A SECOND LOOK, page 3
Published in City Limits, February 2004

DENNIS ARYEEQUAYE “DOG AND FLOWER”

Admiring “Dog and Flower,” Baez stands with artist Dennis Aryeequaye, shown here in the turtleneck shirt. While he was working on this picture, someone admired the “dog” and Aryeequaye realized it didn't look at all like the ram he thought he was painting. Fifteen years ago, when Aryeequaye was 13, his family moved to the United States. He didn't return to Ghana until three years ago, when his family went back for a visit. There he met a cousin, a draftsman, whose talents he admires and emulates.

Aryeequaye typically paints his homeland working gold, yellow and orange. Symbols of Christianity, including a lion from the tribe of Judah, recur. “African Mother” evokes the peaceful African prairie rich in his memory. Blues drench the sky boldly and dramatically. It is “the color of happiness,” he says. “God has changed gray skies.” On the horizon, a mother wears a bright green-and-red patched skirt; she holds an infant, baby Jesus. Near them sits a lion, comfortable, happy, and a protective smile. Wind bends the trees bracketing mother and baby – “a peaceful wind,” is how Aryeequaye describes the motion flowing across the green canopy. “I once saw a tree like that,” he says, pointing to the hunched-over trunk, from which branches grow skyward.

In another picture, “Africa: Red and Gold,” the lion sits in the upper-right-hand corner, a guardian of culture. In the bottom right are a snail and peanut, ingredients for a stew his sister buys from a Bronx store specializing in foods from Africa. But it is the haunting skeleton, drawn in a thick gold, that pulls you into the frame.

The skeleton was a creation of Ralph Correa and is reminiscent of “Bone Farm” and its eerie quality. Frampton says such collaboration is rare among painters; it's more common among sculptors making large pieces. But that's exactly the kind of effort he deliberately promotes – to help his student share in a community before they have finished their own individual work.

MARY PELTZER “SPIRITS OF LOVED ONES”

At 45, Mary Peltzer, still a fan of Janis Joplin, wears a long-sleeved t-shirt with the late singer's picture. Her own gravelly voice is strikingly evocative of Joplin's; flamboyance, a wry humor and a past interrupted by drugs flesh out some of the similarities. Peltzer, however, got control of herself in a way Joplin never did.

Here she cradles “Spirits of Loved Ones,” a picture that she thanks Frampton for helping her finish. White doves appear suspended on the blue portion of the picture. On the circular edges, the color thins, allowing the canvas to emerge as the boundary.

Mary says this picture speaks to “blessings from God” and a hope for the time she will return to music. Because she was adopted, she knows little about her birth mother. But she does know that her mom was musical. Perhaps that explains Peltzer's talent, and her aspirations. It is unlikely that she will return to go-go dancing, or to the Greenwich Village bars where she played the guitar as an opening act.

What she really hopes is to reconnect with the producers who once showed an interest in her songs. That wish, and the belief that “someone's watching,” pervade her picture.

It has been a long day for Peltzer and the other artists who, one by one, have peeled off for the photo shoot for this story. Now it is 5:30, and Peltzer has removed her canvas to go upstairs for picture. It's also dinner time, time for residents to track through the lounge on their way to the dining hall. One woman in a wheel chair parks herself in front of the place where Peltzer's doves usually fly. But there is only a blank space.

“What happened to the picture?” the resident asks. “Where is the picture that's usually there?” She points to the emptiness on the wall. “I like to see these pictures here,” she says emphatically to no one in particular, lingering an instant before wheeling herself into the dining room.

The impact of this art show for the residents of Odyssey House, according to Arnold Unterbach, director of mental health services, compares to the collective joy and energy that explodes when a resident graduates, gets a job or finishes a GED. He describes it as “opening the windows and letting the fresh air in.” But this exhibit, he says, surpasses that. It is, Unterbach decides, like “all the windows opened at once.”

Phyllis Vine is a member of the National Alliance For the Mentally Ill and author of Families in Pain: Siblings, Spouses and Parents of the Mentally Ill Speak Out.

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