Shannon
- Aug 25
- 4 min read

Summer Postcard '24

1. Riding a Rogue Wave

This summer, in Philly, I fell in with the wrong sort. Criminals, nearly a dozen of them, rogues and scoundrels all. A friend and fellow artist invited me into this sordid underworld to collaborate on a series of new works depicting ten criminals from America's Gilded Age. I entered the arrangement thinking that this foray into the topic of criminality would be a bit of a departure from my usual areas of inquiry (family, identity, sexuality, expectations, roles, and renewal; the privacy and clarity of interior life). But it turns out these are pretty universal themes.

I have to confess that--working over their features and wondering about the lost details of their lives--I fell for each and every one of these ne'er-do-wells in turn. Conning me from beyond the grave, such was their skill. (Did you know that "con" comes from "confidence"? As in, "Her crime was Confidence.")

From left:

Our handbook, 1886 Professional Criminals of America, published and circulated as the original rogues' gallery
Bertha Heyman, Confidence Queen (Her crime was Confidence.)
Each of the figures in this series are executed in egg tempera. This is the Confidence Queen leaving my studio on her way to Derek for a background check.

Bertha Heyman, Confidence Queen

Made in collaboration with Derek Ayres

Egg tempera, watercolor, and gouache

8" square

Collaboration is such a fun breath of fresh air, blowing in ideas and connections I never could have discovered on my own.

Here is another member of our curated Rogues' Gallery, Philly Phearson, alias Peck, Bank Sneak.

"Phearson, or Peck (which is his right name), is one of the oldest and smartest sneak thieves in this country. He has obtained a good deal of money in his time, for which he has done considerable service in State prisons. He comes from a respectable Quaker family of Philadelphia."

--1886 Professional Criminals of America

From left:

Graphite drawing with initial egg wash
Completed egg tempera figure
The finished piece with background in watercolor and gouache (Derek Ayres)

He looks a bit like Whitman, don't you think?

O I see flashing that this America is only you and me,

Its Congress is you and me, the officers, capitols, are you and me,

Its ample geography, the sierras, the prairies, deserts, forests, are you and me,

Its power, weapons, armies, ships, wars, peace, are you and me,

Its inventions, science, schools, are you and me,

Its crimes, lies, thefts, defections, are you and me,

The perpetual arrival of immigrants are you and me,

Freedom, language, poems, employments, are you and me,

Failures, successes, births, deaths, are you and me,

Natural and artificial are you and me,

The north, south, east, west, are you and me,

Past, present, future, are only you and me.

--Walt Whitman, from Leaves of Grass

The 10 new pieces created via this summer collaboration will be on view as Rogues' Gallery at Da Vinci Art Alliance as part of the 2024 Philadelphia Fringe Festival.

Rogues' Gallery

September 5-8 and 12-15, 2024

Da Vinci Art Alliance, 3rd floor gallery

704 Catharine Street

Philadelphia, PA 19147

2. Aspiring Vermonter

We spent part of the summer in the beautiful state of Vermont, trying to act like locals. I even managed to get a piece up in a gallery space that is exclusively for Vermont and New Hampshire residents. ("Excuse me, how did you get in here?") So that felt like a bit of a coup and a bit of progress towards goals.

(Don't worry, you guys, I didn't break any rules. Obviously. C'est moi, apres tout.)

Here are some paintings from this time:

In the Pines

Egg tempera on cradled panel

Diptych, each 12" x 6"

Left: Before Breakfast Plein Air: Pond, Watercolor, 15" x 11"

Right: After Dinner Plein Air: Echinacea & Rudbeckia, Watercolor, 15" x 11"

Plein Air: Late Summer Maples

Watercolor

11" x 15"

And y'all know I like to make a birthday autoportrait every summer as part of annual rituals of reflection. Here's 49:

It's Not a Crime

Watercolor

15" x 11"

The moon and the flowers,

forty-nine years,

walking around, wasting time.

--Issa

3. (Continuing to) Melt with You

The Reciprocal Portrait Project is alive and well--thriving, honestly. I'm thrilled to share the work with the public for the first time in a show at Mount Airy Art Garage this September. All the details about that here.

YOU are warmly invited to be part of the project and collect your own data in its depths. There's a place to digitally express interest in participating here.

(From a recent session in the RPP)

As part of my ongoing efforts to communicate with you about the ineffable mysteries of the Reciprocal Portrait Project, a couple of quotes from people wiser and more articulate than myself:

On painting portraits, empathy, and unity consciousness:

"I go so out of myself and into them that after they leave, I sometimes feel horrible. I feel like an untenanted house."

--Alice Neel

It's so true.

And also this, quoted from Rilke's journals in Eric Torgerson's excellent book, Dear Friend:

"Perhaps that is what all togetherness is: to grow in one's encounters. Down a long road, whose end neither one could foresee, we came to this moment of eternity. Astonished and trembling we looked at each other like two who, unsuspecting, have already reached that portal behind which God is."

--Rainer Maria Rilke

My three sons in the RPP

July 2024

That's about it!

Summer's over; school starts tomorrow.

Time to sweep the summer cobwebs away.

Good luck with your seasonal transitions.

Thanks for reading!

(PS: We were lucky to spend a few summer nights in a treehouse along the Chesapeake & enjoyed crossing paths with some barn swallows and many loblolly pines.)