Category Archives: Past Exhibition
Contact: Melissa Abernathy, 201-656-2240, pr @ hobokenmuseum.org
Anna Pinto – “30 Years of Snow”
November 18 – December 31, 2017
A hand-crafted card is a gift in itself, in an age when computer-generated “hand-writing” typefaces attempt to mimic the personal touch without quite pulling off the illusion. Hoboken-based lettering artist Anna Pinto has produced snow-themed calligraphic holiday cards for more than 30 years.
“My holiday cards are an opportunity to create something completely for my own pleasure, that I can also share with family, friends and clients,” she adds. Her cards often combine hand-lettering with photographs or drawings, and occasionally hand-coloring or stencils and individual tiny collages.
“After a series of cards based on lines from Dylan Thomas’ “A Child’s Christmas in Wales,” I decided if I just used winter and/or snow as a theme, I wouldn’t have to worry if I was late with my cards as long as they got out before the first day of spring!” The theme continued to resurface as a theme in her cards, as she keeps an eye out for references to snow in her reading throughout the year.
An exhibit of her work, “Thirty Years of Snow: Calligraphy by Anna Pinto,“ will be on display at the Hoboken Museum from Nov. 18 – Dec. 31, featuring her printed cards, along with original pieces using some of the same quotations used in the cards. The exhibit also will include examples of preliminary work and writing for a few of the cards, to give visitors an idea of how they were done. In some cases, the size of the lettering has been reduced dramatically for the final card — so having the original writing will demystify the cards a bit. Her card formats vary quite a bit, often with unusual folds that allow her to include a greeting without printing on both sides. Join the artist for a talk and Q&A about her work on Saturday, Dec. 9, at 4 pm at the Museum.
Pinto cobbled together a lettering education by taking many workshops and classes over the years. “Calligraphy really is drawing: You’re controlling line very precisely,” she says. “I also enjoy watercolor and collage. But I always loved literature as well, so calligraphy seemed like an ideal way to combine both interests.”
Now, she’s an established freelance calligrapher, doing a variety of lettering work, from invitations, envelopes and placecards for social events; citations for educational institutions and corporations; to hand-lettered poems and quotations for individual commissions. She also teaches calligraphy for the Society of Scribes (societyofscribes.org) and other organizations.
Aside from her cards and commissioned lettering projects, some of her most fascinating projects have been film props, ranging from medieval calligraphy for pages of a huge book of spells used in Disney’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” and lettering on a map for the “The Smurfs,” to writing entries for a 1920s ship manifest for “The Immigrant,” an illuminated spread from Dante’s Inferno for “True Story,” and 1950s-style handwriting for a notebook in “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.” She notes, “I enjoy the research into the topic as much as the work itself, because it takes me into worlds I might not enter otherwise.”
Pinto moved to Hoboken in 1980 with her husband, Pieter Sommen, to find a more peaceful and affordable place of their own after sharing a large apartment with friends on Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village. “Our block had become a kind of tourist circus, but Hoboken felt so familiar, and reminded us of what we loved about the Village: the human scale of the buildings, the coal oven bakeries, delis making their own mozzarella, café con leche at the bodegas, people growing fig trees in their backyards,” she recalls.
“Hoboken has certainly changed dramatically,” she adds, “but we still love it here. My experience of snowy days in Hoboken certainly inspires my choice of quotes. I love the hush that expands as the snow falls and the normally noisy Willow Avenue traffic outside my studio window stops. And I love the graphic geometry in the backyard view from my kitchen, as snow settles on the angles of fire escapes and roof tops and the branches of trees.”
Her work has been exhibited in the show “The Revival of Calligraphy” at the Grolier Club in NYC, as well as in an exhibit along side work by her parents and sister in the “Families/Cities Shift” show at the Susan Teller Gallery in NYC in 2013. The exhibit at the Hoboken Museum will include both originals and printed cards available for purchase. For a glimpse of her work, visit www.annapintocalligraphy.com.
