Thursday August 4  / Duo  to Discuss Artwork with Moderator Roy Kortick  

Cooperstown NY- Critically acclaimed area artists, Elizabeth Schula and Megan Adams Irving, will discuss their intriguing “landscape” work in a free Artists Panel Discussion, Thursday August 4, 4PM at The Art Garage 689 Beaver Meadow Road, Cooperstown, Part II in the talk series. Established artist Roy Kortick will facilitate the discussion as moderator. Space is limited: reservations recommended. The gallery will open at 3:30 to preview the artists’  work in The Setting: Of Land & Dreams, on view through August 13. For reservations: Call or text 315-941-9607. The discussion will build on an initial talk with new material.

Both artists live and work in Otsego County and feel a deep connection to the land—and after years living in other locations, each chose to be here.  Irving (Westford, NY) explores low-relief landscapes built of clay, better understood as “clay paintings” than traditional sculpture. Schula (Roseboom, NY), lives just outside a tiny hamlet and builds her magical nightscapes from starlit walks, memories and dreams. The show includes watercolors by Alanna Rose who presented in the Artists Talk on July 28.

The exhibition ends Saturday August 13.

Moderator Roy Kortick lives in Middlefield, NY where he homesteads with his wife, filmmaker Aube Giroux. He is   restoring an 1840s store in the hamlet of Middlefield that is on the national register of historic places.  An art maker himself, he has exhibited widely, including in Stockholm, Sweden, Rome, Italy and in the US in NY and San Francisco.  Kortick has been awarded art residencies including at Vermont Studio Center, the MacDowell Colony, N. H.  and Millay Colony  (Austerlitz, NY).  He taught painting at the SVA in NYC and earned his BA at Bennington College in visual arts and literature. 

The Art Garage is located in Middlefield halfway between Origins Café and Bassett Health Center, and is open Saturdays 11-3, Sundays noon-3, and seven days a week by appointment (call or text 315-941-9607). See FB and Instagram for images and more.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS:

ELIZABETH SCHULA, trained as an artist, is better known as the inventive star chef at several area restaurants including Table on 10 (now closed). For a short time, she co-ran The Porch with artist Roy Kortick at the north end of Lake Otsego. She also was a hit in New York City as a pastry chef and co-founder of the legendary Saltie “sandwich shop.” She is co-author and illustrator of Saltie: A Cookbook. She is also a contributor to Diner Journal, providing articles and illustrations.

“An effortless pioneer,” as described by Carolina Fidanza of Saltie, “she has roots deeply planted in the land and the art of living off of it. She has a uniquely bright and exhaustive understanding of and reverence for the natural work.” These characteristics are duly evident in her paintings.

Originally from Minnesota, where she was born and raised in Rochester, Schula studied at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and the San Francisco Arts Institute, concentrating in painting and experimental film. Even in the present exhibition, one can sense a filmic quality to her tableaux: the shifting clouds and skies of her dramatic yet serene night scenes. The Art Garage exhibition is a rare opportunity to see Schula’s oeuvre. Previously, the Cherry Branch Gallery exhibited her ‘water’ paintings and her work was featured in a number of shows in San Francisco and Seattle back in the day.

MEGAN ADAMS IRVING studied studio art at Bard College. She has exhibited her work in artist-run pop-up spaces as well as traditional venues including the Samuel S. Dorsky Museum (New Paltz, NY), the Corcoran College of Art Design (Washington, D.C.), and locally at the Smithy Center for the Arts, Roxbury Arts Group, The Art Garage and the Community Arts Network of Oneonta (CANO).  Travel, gardening, and living generally close to the land are all critical aspects of her lifelong study of the landscape and its connection humanity. “You can’t see any human/animal story in abstract landscapes,” Irving notes. “What you see is the erosion and geometry of the earth with the sky sliding into the water…the scale is both expansive and miniature.” Irving sees her work as storytelling, yet “the whole story in not available from this view of the landscape, so they appear uninhabited.”

Her parents were New England transplants to Cherry Valley, NY, where she grew up. She has lived in the Hudson Valley, South East Asia and both coasts and has traveled nationally / internationally for long periods of time. Now in Westford, NY, where she keeps a studio, she works and teaches at a community clay studio. She is committed to fostering art in her community as a consultant, helping to improve the web presence of small businesses, artists, and nonprofits in the region. Irving has served on the Cherry Valley Artworks Board and the Glimmerglass Film Days Steering Committee where she produced the companion art exhibitions for the festival for many years.

For further information please contact The Art Garage at 689 Beaver Meadow Road, Cooperstown ,NY 13326. Tel: 607-547-5327, email leartgarage@gmail.com, text 315-941-9607, see FBArtGarageCooperstown and Instagram artgaragecooperstown.