Reception and Gallery Talk: Hierosgamos: From Requiem to Revival (Main) In-Person
Join us for a reception and gallery talk by Constantia Thibaut as she discusses her latest artwork, Hierosgamos: From Requiem to Reunion.
When Thibaut's partner, Bill, died in 2018 after a long illness, she created a series of portraits that represent his struggle with his fatal illness during the last months of his life when he was in hospice. Thibaut based these portraits on the many hundreds of photographs she took of Bill with her cell phone and digital camera.
"I have been through a profound experience as a witness to my partner Bill’s illness and death, and these artworks are my visual testimony," writes Thibaut. At the hospital, where Bill spent the last months of his life, a great drama unfolded. I attempted to catch fleeting images of it with my camera. Bill died with tremendous gravitas, seeming to transcend the condition of a helpless victim of a dread and fatal disease. It was as if I, in witnessing this event, as a mere conduit, a mere medium, were transported to another and a greater, though mysterious, dimension of existence. It was a humbling experience. I wondered at how it could be at once so sorrowful and at the same time so beautiful."
Registration is required.
- Date:
- Wednesday, October 18, 2023
- Time:
- 6:30pm - 8:00pm
- Time Zone:
- Eastern Time - US & Canada (change)
- Location:
- Lecture Hall
- Branches:
- Main Library
- Audience:
- Adult
- Categories:
- Cambridge Room Presentation/Lecture
Connie Thibaut is a graphics and mixed-media artist who studied painting for five years at L'Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris, where she was exposed to the Surrealist painters whose work became a strong inspiration. Later, at Massachusetts College of Art, where she graduated with a BFA and a MSAE (Master's of Science in Art Education), she learned about the Surrealist women painters and created a Surrealist reinterpretation of an Old French romance for her thesis show. She has studied with and been influenced by local Boston area artists such as the late Conger Metcalf (Neo-Romanticism) and more recently Adria Arch (Abstract Expressionism). Although she has retired from teaching, she continues to create art that is informed by her life experiences and which reinterprets the traditions of the Renaissance, Fantastic Art, and Expressionism.