Carriage Barn Arts Center

37th Annual Members’ Art Show at Carriage Barn Arts Center Extended to Oct. 18

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The Carriage Barn Arts Center in Waveny Park announces the extension of its current art exhibition the 37th Annual Members’ Art Show. The new closing date is Saturday, October 18th. The 37th Annual Members’ Art Show celebrates the diverse work of its strong contingency of current artist members in its annual Members’ Show. All subjects, styles, and media are exhibited in this expansive group art exhibit, in which approximately 160 artists, mainly from Connecticut and New York, each display one representative work. The works include a lenticular photograph by Miggs Burroughs in which the image of a woman shifts as you move, a mixed media piece using jewelry by Mary Yordon, sculpture composed of found material by Lubomir Tomaszewski and Rick Kulawitz, and stunning interactive and dynamic sculptures by artists such as Drew Klotz, Jerome Harris Parmet and Lewis Cohen.

Around Town

Kiwanis Club of New Canaan Awards $16,000 to 25 Local Organizations

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Six years ago, the Kiwanis Club of New Canaan—a nonprofit organization whose mission is “serving the children of the world”—doled out $1,800 to seven local recipient groups in line with its cause, with monies coming from established, though limited, events such as the St. Patrick’s Day Dinner. On Friday—thanks mostly to the more recent, very popular Zerbini Family Circus, which Kiwanis presents in conjunction with the New Canaan YMCA—Kiwanis was able to give nearly $16,000 to 25 organizations. According to 6-year Kiwanian David Hoyle, an attorney in town who helped host a gathering at the Y to mark the handing out of those funds, the circus “has really changed what we’re able to do.”

“We work really well with them and they do stuff that we can’t do and vice versa,” Hoyle said. “[YMCA Marketing Director] Kristina Barrett and [Kiwanian] Kathy Holland just do yeoman’s work.”
Local organizations receiving allocations include ABC House, CERT, Future 5, New Canaan Historical Society, Pesticide-Free New Canaan and Summer Theatre of New Canaan.

Around Town

VIDEO: Laughter, Dancing at Carriage Barn’s ‘Night in Havana’

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A Night in Havana, May 17, 2014
Carriage Barn Arts Center Board of Directors President Serena Gillespie says there are two major reasons that inaugural fundraiser “A Night in Havana” sold out two weeks before the event. “One, the directors [Eleanor Flatow and Arianne Kolb] over the course of this year have had an amazing push in PR and marketing, and the community is responding,” Gillespie said from under a tent outside the Carriage Barn, home of the New Canaan Center for the Arts, as 160 supporters arrived to mingle, dance and laugh (see video above) on a picture-perfect evening for “A Night in Havana.” The fundraiser featured live Latin music from Manchado, plenty to drink, silent auction and a Cuba-inspired menu—all amid the “Absolut Kuba!” exhibition which runs through June 1. “Our turnouts at openings have been astronomical, and now on top of that, we have an exhibition going on that is really caught the eye of a lot of people,” Gillespie continued. “We brought in a lot of people to the lecture last week and to the openings for people who had never set foot in the Carriage Barn before. So I think between the two there is newfound interest.”

It showed.

Business

‘Sisters Forever’: Sorelle Gallery Opens on Main Street

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Two generations ago, Sandra Pelletier’s grandparents made their way from Italy to Fairfield County by way of Brooklyn—to the Huntington section of Shelton, specifically. There, they purchased and worked a large dairy farm, and some years later, Pelletier’s father married into the family and built a small house on 70 acres next door. “It was a small, five-room ranch but we had probably the richest life in the world because it was such a wonderful experience to grow up in that environment,” Pelletier recalled Friday from inside Sorelle Gallery, which opened three weeks ago at 84 Main St. “We felt we were like Tom Sawyer kids. We had great tree forts all over the place, so it was a creative and rich artistic environment.

Around Town

New Downtown Stroll to Kickstart ‘Art in the Windows’ on May 22

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Three springs ago—her first in New Canaan—Serena Gillespie found herself walking downtown when she noticed, and felt moved by, works of art in storefront windows. Attracted to a display that included peonies flowers, Gillespie made inquiries and discovered that she was experiencing Art in the Windows. That’s how she came to find out about the Carriage Barn Arts Center (home of the New Canaan Society for the Arts), which organized the event. “For me, art has always had to connect with me personally,” Gillespie, now president of the art center’s Board of Trustees, recalled on a recent evening as fellow board members, Carriage Barn staff and business owners gathered at the Waveny property during a kickoff/planning gathering for the Seventh Annual Art in the Windows. “If it talks to me and brings back a memory, that’s when it connects with me.