#37 Penelope Finnie and Katherine Conkling Thompson

#37 on the Brochure

Artists showing at: 783 Gifford Rd, Westport, MA 02790

Penelope Finnie

JULY 20 & 21 Only

PAINT: Pastels, photography, watercolor, oil and encaustic

penelopefinnie@icloud.com

510-701-3472

Find us on Instagram!

As a younger painter, urban wastelands, done in an old master’s technique, was what Penelope Finnie painted. They had a De Chirico-esque quality about them. The time was the late 80’s and the decay of our industrial era was beginning, with all of the environmental implications beginning to be evident…beautiful but eerie. Fast forward 35 years and the effects of our past are definitely catching up with us. Moving to Westport full-time 3 years ago definitely changed Finnie’s work. It did become more about the natural world but always with an awareness that these resources are fragile and unbelievably amazing. She use pastels, photographs , watercolor, oil and possibly encaustic to create layers of reality.

Exhibition is in the carriage house in the back.

Katherine Conkling Thompson will be showing there as well.

____________________

Katherine Conkling Thompson

JULY 20 & 21 Only

CLAY: Animal vessels, haiku moon jars and fruiting bodies candelabras

kcthompson718@gmail.com

917-912-8504

Find us on Instagram!

Katherine Conkling Thompson makes ceramic vessels to hold thoughts, hopes or flowers.

In 2023 Thompson began making a series of “Animal Vessels” honoring the creatures that live amongst us here in the South Coast of New England. Her deer, coyotes, owls, and crows have an iconic presence in their sculpted simplicity. They evolved out of Thompson’s series of “Bust Vases.” These unembellished human form vessels communicate through gesture, our unspoken and, often subconscious, physical language and subtly become imbued with an undercurrent of quiet emotion. They love to be dressed up with a seasonal headdress of flowers or branches. Thompson’s “Haiku Moon Jars”, inspired by the Korean moon jar tradition, are hand built and so are somewhat irregular, cratered, and are embossed with original haiku poems reflecting on the moon’s power, creatures of the night or humanity’s shy devotion to our silent orb. Pile them up and they become a totem. Thompson’s “Fruiting Bodies” candelabras are organic in form and inspired by the buried life force of fungi and their amazing communication networks which knit together ecosystems. The candles illuminate within the organism and in the fruiting “flowers.” She also hand-builds ceramic tableware, bowls, cups, and candlesticks.

Katherine Conkling Thompson works and lives in Brooklyn, New York and Westport, Massachusetts. She grew up in Boston but came of age in New Orleans where she went to Tulane and studied English and Fine Arts. Katherine is inspired by the nature in her midst along the shoreline of Brooklyn’s East River, Westport River’s marshes or the rocky points in Maine where she spent her childhood summers.

When she’s not in the studio, you can find her gardening in her local Brooklyn park, working with others fighting against climate change or sailing around Buzzard's Bay with her husband, Dewey, on their boat Harmony.

Art show is in the carriage house in the back.

It is at the studio of artist Penelope Finnie.