The show features a trio of realist paintings of tree trunks by Trey Friedman, whose “Trees on a Line” series is an attempt to depict his “intangible” relationship to old-growth trees. “Try talking about trees without sounding sentimental or political,” he wrote on his website.
Furniture maker Sophie Glenn is a current CFEVA fellow, and contributed a caned chair that appears to be made of turned wood, but is actually painted steel. A medallion on the chair back features an image of a shirtless Jason Alexander, aka George Constanza in the TV show, “Seinfeld.” Poking fun at the history and craft of American furniture design, she calls it “Gorgeous George,” the ring name of a famous wrestler in the 1940s and 50s.
Mary Henderson just completed her two-year fellowship in 2023. She had applied to find help balancing her many lives as teacher, curator, artist, and mother.
“I have a couple of kids. I’ve been putting my head down and working and painting and not really connecting as much as I would have liked to the Philadelphia art scene,” she said. “The array of really fantastic artists that have passed through that program — I felt like it had to be something worthwhile.”
Andrea Packard contributed a triptych of carved and inked wood panels depicting an imagined forest scene, “Midnight Glory.” In 1995 she was a CFEVA fellow, when it was still called C.A.N., freshly graduated from the certificate program at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.
Packard was attracted to the way the fellowship could be tailored to an artist’s personal circumstances in their life and work.
“The journey of art is very long and there are many transition points,” Packard said. “Transitioning from an art school program or, say, after having a family, it helps to reconnect and have support. There are many residency programs, but C.A.N. provided more holistic guidance and community, one that’s always changing.”
“CFEVA at 40” will be on view at the Michener Museum until May 26.