The exhibit is supported by a block grant from the State/County Partnership program for the Arts, administered by the Hudson County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.
Frank Hanavan – “Hoboken”
September 24 - November 12, 2017
A plein air painter’s life isn’t easy, especially in an urban setting. Imagine lugging around close to 20 pounds of art supplies, including an easel and bulky canvases, perched on a bike or squeezed into public transit, just to capture a scene in the right light. For more than 25 years, that’s been the modus operandi of Frank Hanavan, whose acrylic paintings of Hoboken and New York City streetscapes, parks and waterfront adorn the walls of dozens of Hoboken homes.
A couple of years ago, to lighten his load on his “days off,” Hanavan began carrying a small watercolor set and a pad of watercolor papers, just to do some light sketches. He hadn’t worked with the medium since taking classes at the Art Institute of Chicago, University of Buffalo, and Chautauqua. He discovered it took a few tries to get the hang of it. At first, he applied the watercolor pigments thickly, resembling the opacity of acrylics. But the more he painted with them, the lighter his touch became, bringing more and more light into his paintings.
“I’ve always taken the watercolor less seriously,” he admits, adding, “I view the medium as being more carefree, and it’s my favorite thing about it.”
That insight may be the secret to why this series of watercolors of Hoboken is so delightful. “Perhaps because I don’t take it as seriously, or put it on a pedestal, I can experiment more with it,” he says. “And when I go back to using acrylics, I find the watercolor experience gives me a fresh look at the acrylic, a perspective I could not have gained otherwise.”
Using a smaller format than his acrylics, the artist infuses light and air into these 43 scenes of the city’s waterfront walkway and parks, train terminal, and street views. Fans of his work will recognize some of his perennial favorite Hoboken scenes, such as sidewalk cafes and the cherry trees in bloom along 9th Street, and some new ones.
Even with the entire city of New York at his disposal, Hanavan is drawn to Hoboken. “It’s small enough to feel like a microcosm,” he says. “It’s close, yet it’s a different place, it’s distinct from Manhattan or Jersey City and it pretty much looks good no matter where you plop yourself down.” And as a self-taught sailor and fan of all things nautical – he creates historically accurate ship models as a hobby – he likes that the Mile Square City is right on the Hudson.
Hanavan grew up in the Buffalo, NY, suburb of Kenmore, and moved to New York City in 1990, where he began painting scenes of everyday city life. Winter, spring, summer and fall, regardless of the weather, rain, snow or shine, he is constantly out painting the city he loves from life, without editorializing or romanticizing the subjects. He often says his real subject matter is the quality of light falling on the subject, not the physical subject itself.
The exhibit, Hanavan’s third exhibit at the Hoboken Museum this decade, opens Sunday, Sept. 24, and remains on view through Sunday, Nov. 12. And on selected Saturdays, Oct. 7th and 14th, and Nov. 11th, Hanavan will share his talents in three art classes, from 2 – 4 pm, with anyone who wants to learn how to handle watercolor paints. Each class costs $25, $15 for kids, and materials are included. See the Museum’s events calendar page for sign-up links.
The exhibit is supported by a block grant from the State/County Partnership program for the Arts, administered by the Hudson County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.
Artists on the Move – “In Transition”
August 6 - September 17, 2017
Art teacher Liz Cohen has been teaching weekly classes at the Hoboken Shelter and St. Matthew’s lunch program, as a volunteer. After retiring from 40 years of teaching in a private school, she enjoys working with Hoboken’s transitional population, helping them explore their own talents by exposing them to the techniques and styles of a diverse group of artists, including Keith Haring, Jim Dine, Hans Hofman, Kara Walker, Faith Ringgold, Georgia O’Keeffe, Romare Beardon, Stuart Davis, Jackson Pollack, Jasper Johns, Basquiat, Helen Frankenthaler and Yayoi Kusama.
