wanted to do it,” she said.
The result, she said, was getting artists to capture a true effect of light and shape. In addition to that, painting outside affects the painter in other ways. Sounds and smells influence a painter’s feeling of a scene.
Beam told the story of her recent experience painting Strode’s Mill on Route 52 in East Bradford Township with a great horned owl sitting in a tree above her.
“He was singing to me. I’m smiling as I’m painting. What better experience than to be happy with everything around you and being in your zone?” she said.
Beam did not include the owl in the painting because, she said, “I’m a purist. I wasn’t looking at the owl; I was looking at Strode’s Mill, and I painted what I saw.”
A returning favorite to the show this year was Helena van Emmerick-Finn, this year’s featured artist. She’s been showing at Chadds Ford for 12 years and has been the featured artist several times before. She said it’s the quality of the show, its visitors, and its history that keep bringing her back.
“It’s the tradition of the show; that Betsy Wyeth started it and the friendly atmosphere. The support of the community for the show is amazing,” she said, adding that she always sells well.
This year’s salon area was filled with high-end sculptures from several local artists. The theme was “Forces of Nature” by Chester County female artists.
One, of the artists was Helen Mason, who uses recycled rubber tires as her sculpting medium.
Mason said she had spent time in Japan and was strongly influenced by materials used there, such as silk and bamboo. She had a show to do in Wilmington and latched onto the idea of using industrial materials, clay, aluminum, and rubber.
“There’s something wonderful about rubber. It made me think I was doing some kind of black magic because, when you get this discarded material that’s ugly and wet and dirty, and you wash it, polish it, color it and then get an armature and hammer into it, it changes its complete character,” she said. “It’s a kind of magic, black magic.”
About Rich Schwartzman
Rich Schwartzman has been reporting on events in the greater Chadds Ford area since September 2001 when he became the founding editor of The Chadds Ford Post. In April 2009 he became managing editor of ChaddsFordLive. He is also an award-winning photographer.
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