Ann Sheffer is among Westport’s most avid arts advocates. Her support of all mediums — visual, performing, classical, new — is abiding and true.
So it’s very fitting that Ann’s latest project involves both an art gallery and the Westport Country Playhouse.
Actually, it’s a gallery at the Playhouse.
Thisi Saturday (November 24, 5 to 8 p.m.), the barn next to the theater welcomes “Amazing Grace.” Noted Westport painter/illustrator Ann Chernow and famed graphic artist Miggs Burroughs offer dozens of mixed media images, photos and oils of real and invented people, from life’s shadows.
Ann Chernow and Miggs Burroughs
It’s the gallery’s inaugural exhibit.
It opens in what is already called the Sheffer Studio Space. The name honors Ann and her family.
As a child, Sheffer’s grandparents and parents took her to the Playhouse. She still recalls sitting in those red seats, for Friday afternoon children’s shows..
At 15, she became an usher. She continued serving the Playhouse long after graduating from Staples High School in 1966. Today, she’s an honorary trustee.
Sheffer has known and admired the 2 artists featured in this first show for decades.
Chernok’s work has been exhibited all over the world. Her Playhouse art focuses on actress portraits from American film noir of the 1930s and ’40s. Of course, many film stars also appeared on the Playhouse stage.
Burroughs — who graduated from Staples a year before Sheffer — has designed Time magazine covers, a United States stamp, Westport’s flag, and hundreds of logos for commercial and non-profit clients. His lenticular photos line the Main Street and railroad station tunnels. His Playhouse exhibit includes 24 male criminals.
A sample of Ann Chernow’s work (left), and one by Miggs Burroughs (right).
Westport has long been known as an arts community. Next Saturday, we celebrate that heritage — in all its forms.
(The Gallery at the Westport Country Playhouse is a partnership between Friends of the Westport Public Art Collection and the Artists Collective of Westport. Saturday’s opening features music by Warren Bloom, drinks and light bites and more. The exhibit runs through December 22.)