The result is a stunningly diverse exhibition of nearly 150 works of art that reveal the unique perspectives and individual talents of these local artists. On view from August 6 through September 17, the exhibition should give visitors a new respect for members of our community who are often underappreciated, according to Cohen. She says some of the artists are creating artwork for the first time, while others show natural talent equal to some of America’s best-known self-taught “outsider” artists.
One of the artists once asked Cohen why she enjoys hanging out with homeless people, and after two years, she says she has come to see the art classes as a powerful tool for helping people communicate. “I really enjoy talking to the students,” she adds. “Each is unique; as unschooled talents, their work is fresh and uninhibited, unselfconscious, and naïve.”
She hopes viewers will come to see these artists more clearly as individuals through their work. “They’ve created a life for themselves,” she observes. “Hoboken provides a good amount of support, with the food pantry, the Hoboken Shelter, and St. Matthew’s lunchtime ministry, they have formed a community, sharing ideas and problems with each other.”
The exhibit is supported by a block grant from the State/County Partnership program for the Arts, administered by the Hudson County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.
World War I Centennial, 1917-2017: Heaven, Hell or Hoboken
August 6, 2017 - December 23, 2018
“World War I Centennial, 1917-2017: Heaven, Hell or Hoboken” explores how Hoboken and its residents were transformed by the United States entry into World War I on April 6, 1917. The city was declared the main point of embarkation for the U.S. Expeditionary Force bound for Europe.
Almost overnight Hoboken became a military town, as hundreds of officers and thousands of enlisted men took residence here to facilitate the logistics of the Embarkation Service. With an additional 14,000 civilian employees, they would oversee the transit of an estimated two million American servicemen to Europe—and then the soldiers’ return—from 1917 through 1919.
Soldiers arriving in Hoboken from boot camps soon began to use the phrase “Heaven, Hell or Hoboken,” referencing John J. “Black Jack” Pershing, the commander general of the Army forces destined for Europe. Pershing had predicted they would be in “Heaven, Hell or Hoboken”—return into America—“by Christmas” 1917.
As the Great War raged on, servicemen retained the saying for Christmas 1918, and when about 5,000 men returned to Hoboken just days before the holiday, the City fathers lined the march route with flags, bunting, and a banner bearing that slogan. The men marched from the trains of the West Shore Railroad, from Jersey City Heights into Hoboken, up First Street, to Hoboken’s waterfront piers, and new destinations—including home. A Jersey City solider, Thomas T. Gavin, told the local Hudson Dispatch: “It certainly is fine to know we accomplished what we set out to do: “’Hell, heaven, or Hoboken by Christmas.’ I am lucky that it is Hoboken.” As he and the returning men marched along First Street, flag-waving residents, gathered in throngs, cheered and sang.
There would be many more returning servicemen and parades, but there would also be sorrowful reckoning and recognition of the soldiers’ great sacrifice, as transport ships increasingly brought back wounded men, and the bodies of those who had died from battle wounds or disease. The influenza epidemic was especially deadly, claiming the lives of nearly as many soldiers as died in combat.
The Great War lasted nineteen months, and many Hoboken men served. Women on the home front also volunteered to assist the war effort in many ways. “World War I Centennial, 1917-2017: Heaven, Hell or Hoboken” displays some of the personal letters, postcards, official documents, and photographs of these men and women, allowing us, 100 years later, to consider their unique perspectives and contributions, and the way the war changed them and their hometown.
— Introduction written by Holly Metz
The exhibition is on view from August 6, 2017 – December 23, 2018. Other highlights in the exhibition include:
- The official ledger book – measuring 3 ft. by 4 ft.! – in which a Hoboken city clerk inscribed the names, addresses and ages of all the men ages 18 – 45 who were required to register for military duty under the country’s first Selective Service Act.
- Twenty-five patriotic posters (on loan from the Jersey City Free Public Library) issued by the US government to rally all citizens to contribute to the war effort, through military service, buying bonds, or conserving food.
