BRATTLEBORO — The members of Brattleboro-West Arts (BWA) will hold the first of what the grassroots arts collective hopes will be a longstanding holiday art and crafts show and sale, which takes place this weekend in downtown Brattleboro at the C.F. Church Building, 80 Flat St., No. 106.
The exhibition - “14 Artists, 3 Days” - is timed for holiday shopping and will offer pieces ranging from paintings, photography, and botanical drawings to pottery, textiles, and woven items.
Founded in 2009, Brattleboro-West Arts is a group of about three dozen artists who create their art and make their homes within the watershed of the Whetstone Brook in West Brattleboro, Marlboro, and Dummerston.
BWA's flagship event is its annual Open Studio Tour, which brings patrons to the wooded hills to the west of Brattleboro during the last weekend in September.
Painter Petria Mitchell, a primary organizer of the December show, said creating a group exhibit and sale in downtown Brattleboro also makes sense for BWA, especially during this bustling holiday retail season.
“There is a very thirsty audience in the downtown area, and this part of town is up and coming,” she said, adding that Brattleboro residents and shoppers are well-educated “and very interested in purchasing works of art and fine craft. The creative renaissance in downtown Brattleboro offers wonderful opportunities for artists in all flavors.”
Mitchell said she believes the show has potential as more than a one-time event for Brattleboro-West Arts, which marks its fifth anniversary this year.
“The timing is great,” Mitchell said. “I think we are ready to produce a show like this annually and have it be successful and sustainable.”
In addition to Mitchell's landscape paintings, the show will feature the paintings of Jim Giddings, Stephen Lloyd, Janet Picard, and Doug Trump; pottery by Walter Slowinski, Matt Tell, and Malcolm Wright; woven vessels by Jackie Abrams; Bobbi Angell's botanical drawings; blown glass by Josh Bernbaum; silver jewelry by Chris Lann; traditional rug braiding by Kris McDermet; and the photography of Gene Parulis.
Teaching one another how to be artists
Lann, a member of BWA and another organizer of this show, says that most of the members of BWA “feel that their art is somewhat defined by where they live.”
“What I mean by that is that this beautiful place we call our home has been a particularly inspirational aspect of the art itself,” Lann said. “In a way, we see what we do as giving back and enriching a community in which we take so much pride.
“We're not an exclusive group. I mean that in the sense that we're not trying to impart West Brattleboro with some cachet or take on airs of superiority. Yet as far as full membership goes, only artists within our self-defined boundaries are eligible to belong.”
Lann, a silversmith, joined BWA three years ago. Although he has lived in Brattleboro after relocating to Vermont from Pittsburgh 15 years ago, he moved to West Brattleboro in 2010, where he established in his home a dedicated studio space that is open to the public.
Lann says he was excited to join BWA because he found he could get excellent support from the group of artists living around him, his neighbors. He was able to connect to artistic culture in the area he lives.
At a monthly potluck, members of BWA get together to talk over their concerns and strategies to succeed in creative businesses, Lann learned how to be an artist.
“I don't mean how to do my art, which I already knew,” he explains. “But the other practical ends of making what I create work as a business.”
Lann has had to travel to craft shows to sell his work, and he still sometimes does so. But he credits BWA for exposing him to other methods to succeed as an artist.
Dedicated to the artistry of his craft, he works in handcrafted jewelry, mostly in silver, specializing in etched designs and the addition of semi-precious gem stones.
On his website, Lann writes that he finds sterling silver “warm, clean, versatile, and flattering, no matter what style. [In] a collection of handmade sterling silver earrings, rings, bracelets, necklaces and more, organic forms [join] with contemporary styling from my jeweler's bench in Vermont.”
He has two special focuses in his work: hand-knitted chains, and castings made from actual twigs and branches.
“But everything I do is completely handmade,” he says. “I do not even buy pre-made clasps for my chains.”
Since the Church Building is a big space to display art, Lann says that BMA decided to use a wall at the main entrance where samples from all 14 participating artists will be on display for visitors to see at a glance.
Artists will be available to talk about their work, and many, like Lann, plan to be there through the entire show.
“I am used to talking about what I do with people, because I have shown my work at so many craft shows,” he says. “Also, getting folks to understand what goes into a piece of jewelry is the best way to sell it.”