Warm your senses at the Jessie Edwards Gallery by joining us in our Winter Collective offerings on line and in person throughout the holidays. We are located upstairs in the iconic Post Office Building in Old Harbor weekends as well as Tuesday evenings through the December and always by appointment. If you are on Block Island please stop in to visit with us and browse all the beautiful and inspiring works of art in the Gallery.
We represent some very talented ceramists and would love to present the work of both John Warfel and Tim Scull. Block Island artist John Warfel creates stunning pottery in the Japanese Raku tradition. These low fired works offer vibrancy and rich tones which embody beauty, simplicity and naturalness. Connecticut artist Tim Scull uses the Saggar technique which is an art form in itself. There is something beautifully exotic and ancient about both styles. Both artists have their work displayed throughout the gallery to add complement to the wall art.
Rhode Islander Tom Martinelli delights our senses with his interpretations of the ocean. The visceral feel of the churning or calm seas offers us a sense of homecoming and remembering our time by the ocean. In ‘Evening Tide, an oil and cold wax on canvas piece measuring 37 x 37”, we feel the starkness of the winter weather.
Sandra Swan portrays in her ‘Grove of Shadblow Trees’, an editioned giclee on canvas, 32.75 x 46.75”, the very familiar landscape that covers Block Island. These beautiful trees are stark yet brilliant as a landscape feature in what could be a snow-covered field. This piece is framed and ready to be hung and we also have smaller numbered reproductions of this same image available.
Gerard Blouin’s practice of painting early morning or late in the day to capture the light in his oil on linen panel works ‘First Snow’ (8 x 10”) and ‘Hillside Farm’ (9 x 12”). Both works give us landscapes of serene beauty with muted tones and barns redolent of cold winter days after early season snow falls. There is an optimism and quiet love of the beauty that surrounds us in the natural world.
Heidi Palmer has us mesmerized with her oil on canvas works ‘Sunset’ (20 x 15”) and ‘Last Light’ (12 x 12”). The stillness of both these works invites us to linger while we catch our breath. They are both contemplative for different reasons. While the light on the water in ‘Sunset’ leaves us warm and sated, the lingering light in ‘Last Light’ is just that at the end of a winter day.
Both of Whitney Knapp Bowditch’s works use water as subject. ‘The Atlantic’, oil on canvas at 24 x 36”, places us in front of a breaking wave with a slight chop to the ocean behind. Winter on the island means all sorts of weather and this work reminds us of the power of the ocean and how present it is in our daily life.
‘The Winter Dock’, an oil on paper piece measuring 8.25 x 10.5”, on the other hand portrays the calm water of an empty pond with the muted winter sun casting a still and beautiful shadow in the shallows.