- Archival film footage of soldiers and YMCA volunteers busy with preparations for shipping out or returning home.
- An authentic, hand-cranked Victor Victrola, made in Camden, NJ, in 1918, and stereoptical images of the bustling Hoboken waterfront in wartime, with both an original and a modern viewer for enlarged versions of the cards.
- Artifacts from the Warriors’ Shrine at the former St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, on Hudson St. (now a residential condo building), including a sanctuary chair containing a stone from the bridge across the Marne River at Chateau-Thierry in France.
Funds from the David Webster Memorial Fund were used to purchase some artifacts for this exhibition, including items from Peter Spinetto’s estate and the estate of John DePalma. Additional thanks to the Jersey Room at the Jersey City Free Public Library and the Librarians Cynthia Harris and John Beekman. We would also like to thank Ronald Magnusson for his research on Peter G. Spinetto, and the following Museum staff and contributors for making this exhibit possible: Melissa Abernathy, Robert Foster, Rand Hoppe, Eileen Lynch, Holly Metz, and McKevin Shaughnessy.
William Magruder – “The Walls of Hoboken”
May 28 - July 2, 2017
An architectural illustrator by profession, William Magruder has an irrepressible artistic imagination that expresses itself in fantasy-infused drawings, reminiscent of one of his favorite artists, Windsor McKay.
A recent series was inspired by Hoboken’s inundation during Superstorm Sandy. Magruder and his wife had lived here since 2002, and his adopted city’s defenselessness during the storm surge sent Magruder’s imagination on a journey to the fortified cities and villages he had seen on his travels through Europe. Among his favorites is Lucca, Italy, whose thick, sloped, brick-and-stone walls were built by 16th century residents for protection against mortar shells.
The walls were built to last and give the impression of impregnability, he recalls, but they are also topped with promenades so the people could enjoy the surrounding landscape during peaceful times. “They’re a delight, a magical combination of landscape and architecture,” he says. “They’re a wonderful asset to the city, drawing tourists and residents alike.”
These walls become particularly intriguing when they’re adjacent to water, Magruder adds, like those in Antibes, on the Côte d’Azur of France. That’s what inspired him to imagine such fortifications surrounding Hoboken, keeping the water at bay, yet allowing people to enjoy the views from the walkway on top. He began the series by drawing in pen and ink, with no preconceptions of how they would turn out, because he prefers creating art spontaneously. He then developed some illustrations into full-color renderings using 3D computer modeling.
His “The Walls of Hoboken” drawings are a fantasy exercise, he admits, “not a design solution.” For one thing, in the 16th century, most of the labor was conscripted! But with Margruder’s award-winning technical expertise, his illustrations of solid walls seem as capable of protecting a city as any Frank Lloyd Wright renderings.
Magruder has published the illustrations in a book, and a number of them will be displayed in the Hoboken Museum’s Upper Gallery from May 28 through July 2. For a preview, and to see other work by the artist, visit www.williammagruder.com.
Magruder and his wife no longer live in Hoboken; they have recently relocated to Italy, choosing Milan for its central location and ease of life without a car. He continues to practice his art and do some teaching.
The exhibit is supported by a block grant from the State/County Partnership program for the Arts, administered by the Hudson County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.
Robert Nardolillo – “The Essence of Hoboken”
April 15 - May 21, 2017
Join us for a free opening reception for our latest Upper Gallery art exhibition: “The Essence of Hoboken: Watercolors by Robert Nardolillo.” These dynamic and moody watercolor paintings by the Brooklyn-born artist who now lives in the suburbs, express the urban energy of the Mile Square City. He discovered the city’s unique beauty when his daughters moved to Hoboken after college. Meet the artist at the opening reception for his works on Saturday, Apr. 15 from 2 – 5 pm. His works will remain on view through Sunday, May 21. For a preview of his work, visit the artist’s website.
