Month: October 2019

Quince is an ancient fruit, found in Roman cooking and grown across Turkey and southeast Asia. It grows on small trees and is closely related to apples and pears, but it lacks their immediate edibility and appeal. The fruit is knobbly and ugly, with an irregular shape and often a gray fuzz — especially when the fruit has been picked underripe. The ripest, nicest quince will have a golden tone and smooth skin like pictured directly above. But even ripe quince doesn’t taste very good raw.

Quince was popular in 18th century New England. Nearly every home had a quince tree in the yard because quince provided a natural and plentiful source of pectin that was necessary for home canners to ensure that preserves they were putting up for the winter were properly set and preserved.  After powdered pectins were invented, quince fell out of favor.

The first clue that quince hides something special is its aroma. If you leave a quince on a sunny windowsill it will slowly release a delicate fragrance of vanilla, citrus, and apple into your kitchen. It’s a heady, perfumed scent that is completely at odds with its appearance. Maybe this is why the quince is slowly making a comeback and is celebrated at White Silo Farm in Sherman on November 2, and November 3 at the 6th annual Quince Festival from 12 noon to 5 p.m.

They will be serving 6 scrumptious dishes made with quince. Their menu includes Butternut squash and quince soup; Quince Cippolini onion and bacon; Quince Pumpkin, quinoa salad with pomegranate seeds; Quince and Manchego Empanada; Panacotta with spiced quince and amaretti and hazelnut crumble; Quince gingerbread cake; and Pretzels with quince mustard.

Admission is free. Pay for wine and food. Quince mustard and Quince jam will be available to take home. There will be live music on Saturday from 1 pm to 4 pm with the Hummingbirds and live music on Sunday, from 1pm-4 pm with Al Rivoli. Free outdoor tours weather permitting.

If you are looking for some spooktacular fun tonight take a candlelit tour along a path of 1,000 luminaries through the historic cemetery and meet some of Washington’s unforgettable residents from the past! This year’s tour, with new stories and about an hour in length, is produced by Gunn Historical Museum with support from local theater legends Doug and Martha Winkel of the Washington Dramalites. Tour guides dressed in period costumes will take groups of visitors through the cemetery to listen to tales of the departed. A Halloween themed movie will be shown and light refreshments will be served in the Wykeham Room of Gunn Memorial Library where attendees can wait inside for their tour group to depart.

The new exhibit, Washington Connecticut: An American Story, will be open for viewing in the Museum until 8:30pm. Tour guests are encouraged to bring a flashlight, dress warmly and wear comfortable walking shoes as they will be walking on uneven terrain.

Ticket Distribution: Members of Friends of the Gunn Historical Museum will be given preference for the first tour and should pre-register by emailing info@gunnhistoricalmuseum.org or calling 860-868-7756. Tickets will be distributed under a tent in the Gunn Museum’s parking lot, on a first-come-first-serve basis, starting at 6:00 pm and continue through the evening until the tickets run out. Tickets can’t be reserved in advance.

Gregory James Gallery in New Milford is presenting an exhibit of more than 40 new and recent landscape paintings by Connecticut artist Jim Laurino this fall, opening with a reception from 5 to 7 p.m. Oct. 26.

A demonstration with the artist will be held Nov. 16 at 5 p.m. and the exhibit will remain on view through Dec. 8.
Laurino, who studied design and color theory at the University of Connecticut, paints en plein air in a bold representational style, producing evocative scenes of rivers, lakes, seascapes, woodlands, farms, historic buildings, and other iconic scenes in the Northeast.

His compositions appear almost photographic from a vantage point of eight to 10 feet, but these are hardly just pretty pictures. Get closer to each canvas and Laurino’s proficiency as a serious painter becomes apparent. His robust brushstrokes form a meditative exaltation of form and texture, with individual brushstrokes pushed toward abstraction before coalescing as a suite to masterfully depict the transformative effect of light on landscapes and seascapes.
The artist is inspired by the thick brushstrokes of Van Gogh, and by the Impressionists, notably American artists Childe Hassam and Theodore Robison. He has been painting since he was a teenager and studied with noted painter Christopher Magadini, among others.

“Laurino doesn’t fret too much over color,” Bob Bahr wrote in a January 2018 story published in Plein Air Magazine. “He’s more concerned with texture and brushstrokes. The colors in a Laurino painting are very harmonious, and this is undoubtedly attributable to his extremely limited palette. The artist only squeezes out a cool blue, a cool red, a warm red, a [cool] yellow, and white. His pieces tend toward a high key, with a lot of bright light.”

“I love the extremes in a painting, the dark darks, and light lights, so I do work toward that,” Laurino says in the story. “I tend to paint darks first and apply lights on the focal point last—last, or close to last. I don’t like working too small. I like a lot of inference, and you lose some of that when you tighten it up.”

Laurino, who begins with a thumbnail sketch, works on-site and finishes paintings in his studio, is a hands-on artist from the beginning to the end of the process. He stretches his own canvas—and he makes his own rustic frames for each of his paintings. “I’ve always liked to make my own frames, and about 10 years or so ago I started using reclaimed materials,” the artist says. “I just like working with the wood that’s a little older, a little roughed up.”

A resident of Burlington, Conn., Laurino paints often in western Connecticut and favors the Finger Lakes region among many preferred locales in the Northeast.
Laurino has paintings in numerous private collections, and is a longstanding member of the prestigious Lyme Art Association, where he exhibits frequently. In 2019, the artist won the Artists’ Choice Award at the Parrsboro International Plein Air Festival in Nova Scotia, and in 2018 he won a third-place award in the Finger Lakes Plein Air Competition & Festival. His juried show participation includes the Granby Land Trust Art Show and the seaARTS Maritime Exhibit in Gloucester, Mass.
The artist has had a selection of works at the Gregory James Gallery about a year. “I’m so pleased with that arrangement,” he says.

For more information, call the Gregory James Gallery at (860) 354-3436, or see the website at gregoryjamesgallery.com. The artist’s website is jimlaurino.com.