As part of the Town of Bovina’s Bicentennial Celebration, Brooke Alderson enlisted a group of ten local artists to create paintings of Bovina Landmarks. The artists were invited to paint their own interpretations of photographs of different Bovina buildings that are no longer in existence or have been altered. The resulting ten paintings were mounted on easels by Brooke and Scott Hill and were displayed throughout the hamlet during the Celebration at the site where the original structure stood (or still stands).
Over the next few months, I will be doing a series of entries highlighting the buildings and the paintings. The paintings are on display at the Bovina Public Library, where you can order prints of any that catch your fancy for $80, all proceeds going to the library. And stay tuned for an auction of the original works being planned for this fall.
Boyd Place, painted by
Lizbeth Firmin
It is not clear when this house
was built, but likely in the 1840s or 1850s. It was owned by James Gill and later by William Gladstone. For many years, it was owned by the Boyd family, starting with
Andrew and Ellen Boyd. Ellen lived in the house after the death of her husband
in 1879. After Ellen’s death in 1893, the house was rented out. In the 1890s at
one point, a gentleman named Samuel Ingles ran a barber shop there. The house
was sold in 1913 by Ellen’s grandson, Andrew J. Boyd, to newlyweds John and
Helena Hilson. They started the process to build a new home behind the Boyd
house, intending to demolish it. They had barely moved out of the house into
rooms nearby and arranged for the house’s demolition, when on June 6, 1916, the
house burned down. The local hook and ladder company were meeting not far away
and got to the fire quickly but focused mainly on ensuring adjoining properties
did not suffer the same fate. By January 1917, John and Helena were living in
their new home.
Lisbeth Firmin is a
contemporary American realist known for her urban landscapes. For over five
decades her work has been in hundreds of solo and group show across the country
and internationally. Honors and awards include inclusion in” “New Prints
2018/Winter, IPCNY, “2017 North American Print Biennial”, 2017 solo exhibition at University of North
Carolina, Chapel Hill, a 2017 Printmaking Residency @ Scuola Internazionale di
Grafica, Venice, Italy, Printmaking Residency
@ Tides Institute in Eastport ME (2016), a NYFA Fellowship (2007),
Pollock-Krasner Grant (1999), full fellowships to the MacDowell Colony,
National Seashore Residency, the Vermont Studio Center and Saltonstall Arts
Colony. Her paintings and prints are in several public collections including
the New York Historical Society, Provincetown Art Association & Museum,
Munson Williams Procter Arts Institute, Arnot Museum, Tides Institute and
Museum of Art, Fleming Museum, University of Texas, Cape Cod Museum, and
Hofstra University. Firmin moved from downtown NYC in 2000 to a small village
in upstate NY, where she paints every day.
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