The exhibit is supported by a block grant from the State/County Partnership program for the Arts, administered by the Hudson County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.
Jean-Paul Picard – “Hoboken Sweeps”
March 4 - April 9, 2017
The versatile artist Jean-Paul Picard specializes in web design and digital photography. He teaches courses in these technical skills in evening classes at the Hudson County Schools of Technology. But he started out as a graphic designer and photographer back in the days when you used an actual T-square to draw a rule, and mixed chemicals in a darkroom to print a photo.
With a penchant for trying new things, Picard started experimenting with using multiple images in single work to create a story line, after seeing a Richard Avedon exhibit in 2013. Avedon had created monumental, panoramic photographs of people standing in a row by combining several exposures together. Inspired by this and by his affinity for art by cubist painters like Picasso and Braque, Picard started combining a series of separate exposures he had taken at another art exhibit.
Then, he struck on the idea of using the panorama mode on a digital camera, but rather than moving the camera in a smooth line, he learned he could create more interesting effects by sweeping the camera in different ways and at different speeds. Like the cubists, this he uses this technique to show more sides of an object than a traditional single-perspective image offers.
At first, he printed these “sweeps” from his digital printer on white paper, but because of the images’ shapes, there was too much white space on the final artwork for his taste. So he experimented with printing on different types of fine-art paper, first preparing the paper with a digital ground – a field of special white paint applied to the paper to help set the inks and make the image pop.
He devised this approach on his own, inspired by a technique that dates from the earliest days of photography, when photographers applied a silver gelatin halide solution by brush to paper before developing their images. The silver gelatin images usually had rough-edged borders, unseen behind the matte or frame of the final product. But that rough edge appealed to Picard, who incorporates it into his original works of art.
Although the images originate in a digital camera, each of the works on display in the Museum’s upper gallery is a unique edition, or monoprint, containing the serendipitous elements of the artist’s hand. In addition to the Hoboken Sweeps series, Picard is working on similar series with the themes of nature, travel, portraiture, New York City and Québec, where he has family roots. More examples of his work, including his 2009 “Visage Hoboken” portraits that were displayed in his first Museum exhibit, can be seen at www.jean-paulpicard.com.
The exhibit is supported by a block grant from the State/County Partnership program for the Arts, administered by the Hudson County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.
Hoboken People and Places, 1976-1994: Photographs by Michael Flanagan
January 22 – July 2, 2017
When he moved to Hoboken in the mid-1970s, Michael Flanagan was already a seasoned photographer with a passion for developing his own prints through meticulous experimentation.
His camera of choice was a large format, four-by-five-inch Linhof view camera, mounted on a tripod. The equipment was bulky and cumbersome, but under his skilled hands, it yielded crisp, detailed black and white images. He even toted this same camera and tripod on his many trips abroad.
From 1976 to 1994, Flanagan lived near the corner of Bloomfield and 10th Streets, and many of his photographs document the changing storefronts of this uptown location. He was determined to capture a feature of Hoboken life that was swiftly fading during the course of that decade: Mom-and-Pop shops, and the blue-collar residents that populated the city.
Only a few of the corner businesses recorded in Flanagan’s photos survive today: Lisa’s Deli, Truglio’s Meat Market, and, on the northeast corner of his block, the Bloomfield Launderette. Through his photographs we can see what has long been lost: Pierro’s Butcher Shop before it closed, and its owner, Al Pierro, during its last days. Today, it’s a kids’ yoga studio.
On the southeast corner, we see the interior and exterior of Kusseluk’s Shoe Store, which maintained an ancient display of footwear during the years Mike lived in the neighborhood. That it remained open at all during the 1980s was paradoxical, as potential customers would have to beg Sam Kusseluk to sell them a pair of shoes-—and rarely succeeded. Today, the building hosts Anthony David’s restaurant and an adjacent tattoo parlor.
