A retrospective featuring a forgotten Delaware artist is at Historic Odessa.
The exhibition A Wonderful Life: Regionalist Paintings features the work of Louise Haas Jamison through the month of October.
Jamison grew up near Pickering Beach, on a chicken farm with her eleven siblings. She developed an interest in art young, but her mother’s death sidelined that interest for years in favor of helping on the farm..
Jamison ultimately studied with celebrated Lewes artist Howard Schroeder, and painted her daily Delaware life until her death in 1980.
Her grandson, Kirk Jamison, says she drew from her surroundings as she developed her work.
“She really loved the town of Leipsic - a boating community, and, you know, the boats from the 50s and 60s, they had character, the boats themselves tell a story, let alone the surroundings.”
Jamison began assembling her works four years ago - and hopes the exhibition brings out more of her artwork to catalog.
“So I’m up to about 140 paintings I’ve cataloged now. I’m thinking there’s 30-40, maybe 60 more paintings out there somewhere. We’ll see. I’m not going to stop looking.”
A Wonderful Life: Regionalist Paintings by Louise Haas Jamison
is at The Historic Odessa Foundation through Sunday, October 29.
For more information about the exhibition, visit www.historicodessa.org.
Delaware Public Media' s arts coverage is made possible, in part, by support from the Delaware Division of the Arts, a state agency dedicated to nurturing and supporting the arts in Delaware, in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts.
