March 16, 2025 – ChaddsFordLive.com

CFES art show a hit

DSC_0496-early-crowd — Early morning arrivals get first crack at the painting during the 76th annual Chadds Ford Elementary School show.

The 76^th annual Chadds Ford Elementary School Art Show and Sale came together smoothly with a steady stream of art lovers and buyers despite some soggy weather.

The event, started by the late Betsy Wyeth, is a fundraiser for the CFES PTO, and principal Danielle Clark said the money raised is both appreciated and well spent.

“Most recently, in the past year we used the funds for a greenhouse in the back of the building so we’re really looking forward to getting that as part of our curricular resources,” she said. “This coming year they’re allocating some funds to full-day kindergarten and using some of the funds to use for outdoor space improvements.”

She continued by saying “It’s benefitted our playground; they used some money on redesigning our playground three years ago. So, it’s been really beneficial. All the proceeds from the show that the PTO makes, they directly give back to the school. It’s been really exciting to see what they’ve been able to do.”

The sheet music from the tune “Satisfaction” is overlayed with a portrait by Frederick Swarr of Rolling Stones singer Mick Jagger.

Jessica Eldridge, this year’s event chairman, didn’t give a dollar figure for this year’s goal but did say they reached a goal of having more than 60 artists, with many new to the show this year. She also went on to explain the new format.

In years past, this was a two-day event, but constraints led to it coming down to Saturday only, with no Friday night reception. There’s also a change in how the PTO gets its money. Instead of giving a percentage of sales to the PTO, artists keep what they take in but pay a rental fee for space to display their work.

“This year we implemented a tiered pricing system, based on the number of screens [where artists hang their work], proximity in the gym,” Eldridge said.

She further explained that the stage area where there used to be the featured artist, is now a premier space.

Costs to the artists range from $125 for a single screen, to $650 for each of the three stage spaces.

And while the event is for the PTO and the school, it’s also for the artists. Not just to sell, but to have the chance to hang out and get social.

Kathy Ruck has been showing at the CFES art show since about 2017 and noted the format change with artists handling their own sales, and was a little disappointed in no longer having the Friday night reception.

“But the good thing is everybody gets to come out and meet the artists since the artists have to be here the whole time, so [visitors] can interact with the artists,” and commented about being with other artists. “It’s so much fun seeing everybody. It’s a big artist family.”

Artist Rachel Coleman with samples of her “fluid art.”

Ruck was not the only returnee, of course. There was Shawn Faust, Jacalyn Beam, Nicki Wandersee, and a multitude of others, but there’s always room for some newbies with their own unique brand of work.

This was Susan Lowenstein’s first show at CFES. Her approach is what she calls diamond painting. She explained that diamond painting starts with a person’s personally chosen photo that Lowenstein sends to a vendor which sends it back to Lowenstein as a canvas. She then adds pieces of crystal with a chart for the coloring.

“Each piece is glued on separately,” she said. “The chart correlates with the canvas. There are numbers on the pieces for different colored pieces of crystal]. It’s like paint by numbers.”

Two others at the show for the first time with their own approach were Rachel Coleman and Frederick Swarr.

Coleman calls her art fluid art.

“Fluid art is taking acrylic paint and making it very liquidy by adding a medium. That way I can manipulate it the way I want on a canvas…The colors then stay vibrant when you move the paint around the canvas.”

Coleman said the mixture is a pancake batter type of consistency.

Susan Lowenstein and her “diamond painting.”

She said acrylic “doesn’t have any movement. When it comes out of a tube, you squeeze it and it just kind of sits there in a clump.”

And then there was Frederick Swarr, a former teacher out of Montgomery County. He overlays sheet music with a portrait of the singer.

“I start out doing a sketch of the celebrity. Then I go online and get the actual sheet music for a specific song from the artist I want to portray. I cut out sections of the music and try to fit that where the face would be. I glue that on the canvas and do the rest of the painting on top of it.”

Some of his work on display at CFES were portraits of Mick Jagger, Jimmy Buffet, Taylor Swift, Ed Sheeran, and Jennifer Lopez.

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Rabbinic Reflections: Finding joy

Thursday night, I dressed as a frog. I was channeling my namesake Jeremiah and the bullfrog from the song “Joy to the World.” In celebrating the Jewish holiday of Purim which commemorates the story in the Book of Esther, I was trying to capture the “light and joy, rejoicing and glory” (Esther 8:16). It worked; whatever had been weighing me down was temporarily lifted. I felt a sense of abundance.

In the midst of a challenge, it can be very hard to think expansively. The pressure of the moment constrains our view of what can be, narrowing our options so that we can respond quickly. In the movies, this tension is often broken by some sort of comic relief or special effects visual explosion. In real life, though, we seldom get that release. Instead, we end up muddling through for as long as we can, ideally getting help along the way.

Courtesy image created by Jeremy Winaker in Canva.

In reading the Book of Esther this year, I saw plenty to draw on in the political and theatrical shenanigans of the King, Haman, and Mordechai. I also found resonances with the Jewish question of how to show up when surrounded by those who hate us, as Haman clearly does. What really struck me, though, was the theme of transgression.

Yes, there is all sorts of excessive feasting and alcohol consumption, there are threats to gender norms, and there is Haman’s offer to pay enough silver to compensate the treasury for the tribute to be lost once all the Jews of the Persian empire are killed. Those elements of the story transgress behavioral norms. Ultimately, though, those transgressions make a Jewish transgression stand out more: Esther asks the Jews to join her in fasting during the start of Passover instead of celebrating the Feast of Freedom, the seder. It is only after this deep denial of the foundational Jewish story of the Exodus that Esther dares to be like Moses and appear, against the rules, before King Ahashverosh. Her transgression meets with success, and she is able to save the Jews by turning Haman’s plan upside down.

We know the human need for transgression. During times of restriction, darkness, or scarcity — even if we know freedom, light, and abundance are coming — we yearn to let loose. Purim and St. Patrick’s Day both interrupt the serious preparation for Passover and Easter redemption, respectively, with feasting and binge drinking. The ritualization of these celebratory releases gives us space to step back from our struggles and return to them with fresh eyes and, perhaps, surer of ourselves.

I have to acknowledge the potential danger of that self-confidence. In the Book of Esther, the Jews seek revenge in outstanding numbers. It is important then to remember that the book is highly literary, and the holiday is not intended to go on for days. Done with reverence, we can engage in productive transgression and emerge into spring with a greater capacity to appreciate our humanity. In this recognition, I find abundance — resilience, hope, and commonality — to widen the path ahead and its possibilities. May we each find “light and joy, rejoicing and glory,” so that we might find and celebrate each other.