Opposite Kusseluk’s was Nellie’s Store, where a customer might find just about anything available at the city’s one big supermarket, but in smaller quantities. Like so many who owned and ran the corner stores in Hoboken in the 1980s, Nellie lived in the building, and seemed to be in the shop night and day, offering warm greetings along with candy bars, cans of soup, and cartons of milk.
Flanagan photographed other longtime residents: barkeeps, plumbers, mailmen, retired longshoremen, and many seniors, often snapped while sitting in folding chairs on the sunny side of the sidewalk, as if the public pathway were a corner of their own backyard. Some were known as the “mayors” of their block-—the characters, the ones who told the best stories, the ones you sought out when you wanted to learn the news behind the news. One barkeep he photographed, “mayor” Tom Vezzetti, actually became Mayor of Hoboken in 1985.
Like most photographers, Mike did not set out to create a comprehensive visual record of the city. There are, for example, no photographs of the music scene at Maxwell’s, which was at its height during the late 1970s and 1980s, and there is but one image that attests to the spate of arson that terrified Hoboken’s tenement dwellers during the same period. It is a haunting memorial for the eleven tenants, including seven children, who died in the 1981 fire in the Eldorado on 12th Street.
But in their close observation of textures and absences and the uses of public space, Flanagan’s photographs allow current residents and visitors to reflect upon significant changes, over time, in the life and landscape of Hoboken. The exhibition also includes festival and political posters, t-shirts and video footage from the period, including the critically acclaimed “Delivered Vacant,” Nora Jacobson’s sensitive documentary showing the personal consequences of gentrification.
The most striking changes are visible in his images of the waterfront and of city parks. Hoboken’s young family population had declined by the 1980s, and some of the city’s old school buildings were sold for condominium development. The parks in that period were crumbling and seem nearly abandoned-—barely recognizable compared with the green, equipment-filled spaces that teem with activity today.
The Museum is indebted to the Estate of Michael Flanagan, for sponsoring this exhibition, with additional financial support from: Lizzy Flanagan; Michael Flanagan and Christine Allen; Abigail, Luke and Liam Flanagan; Liz Flanagan and Nancy Wilkinson; Hoboken Improvement Company; Justin Silverman; and Robert Foster; and thanks also to Steven and Lily Zane for their generous donation of Michael Flanagan’s photographs, negatives and slides to the permanent collection of the Hoboken Historical Museum.
Elliot Appel – “Mile Square Colors”
November 6 - December 30, 2016
Elliot Appel has always been interested in capturing the myriad interesting architectural details embedded in the urban landscape. On weekends, and in the margins of his workweek in Midtown Manhattan, he prowls the city’s more colorful neighborhoods, camera in hand, looking for eye-catching subjects. He’s drawn to antiquated doorways and signs, interesting street performers, or an arresting reflection in a window.
“I try to capture the details of everyday life that people may not notice, or take for granted, as they rush from place to place,” Appel says. “I’ve always been a city person. It intensified when all these old structures were being torn down and replaced by new buildings without detail.”
Born and raised in New York’s Washington Heights neighborhood, he began drawing as a child and kept on sketching through high school and college. Largely self-taught as an artist, he honed his painting technique and subject matter on trips to Europe in his early twenties, visiting museums in Paris, Geneva, Florence, Milan, Venice, Rome and Athens.
During his travels, he would often pause to sketch scenes in the public squares, capturing the unique character of each space from interesting angles. After he sold one of his acrylic paintings based on a photo of a cathedral, he began working in a more photorealistic style that has come to define his art, with urban life as his most frequent subject.
After moving to Bayonne, he began to explore neighborhoods across Hudson County filled with the same late 19th and early 20th century architectural detail that captivated two of his favorite American painters, Edward Hopper and John Sloan. Many of Appel’s scenes recall Hopper’s crisp, light-flooded canvases of modern, realistic street scenes. He interprets these scenes in vibrant colors, with unusual perspectives, as well as an eye for detail, resulting in a singular view of life in the big city. In general, his paintings take about two to three weeks to complete, depending on the amount of detail involved.
