Published: August 15, 2008 02:04 pm            

Mom/daughter exhibit shows world through art

By TOM LAVIS

TLAVIS@TRIBDEM.COM

Mary Lessard of Munster Township isn’t a typical tourist when she visits other countries.

While most travelers are content to enjoy the sites, Lessard takes her memories and transforms them into works of art.

More than two dozen of her watercolors are featured in a mother-daughter show at the Bottle Works Ethnic Arts Center, 411 Third Ave. in the Cambria City section of Johnstown.

A collection of photographs, jewelry, textiles, puppets and unequaled items by Mary Lessard’s daughter, Gabrielle Lessard, 47, of Oakland, Calif., also is on display.

The Lessards have a penchant for travel, and separate trips to India were the geneses for their Bottle Works’ exhibit, “Mary and Gabrielle Lessard: Experiencing the World through Art.”

After every trip, it is common for Mary Lessard to relive her experiences by creating a body of work telling the stories of the people she met in their environments.

Lessard, a retired nurse, along with her husband, Lucien, a retired television producer, traveled to India in January 2007.

Gabrielle visited in January and February of this year.

“It was a push and a pleasure to get the 30 pieces completed in time for this show,” Mary Lessard said.

“I got hooked on the project and could have come up with as many as 120 ideas. I whittled them down to 30, given the time constraint and the space allotment at the Bottle Works.”

Twenty-seven of the pieces are true watercolors while the others are two pen-and-ink works and a watercolor painted on silk.

The paintings’ subject matter is as varied as the country of India.

“India is people, and I’m quite interested into hearing what the Indian population living in and around Johnstown will think of our work,” Lessard said.

One of her favorite paintings is “Mother and Child,” which shows the delight of the subjects.

“The women of India work so very hard, and they are underappreciated for all they do,” Lessard said. “But I wanted to capture the true joy exhibited by this mother and the love she has for her child.”

“A Sea of Saris” demonstrates the crush of humanity in a city.

Set in a backdrop of a drab and gray city, Lessard shows a gathering of women dressed in their colorful saris that resemble a sea of floating flowers.

Lessard’s watercolor depicting the Taj Mahal has the potential to be a show favorite.

“I have palaces, Indian designs and fanciful subjects such as the ‘Pretty Pachyderm,’ which children will find delightful,” she said. “I particularly like the painting I did of the Taj Mahal.”

The exhibit is on display through Nov. 17.

Gabrielle Lessard, a public interest lawyer working for a nonprofit that provides resources for community-based economic development in low-income communities, seizes any opportunity to travel abroad, often performing volunteer work.

A recent trip to cyclone-ravaged Myanmar led to an array of photographs, the profits of which raise money for Doctors Without Borders.

She has collected art in southeast Asia, Mexico, Guatemala and South America.



On display

What: “Mary and Gabrielle Lessard: Experiencing the World through Art.”

Where: Bottle Works Ethnic Arts Center, 411 Third Ave. in the Cambria City section of Johnstown.

When: Through Nov. 17.

Admission: Free.

        

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