“Monday Painters”: 6 Decades Of Sketching

Dorothy Curran has lived in Westport since 1977. She served on the boards of the Westport Library (trustee; co-chair, River of Names community capital campaign) and Westport Woman’s Club (past president, chair/co-chair, many Yankee Doodle Fairs). She is also a past president of the former Westport Historical Society.

Today, Dorothy recalls the “Monday Painters.” The group began here 60 yeas ago — and is still active. Dorothy has been a member for over a decade. She writes:

In the early 1900’s, Westport was becoming a haven for artists of all kinds: illustrators, cartoonists, sculptors, authors, journalists, actors and musicians.

Many were Midwesterners, who had moved to New York to work in the nascent publishing, advertising and performing arts industries.

They married, started families, and were drawn to Westport by its beaches and countryside; its Fine Arts Theater showing foreign films; its rail proximity to Manhattan; its affordable farmhouses and barns for studios, and the congenial culture, good company and collaborative opportunities offered by fellow artists.

One of Westport’s early artists was James Earle Fraser, at work here on a bust of Theodore Roosevelt in his Coleytown studio. Fraser also designed the buffalo nickel, and the sculpture of a Native American slumped over a tired horse.

This was America’s golden age of representational art and illustration. In Westport’s artists’ colony, “sketch groups” and “sketch classes,” with live models, sprung up naturally.

The goal was to hone skills, enjoy professional camaraderie, share the costs of models, and trade job opportunities.

Around 1967, artist Joey Tate organize the “Monday Painters” group. Members included Elizabeth Gaynor, who in the early 1960s already hosted a sketch group in the basement of her Southport home, with live models. Tate and Gaynor met at Bambi Linn’s Westport ballet class. Discovering a mutual love of painting, they joined forces.

“Sam,” by Monday Painters member Susan Kloepfer.

At first the artists met at Constance Kiermaier’s studio. After a fire destroyed it, and with funding from Tate and Gaynor, the group moved to a former ping pong ballfactory on Riverside Avenue.

Access to the 2nd floor space was outdoors, via a fire escape and wooden stairs. One day, the stairs collapsed. The building was condemned, prompting another move.

Next, the group reconvened in another factory building: the 19th-century Lees Manufacturing (cotton twine) site, converted recently into The Mill condominiums on Richmondville Avenue.

“Seated Man Savoring Summer,” by Monday Painters member Dorothy Curran.

From the mid-1980s to 1997, the Monday Painters moved once more: to the Westport Arts Center, housed in the then-closed Greens Farms Elementary School.

Tate, Betty Petschek and Sally Vance opened their shared studio to group members Gaynor, Paul Heifetz, Gamal Eleish, Judy Kamerschen, Andy Neilly, Charlie Reid, Marianne Rothballer and Gene Wilder.

When a rising student population led Westport to reclaim the school, Gaynor hosted the group at her ballet studio. She did so for nearly 3 decades, until her death last December at 95.

More than a decade earlier, Mollie Donovan and Ellen Naftalin mounted a special exhibit at the Westport Historical Society. Gaynor and noted artist Howard Munce helped curate “The Sketch Class: A Westport Tradition.”

“Jonathan Henken,” by Monday Painters member Jo Ann Davidson. (Images courtesy of Diane Parrish)

Today — thanks to the generosity of Green’s Farms Congregational Church; the initiative of artist and congregation member Jo Ann Davidson, and the leadership of artists Christy Gallagher and Marty Fleischman, the “Monday Painters” — now nearing their 6th decade, and in their 6th home as a group — continue painting together in Westport.

Want to see what they’re up to? Green’s Farms Church hosts an artists’ reception this Friday (November 7, 6 to 7:30 p.m.). The exhibit is on display through November 30.

(Prospective new Monday Painters members are always welcome. Email DorothyECurran@aol.com.)

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