For almost ten years RAFFL, the Rutland Area Farm and Food Link, has been promoting locally produced foods and farms to bolster the region’s agricultural economy.
Now RAFFL is teaming up with the Chaffee Art Center for a first ever Farm and Food Art exhibit.
Headlining the show are painters Amy Mosher and Betsy Hubner.
Margaret Barros, Executive Director of the Chaffee Art Center, said when you stand in front of artist Amy Mosher’s paintings of pigs - you almost find yourself looking for a spider webs. “If you’re familiar with “Charlotte’s Web,” its like Wilbur is just staring out at you from every one of the paintings,” said Mosher.
Amy Mosher and Betsy Hubner’s images of barnyard animals, silos and farm fields are sometimes playful, sometimes serene.
Barros points to a large portrait of a sheep, one of her favorites of the exhibit. She says artist Betsy Hubner often uses a pallet knife instead of a brush and Barros says it creates a wonderfully complex blending of colors. “And when children come to the gallery and I’m with them,” says Barros, “I encourage them to get up as close as they can so they can see the violet and green and the black and the blue and the purple. . . that when they’re standing twenty feet away they just see the sheep. You can almost feel Betsy moving the paint when you stare at it. It’s just so moving.”
In addition to the paintings, the exhibit includes a collection of black and white photographs by students at Green Mountain College titled, A Day in the Life of a Vermont Farmer and a series of posters highlighting the nationwide farm to food movement. Rutland’s Farm and Food Art Show runs through August 11 at the downtown Chaffee Art Gallery.