Sari Dienes - A Virtual Lecture

Luminary Artists of Rockland Lecture – Sari Dienes

April 22^nd, Virtual via Zoom

Cost $10, to register go to: www.rocklandartcenter.org

Rockland Center for the Arts (RoCA) continues its mission of enrichment through the arts with another Luminary Artists of Rockland Lecture on Sari Dienes with Barbara Pollitt and Rip Hayman from the Sari Dienes Foundation on Thursday, April 22^nd at 7:00pm. 

The Luminary Artists of Rockland series continues with a Zoom lecture on Sari Dienes with Barbara Pollitt and Rip Hayman from the Sari Dienes Foundation, on Thursday, April 22^nd @ 7:00pm (tickets $10).  Q & A will follow the presentation. Dienes was an early innovator, whose life and work spans the 20^th century and encompasses the globe.  She was not an artist restricted to a few genres, as she also incorporated colorful prints, street and rock rubbings, ceramics—even performance art! —into her vast body of work. Born in Hungary in 1898, her early life led her at first into music and dance. After World War 1, in 1919 when Hungary briefly was a Soviet Republic, she met Paul Dienes. The two would leave Hungary and head west, marrying in 1922.

By the mid-1930s, she would become Assistant Director of Ozenfant Academy of Fine Arts in London, gathering faculty, including the British sculptor, Henry Moore, and students, including Leonora Carrington and Stella Snead.

Sari arrived in New York City, Sept. 3, 1939 the day England declared war on Germany, on an invitation to visit from Ozenfant. Ever enterprising in the field of arts instruction, she taught at the newly established Ozenfant Academy on East 20th St., at Parsons and privately at her studio at 58 West 57th Street, the Brooklyn Museum and at Pratt. Her loft was a great gathering place of artists from all fields, musicians, dancers, philosophers, critics, museum directors and poets. Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg met there, and Sari shared much of her philosophy, technique and invention with them. Close friends of John Cage, Sari became devoted to Zen Buddhism.

In 1961, she settled down at the Gate Hill Cooperative in Stony Point, New York, a community of Black Mountain artists John Cage, Karen Krause, David Tudor and M.C. Richards, Paul and Vera Williams, George Ancona, Stan and Johanna Vanderbeek, Roger Phenix and more. Gate Hill would become her home base, as well as the Ear Inn at 326 Spring, where she lived with Rip Hayman and others. She attended openings of her own at AIR gallery, and was a member of Women in The Arts and the NY Professional Women Artists collective with Ce Roser, part of the emerging feminist movement building rights and representation for women artists. Sari worked until her death in 1992. Currently on view at the Whitney in an exhibition of experimental prints named after a quote of hers, "Nothing is So Humble", and at MoMA in "Zero Degrees", at Kunstmuseum Basel in “Four Years” and in the current exhibition at David Zwirner Gallery of Ray Johnson, in “What a Dump” opening April 8.  Please see Saridienes.org for more information.

Lecturers:

Rip Hayman met Sari Dienes in 1971 when he was a music student attending a concert of John Cage, her longtime friend.  When Hayman moved into the apartment above the landmark Ear Inn pub on Spring St., he invited Dienes to be a housemate during her visits to New York City.   She became the den mother to the various youth who were passing through while taking Hayman and cohorts to art openings and performances in the heyday of the SoHo artist community.   Dienes invited her friends to visit, including Cage, John Lennon, Salvadore Dali, Stella Snead and Marisol.    

Hayman assisted Dienes to establish The Sari Dienes Foundation, which represents her legacy of creativity and has developed her collection. He currently serves as Director of the Foundation.

Barbara Pollitt, is an artist and teacher. After a 25-year career in the NYC theater, as an Obie Award winning performer, American Theater Wing and Drama Desk nominated designer, and director of opera, theater and dance, Ms. Pollitt has specialized in masks and puppetry, and whose work was also featured in Julie Taymor's "Across the Universe".  She is the curator for the Sari Dienes Foundation, a position that began for her in 1990.

To register for the Luminary Artists of Rockland, visit www.rocklandartcenter.org.  Important Zoom Information: Registration for all virtual events will close 5 hours before the program begins. Zoom invitations will be emailed 24 hours in advance of the program. If you don't receive an email with an invitation code, please check your spam folder or send an email to: dflanaganrca@aol.com.

Rockland Center for the Arts is the oldest and largest arts organization in Rockland County, presenting outstanding programming in the arts for over 70 years.  RoCA is located at 27 S Greenbush Rd., West Nyack, NY 10994, Website: www.rocklandartcenter.org.  Phone: 845-358-0877, Fax: 845-358-0971.

The Luminary Artists of Rockland is made possible through a generous grant from The M&T Charitable Foundation, and sponsorships from M&T Bank and Kantrowitz, Goldhamer and Graifman, PC.

RoCA’s programs are made possible, in part, with funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. Funding is also made possible by the County of Rockland.

RoCA gratefully acknowledges support for its programs from The Richard Pousette-Dart Foundation, M&T Bank, The M&T Charitable Foundation, Orange & Rockland Utilities, Kantrowitz, Goldhamer & Graifman P.C., the Rea Charitable Trust, Luxury Kitchen & Bath, Golden Artist Colors, Inc., QuietEvents, Rockland County Tourism, the Estate of Joan Konner, Lighting Services Inc., Sarah and Stephen Thomas, the Mark and Jessie Milano Foundation, Zaklin Family Charitable Fund, The County of Rockland,  The Family Fjord Foundation, Simona and Jerome Chazen, Art Services Group, RoCA members, donors and business members.