Contact:
Nicole Gallego
New Haven Symphony Orchestra
203.931.2991
ngallego@newhavensymphony.org
Please Note: A selection of top-quality, digital photos are immediately available by email.
Pictures at an Exhibition: Where Brush Embrases Baton
September 16, New Haven, CT The New Haven Symphony Orchestra (NHSO) and the Greene Art Gallery, of Guilford, CT are collaborating on the theme of Pictures at an Exhibition. On Thursday, September 18, 7:30pm, Woolsey Hall, New Haven, the NHSO opens its 115th anniversary season with a program which includes works by Gounod, Saint-Saëns, Ravel and Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition. On September 17, the Greene Art Gallery, 29 Whitfield Street, Guilford, opens Pictures at an Exhibition, featuring works by artists George Phillips, Marcia Phillips, Jerry Caron and Daniel P. Buckley.
The artistic bridge between the two organizations is distinguished artist George Phillips, who will create a work in response to the NHSO’s performance at the concert hall this Thursday. Concertgoers will have the opportunity to view his work in progress at the hall and meet the artist in person following the concert. The work created by Mr. Phillips will be auctioned in support of the NHSO at a special event at the Greene Art Gallery, Friday, October 3, 6-8pm. In addition to the work created at the concert, a video which will be produced by 5-time Emmy-award winning producer and New Haven resident Karyl Evans, documenting the stroke by stroke creation of the work, will be shown and presented to the winning bidder along with the artwork.
Of Mussorgsky’s music Mr. Phillips notes: “Mussorgsky’s music …expresses the Russian soul more aptly than any other Russian composer.” Artist Daniel P. Buckley, whose work will also be featured at the Greene Art Gallery’s September exhibition, offered the following comment on Mussorgsky’s “Pictures:”
Mussorgsky once said, “Art is not an end in itself, but a means of addressing humanity”. It is no wonder that Pictures at an Exhibition has become Mussorgsky’s best known work, for no where is his humanity better expressed. Only through humanity can art, whether notes on a page or paint on a canvas, transcend and become more than a clever thought or a skillful rendering. I feel at its core art strives to be a manifestation of the human spirit. When listening to the music in this piece it’s difficult not to respond to that eternal dialogue of creation and not be inspired by it.
Natalie Forbes, NHSO Executive Director notes, “From its inception, Mussorgsky’s “Pictures” has been a link between the worlds of the brush and the baton. Following the untimely passing of his friend, the artist Victor Hartman, and an exhibition of Hartmann’s work attended by the composer, a suite for piano was borne, from which Ravel’s arrangement is drawn. The musical refrain which is repeated between several of the movements is said to represent a visitor at the exhibition”.
George Phillips was born in Brooklyn to Russian immigrants. He great grandfather painted icons and sculpted wood for the Russian Orthodox churches. He worked in an array of what he called day jobs; as a singer, an English teacher, a writer and a research director for the Hearst Newspapers, and a network TV executive. He and Leonard Goldenson, ABC Chairman and president (who was also a painter) used to critique each other’s paintings. In the military he served as an intelligence analyst in the office of the chief of staff, U.S. Army Air Corps.
At New York University he earned a bachelors degree in English. In graduate school he majored in creative arts and studied with Chuck Close who wrote, “Phillips is one of a handful of truly outstanding students.” He studied with John Kacere at NYU, Sidney Dickenson at the Art Students League in NYC, and Sergei Bongart in Los Angeles. George and his wife Marcia taught painting at the Lyme Art Association and privately. They live on the Connecticut Shoreline and in the South of France.
Corporate Purchases: Aetna Life Insurance, American General Life Insurance, Citicorp, Delta Airlines, Disney Corp, PepsiCo, Registry Hotel Group, Union Trust Co, Travelers Insurance, among others. Galleries and Exhibitions: Greene Art Gallery, Guilford, CT; Francisca Anderson Gallery, Boston, MA; Galerie Castiglione, Paris France; Galerie Etoile, La Jolla, CA; Galerie 17, Mougins, France; Galerie 17, Cannes, France; The Gateway Gallery, Carmel and La Jolla, CA; Marin-Price Gallery, Chevy, Chase, MD; Miller Art Gallery, Cincinnati, OH; The Shippee Gallery, NYC; The Union League Club, NYC; among others
The Greene Art Gallery, founded in 1977 by Richard B. Greene, is in an 1890’s Victorian Barn in Guilford, CT, on the town green. The gallery carries the original work of regional and international artists, painters as well as sculptors. Next to the gallery is a sculpture garden that is open to the public, year round. The gallery holds eight shows each year that feature individual artists as well as thematic and cooperative shows, such as this venture with the New Haven Symphony. The gallery director, Kathryn Halloran Greene, the late Mr. Greene’s wife, reopened the gallery in October 2007 (after a two and a half year hiatus,) with a show of the work of George and Marcia Phillip’s and the well wishes of an appreciative art’s community. Mrs. Greene is also sponsoring a film, lecture, music series at the gallery, starting this fall. More information regarding the gallery, its artists and upcoming events can be found at greeneartgallery.com or by calling the gallery at 203.453.4162.
The New Haven Symphony Orchestra – now celebrating its 115th consecutive season – is the fourth-oldest symphony orchestra in America, after the New York Philharmonic (1842), the Boston Symphony (1881) and the Chicago Symphony (1891). It has an established schedule of activities which runs throughout the year and throughout Connecticut. It comprises a comprehensive education program, community engagement initiatives that bring classical music to every sector of our very diverse community, a “Symphony Series” which honors and re-energizes a great art form, and Pops concerts which entertain and enlighten. Currently the Orchestra serves approximately 100,000 people each year.
The NHSO’s 2008-09 season is made possible by the generous support of our season sponsors: Bank of America, Chamber Insurance Trust, The Community Foundation of Greater New Haven, The Guilford Savings Bank, NewAlliance Foundation, New Haven Register, Saint Raphael Healthcare System, Soundview Capital Management Corporation, Southern Connecticut State University, University of New Haven, Whitney Center, Yale New Haven Hospital, and Yale University.
Subscriptions ($60-370) and Single tickets ($10-65) can be purchased through the NHSO box office at the Shubert Theater, 247 College Street in New Haven, (203) 562-5666 or by visiting newhavensymphony.org.
