By Rita Christopher, Courier Senior
Correspondent:
Claudia Van Nes says
she always intended to be an artist. Along the way, however, she became a
reporter, a writer, and an editor.
“I see connection;
they are all creative fields,” she says.
Actually what she
saw when she was registering for college classes as a young mother with a baby
in her arms was a much shorter line for creative writing classes.
“The line to
register for art majors was very long and I had limited time. I liked to write
so I thought why not do it,” she says.
After a career that
included working as a reporter and columnist for The Hartford Courant and as
editor of The Pictorial Gazette, Claudia, now retired, is once again focusing
on art.
“I had taken art
classes and workshops all my life and I always drew. Even when I was covering
things like zoning meetings, I would draw people on the panel to keep myself
awake. I tried to hide it but the people always knew what I was doing,” she
says. “In the face of very little evidence, whatever else I was doing, I always
considered myself an artist.”
Claudia is part of a
group of six women artists whose works will be featured at an upcoming show,
Oct. 10 to 13, at the Essex Art Association. The six have already had one group
show at the Mill Gallery in Chester.
The other artists are Pam Carlson, Amy Day Kahn, Renni Ridgeway-Korsmeyer, Eleanor
Pringle, and Kathleen Sullivan. Four of the women, Claudia among them, will
also have work shown in the Outdoor Arts Festival presented by The Arts Center
at Killingworth on the same weekend.
The six women, who
studied together at studio classes given by Anne Culver in Guilford, paint
together on a regular basis, both encouraging and critiquing each other’s
efforts.
Offering criticism,
Claudia says, can be challenging.
“I think it works
because we learned to critique at Anne’s studio. You want to put what you have
to say in a positive way but still be honest about it,” she says.
Art might be
central, but Claudia’s interests are many and varied. She is co-chairperson of
the Connecticut Unit of the Herb Society of America, which, among other things,
maintains a garden at the women’s prison in Niantic. Claudia volunteers seven
or eight times a year, involving inmates in both learning about herbs and the
gardening process.
“Herbs often evoke
memories of meals, family celebrations, and we have discussions that transcend
their present circumstances,” she explains. “It’s woman to woman and the herbs
make it easy.”
On a regular basis,
most of Claudia’s horticultural efforts are devoted to the vegetable garden
maintained by the Shoreline Soup Kitchens & Pantries behind Grace Church in
Old Saybrook.
Claudia conceived
the idea of a garden after interviewing Patty Dowling, executive director of
the organization.
“I asked what they
needed, thinking the answer would be money, but instead she said they needed fresh
produce,” Claudia recalls.
With that in mind,
Claudia, then president of the Chester Garden Club, approached several local
garden clubs to see if the could cooperate to maintain a vegetable garden. Now,
some 40 volunteers work in the garden.
“We grow thousands
of pounds of vegetables,” Claudia says, explaining that the produce goes into
the grocery bags that are given out weekly at local distribution sites.
Recently, Claudia
has taken up rug hooking, currently working on a set of chair covers featuring
England’s King Henry VIII and his six wives; at the moment, the king and two of
his spouses are finished. She intends the pieces as seat upholstery for the
study of her husband Gordon, a retired physician.
In addition to rug
hooking, Claudia also knits and has organized a regular knitting group.
“I’m a crummy
knitter,” she says, “but I like it because I have to keep doing things with my
hands. I can’t keep them still.”
Claudia has a goal
that she hopes her upcoming exhibition at the Essex Art Association will help
her to achieve. When someone asks her what she does, she wants to be able to
say that she is an artist.
“I can’t quite do it
yet,” she confesses. “I was going to my 50th high school reunion and practicing
in the car what I would say, something like, ‘I do a lot of art and a lot of
gardening,’ but I couldn’t get to saying I was an artist,” she admits.
Still, she knows the
ability to describe herself in those terms isn’t far off.
“It’s really putting
yourself out there, but I know its coming. It’s going to happen when I get
enough nerve, some time in the next year,” she says.
Six Women Painting,
A Group Exhibition
Oct. 10 to 13, noon
to 6 p.m.
The Essex Art
Association
10 North Main
Street, Essex
For more
information, call 860-767-8996
Outdoor Arts
Festival
Clinton Landing
54 E. Main Street,
Clinton
Oct. 11 from 11 a.m.
to 6 p.m.; Oct. 12 from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Admission is free
For more information
on Shoreline Soup Kitchens & Pantries, visit www.shorelinesoupkitchens.org.
Pictured: A retired
newspaper editor, Claudia Van Nes is now an artist in her own right.
Photo by Rita
Christopher