Recent Work / Portraits, a solo exhibition of paintings by Sharon Duffy Verhoef, will appear at First Street Gallery from March 28 to April 22. Duffy Verhoef’s paintings have long explored the psychological overtones of social and familial interaction. In her recent work she is on an adventure – exploring the interaction between herself and her subject! Each illuminates the other. While her previous work on this theme came out of an abstract painting background, she is now working from life. Family members, friends and acquaintances gaze directly at us from tightly cropped head and shoulder views that are life size or slightly larger. While achieving a likeness and displaying her skills in depicting the human form, the artist is really responding to the character and personality of her sitter. The intensity of mood or emotional state begins to emerge in these paintings. Her use of highly keyed colors plays into this. Two paintings – The Spanish Teacher and Lexi Reading - show all or most of the sitter’s figure on a smaller scale and amongst attributes of intellectual interests and pursuits. Lexi, a child quietly absorbed in a book, is gaining knowledge. South American textiles from her own collection surround the Spanish Teacher. These represent cultures that she has taught others about - cultures that fascinate her yet, as she puts it, are not her own and exist outside of her. Larger portraits that show more of the sitter’s body bring posture and body language into play to reveal the person. In our fast-paced world it is refreshing to see portraits from life of people the artist has come to know and value. A few small still lifes show an intuitive and fanciful treatment of Hindu statues against plant motifs.

A native of New Jersey, Sharon Duffy Verhoef was educated at Skidmore College, Montclair State College, and Indiana University. She has lived in England, Tucson, Arizona and Auckland, New Zealand– she now lives with her husband in Central Florida. This is her fifth Solo Exhibition at the First Street Gallery.