By Anne W. Semmes
Last Saturday the showing of art returned to the Cos Cob Library’s new exhibit space.
The room was filled with light and art devotees including a number of Greenwich Pen Women members as the featured artist, Margaret Esmé Simon, is a Pen Women member. Her paintings on display were a mix of still life’s and portraits exhibiting expertise gathered over 18 years of learning and practice.
But from the age of five Simon shared she began studying art in her New York City schools, graduating from Cornell University where she met her husband-to-be David Weisbrod, the new chair of Greenwich’s BET. Simon would study architecture with a master’s in architecture from Columbia University, then serve as an architect for years. But In 2008 she left her architecture career behind to work full time with her art.
During Covid she spoke of having Zoom classes from New York’s Art Student League, with one resulting pastel painting present, “Portrait of Sheba.” “Faces fascinate me,” she told, “so I do focus on them. I hope to convey something of the person in the image I paint.”
Other works – still life’s featuring silver pitchers and copper tea kettles had especial glows about them. She noted, “My art is primarily realistic with occasional abstract infusion. I love geometry; thus, squares and diamond shapes sometimes appear.”
She was happy with the Cos Cob Library’s new frontal exhibit space. “The previous room was in the back of the building,” she told, “and this new room is a beautiful space.”
One of Simon’s still life paintings featured a “Italian Canister on French Wine Boxes.”
It brought to mind her shared recent travel to Florence with her husband. So, how had that Italian art resonated with her? “I would love to have been a fly on the wall during the Renaissance.” And a takeaway she shared. “A key thing I learned in Italy was to slow down. To appreciate ‘un bel quadro’ (a beautiful painting), to spend at least five minutes looking at it. Enjoy it.”
