The Eastwick Press Newspaper

Eastern Rensselaer County's Community Newspaper

Aesthetic/Genetic: New Exhibit Highlights Group of Hoosick-Based Artists

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by Deb Alter

Everyone knows that Grandma Moses was discovered in Hoosick Falls, but she is not the only important artist who lived in Hoosick.

A current exhibition at the Blue Hill Art and Cultural Center in Pearl River, New York highlights a group of artists with close ties to each other and to Hoosick. Jose de Creeft (1884-1982) his wife, Lorrie Goulet, his daughter, Donna Maria de Creeft, have work in this exhibit, which is entitled “Aesthetic/Genetic: Artist Families and their Circles”. Also featured in the show are de Creeft’s protegé, Gary L. Sussman, his wife, Barbara Jacobs Sussman (the curator of the exhibit), and their son, Spencer Jay Sussman. 

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In 1976, the Town of Hoosick passed a resolution for a memorial honoring de Creeft to be placed in Wood Park. He donated his granite sculpture “The Guardian,” and he designed the marble seating and pedestal on which it was placed. His ashes are buried at the foot of the sculpture.
In 1976, the Town of Hoosick passed a resolution for a memorial honoring de Creeft to be placed in Wood Park. He donated his granite sculpture “The Guardian,” and he designed the marble seating and pedestal on which it was placed. His ashes are buried at the foot of the sculpture.

DeCreeft was a world-renowned sculptor who began his career by establishing a studio in the Bateau Lavoir in Montmartre in Paris, among Picasso and his circle. In the course of a long and productive career he worked in Paris, various locations in Spain, New York City, and in Hoosick. He is perhaps best known for the Alice In Wonderland sculpture in Central Park in New York City, but that is just one of the many celebrated works he produced.

De Creeft and Goulet and their daughter spent nearly three seasons a year at their farm in West Hoosick, coming up from New York City each April beginning in 1946, and staying until October. During those months, they created art that is now in museums and private collections throughout the world. Donna Maria de Creeft and her husband still come up to the farm each summer where she maintains a studio (in addition to her New York studio). Lorrie Goulet has continued to create even as she turned 90, although exclusively in NYC now.

Gary Sussman, also an accomplished sculptor, lived with de Creeft and Goulet in West Hoosick while he was apprenticing with de Creeft during his formative years as an artist. During a time when he was studying in New York, Sussman met his wife, Barbara Jacobs, a fourth generation painter. They bought a piece of the de Creeft farm and built a house and studio there. Barbara Sussman and Donna Maria de Creeft became fast friends then, and still are today. Barbara and Gary Sussman continue to live, paint and sculpt full-time in Hoosick. They brought up their two sons, Max and Spencer here. Spencer is  the fifth generation of painters in Barbara’s family lineage. He lives and works in Brooklyn but comes back to Hoosick frequently.

Two works by Lorrie Goulet. Although she is most well known as a sculptor, she is also an accomplished painter. Many of her paintings, including the one shown here, have never been exhibited before. Goulet has continued to work, even as she turns 90.
Two works by Lorrie Goulet. Although she is most well known as a sculptor, she is also an accomplished painter. Many of her paintings, including the one shown here, have never been exhibited before. Goulet has continued to work, even as she turns 90.

All of these connections and overlapping circles of family and friends are what inspired Barbara Sussman’s theme and title for the “Aesthetic/Genetic: Artist Families and their Circles” exhibition. Influences and artistic connections between the families and among the generations are inevitable.(works by the preceding three generations of artists  in Barabara Sussman’s family are included in the show as well.)  The Aesthetic/Genetic exhibition explores the question of how genetics and aesthetics mix from one generation to the next, and from one family to another, and raises the question of how particular sensibilities are passed down from artist to artist. When the artist child of two artists creates her, or his, own art that has been influenced by the art of both parents and their circle nature and  nurture are peculiarly mixed. The Blue Hill Art and Cultural Center exhibition invites you to view the “Aesthetic/Genetic: Artist Families and Their Circles” Exhibition and decide for yourself.

Although the exhibition is downstate, so much of it is really about the Hoosick artist connections and interactions, and is worth an excursion south to see it. “Aesthetic/Genetic: Artist Families and their Circles” runs until November 6, 2015. Hours are Monday through Friday from 8 am to 6 pm. The Blue Hill Art and Cultural Center is located just a short ride from New York City at Blue Hill Plaza in Pearl River, Rockland County, New York.

For more information, email bluehillartandculturalcenter@gmail.com or visit the website: www.bluehillartandculturalcenter.com. You can also call 518.205.5204.

Watercolor lanscape painting by Barbara Jacobs Sussman, a fourth generation artist and curator of the Aesthetic/Genetic Exhibition.
Watercolor lanscape painting by Barbara Jacobs Sussman, a fourth generation artist and curator of the Aesthetic/Genetic Exhibition.

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