“Practice makes perfect,” he adds. “I like to work without a lot of sketching; I block it out on the canvas and launch into filling in the details, working in acrylics because they allow you to paint quickly.” He usually paints at night, with a daylight simulator lamp, with the full sunlight spectrum, and on weekends, when he’s not out searching for new subject matter. He says he’s looking forward to retiring and having more time to paint.
The artist will exhibit about 15 Hoboken-themed paintings, ranging in size from 16” x 20” to 24” x 36”, in a show titled, “Mile Square Colors: Paintings by Elliot Appel.” The show opens at the Hoboken Historical Museum on Sunday, November 6, with a free reception from 1 – 4 pm, and remains on view through Dec. 30. See more of his work at elliotpaints.com. His work is frequently on view at galleries in New York and New Jersey, as well as street fairs and online shows.
The exhibit is supported by a block grant from the State/County Partnership program for the Arts, administered by the Hudson County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.
Donna O’Grady – “Hoboken Scenes”
September 18 – October 18, 2016
While most of us are busy documenting our travels and daily lives with cameras that fit in our pockets, Donna O’Grady carts along a full pochade box, a traditional painter’s supply case with attachable tripod easel, to capture scenes from her travels and her favorite places in her adopted hometown of Hoboken.
She takes her pochade case everywhere: To many of Hoboken’s sidewalk cafes, on business trips around the world as a financial software product manager, on frequent artist workshops in Italy, and even on a boat, where she lived for two years sailing around the Caribbean. She paints to preserve her memories of these places, or sometimes to barter for the catch of the day, painting portraits of fishing boats and their crews in exchange for a hearty meal of fresh scallops.
Like the Impressionists, she paints in oils on location, en plein air, and uses an Old Masters’ technique called underpainting, roughing out the major elements of a composition in dark and light monochromes before applying colors and details. This helps infuse a painting with light and depth, giving them a deeper dimension and a realistic atmosphere. (See examples on her blog, www.donnaogrady.com/blog)
O’Grady has been painting all her life – she can’t remember when she didn’t paint, from her early years in Jersey City and high school years in North Haledon, to her early adult years in Ringwood, NJ. Along the way, she has taken classes at the Art Students League and the School of Visual Arts, both in Manhattan. She likes studying with different teachers to learn different techniques and styles, and has taken to listening to podcasts by artists, too.
Her parents, who had worked so hard to be able to move the family out to the suburbs, couldn’t believe it when she chose to move to Hoboken about 14 years ago, but she says she felt an irresistible pull to the Mile Square City.
“I love Hoboken’s architecture, day or night, there’s so much detail,” she raves. “I love the factories, cafés, the train terminal, the waterfront—there’s so much life on the streets of the city.” Her artist’s eye is drawn to interesting details wherever she goes. She quickly sets up her easel and captures the local architecture, landscape and portraits of the people she meets. She even enjoys chatting with strangers while she works.
Hoboken’s architecture has inserted itself even more directly into her paintings lately, as she has begun painting on salvaged antique ceiling tiles made of pressed tin, once ubiquitous in older Hoboken homes and businesses. “My neighbor had bought some at a street fair and she gave me the idea to paint in the flat center area — a perfect painting surface with a built-in frame,” O’Grady says. “Now, I find them at craft fairs and order vintage tiles online – the older the better, with cracked and peeling paint.”
She’s chosen about 12 new works mostly on these tiles for her latest exhibit, “Hoboken Scenes: Paintings on Pressed Tin,” on view from September 18 – October 18 in the Hoboken Historical Museum’s Upper Gallery. O’Grady is an active member of the local hob’art artists gallery, and exhibits her work in shows in Jersey City and Ocean Grove, NJ.
The exhibit is supported by a block grant from the State/County Partnership program for the Arts, administered by the Hudson County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.