BUSHWICK ON THE AUSABLE:
#128: Emerging Artists Rock The Adirondacks
“Divergent Spectrums III: An Art Show About the Collective Strength of Our Creative Community” opened last Friday September 12 and runs through Sunday, September 21. The exhibition is sponsored by the East Branch Friends of The Arts, which describes itself as “. . . a community-based, non-profit organization dedicated to presenting and supporting the performing and visual arts in Keene and Keene Valley.” The exhibition was curated by artist and entrepreneur foodie Zach Clemans, who earned a fine arts degree from SUNY Purchase and cooked in New York City restaurants, before a Craigardan artist residency brought him home to the Adirondacks in 2017.
Clemans has since devoted himself to artisanal food production. Clemans’s “Cookee Boy Brand” hosts farm-to-table suppers in Upper Jay at Sandy’s cidery, which produces foraged fruit ciders. I asked Zach why he settled in the Adirondacks.
“It's a beautiful place,” he explained. “It's inspiring. It's a theme. It's a muse. It’s a reason for many people to be here. The trick is how to make a life here. In order to survive, you have to be a creative person.”
Nearly three hundred people attended the opening reception. I was reminded of big city First Friday gallery crawls, a Breughel kermess, or a North Woods Salon des Independents. Large welded-steel sculptures by Walter Early anchor the space, while a hamburger stack of digital monitors titled “Propaganda Funhouse” by Echo Only stands in a corner of the room. Madison Kostoss celebrates the dangerous work of New York State Forest Ranger In her canvas “Freight Train Firefront.”
East Branch Friend of the Arts secretary Amy Nelson explained that a hanging painted banner by Beatrice Schachenmayr is a perpetual work in progress. “People and Places I Saw when Everything Broke All Around Me” by Evy Redshaw combines a dozen polaroid photographs arranged in a 3 x 4 grid, attached to a weatherbeaten tabletop. Redshaw’s piece hangs near a painting by cheesemaker Susie Tarnowicz: resident artist at Asgaard Farm, once owned by painter and polymath Rockwell Kent. Other merging and mid-career artists represented include Luke Ayres, Ilya Bernstein, Clam Shed Tommy, Nate Curtis, Jen Jubin. Luisa Mei, Everett Renderer, William Glaser Wilson, Madison Kostoss, Jack Van Wie, Mollie Ward, Julia Kier Wilson, Steve Wyatt, and Lucas Haight.
Zach Clemans confessed to me this was his first curatorial experience. His goal had not been to explore a particular theme, but to celebrate the region’s vibrant community of emerging artists living just below the radar. I asked what kind of experience he hoped visitors would take away from the show.
“I hope people who come here are going to be really moved by a sense of the strength of this creative community,” he replied, “People are going to come here and see art they've never seen before. They’ll see people in a space they never seen before and maybe have some conversations and make some new connections. . . it's a pretty exciting event.”
I have to agree.
“Divergent Spectrums III: An Art Show About the Collective Strength of Our Creative Community” remains on view at Keene Arts: 10881 Route 73. Keene, New York. 12942 Telephone: +1(914) 309-7095. GPS:44.25366° N, 73.78951° W
—James Lancel McElhinney © 2025
Visit my website: https://www.mcelhinneyart.com
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