The Luminary Artists of Rockland: Sari Dienes: A Virtual Presentation (via Zoom), with Rip Hayman and Barbara Pollitt of the Sari Dienes Foundation

Sari Dienes: A Virtual Presentation (via Zoom)
with Rip Hayman and Barbara Pollitt of the Sari Dienes Foundation

This lecture is part of RoCA’s new series: The Luminary Artists of Rockland
Thursday, April 22 at 7:00pm (a Q & A will follow the presentation)
Tickets: $10

Online registration is now CLOSED! To purchase a ticket and receive Zoom information for tonight's lecture, please call 845-358-0877. Thank you!

Sari Dienes’ life spans the 20th century with a 60-year career in art. She was not an artist restricted by any genre, including surrealist painting, colorful etchings and prints, rubbings, collage, sculpture, ceramics—even performance art—into her vast body of work.

Born in Hungary in 1898, she married Paul Dienes in 1922, and in 1930 studied art in Paris at the Academie Moderne with Leger, Ozenfant and Lhote. By 1936, she became Assistant Directress of Ozenfant Academie of Fine Arts in London, engaging sculptor Henry Moore, and teaching students Leonora Carrington and Stella Snead.

Sari arrived in New York City on a visit from England and was stranded on Sept. 3, 1939 the day Hitler invaded Poland. She began teaching and had her first solo show in 1942. From 1945-1959 her 57th Street loft was a great gathering place for artists and intellectuals from all fields; painters, printmakers, musicians, dancers, philosophers, critics, museum directors and poets all engaged in a brilliant exchange of ideas. This included Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Cy Twombly, Rachel Rosenthal, John Cage, Ray Johnson, Yoko Ono, Lawrence Cambell, Frank O’Hara, Louise Nevelsen, and many more.

In the '50s Sari developed her art during residencies at Cummington, Yaddo, McDowell, The Maitland Research Studio and the Huntington Hartford Foundation. She had 4 solo exhibitions at Betty Parson's Gallery. She was invited to document the petroglyphs of the Dalles River, Oregon in 1956 under archaeologist Mark Hedden and then spent two years in Japan before returning to New York.

In 1961, she settled at the Gate Hill (The Land) Cooperative in Stony Point, NY, a community of Black Mountain College artists including John Cage, Karen Karnes, David Tudor and M.C. Richards, Paul and Vera Williams, George Ancona, Stan and Johanna Vanderbeek, Roger Phenix and more. (see Mark Davenport’s blog on the Land Cooperative.)

She would divide her time between Gate Hill and the Ear Inn at 326 Spring Street, which she founded with Rip Hayman, and exhibited at the first women’s co-op, AIR gallery. Through the 70’s she was a member of Women In The Arts (WIA) and the NY Professional Women Artists collective started by Ce Roser: feminists dedicated to raising the profile of women artists. In the 80’s she was featured in People Magazine, and on Bill Moyer’s Creativity series. Sari worked until her death in 1992.

Her work is currently on view at the Whitney, MoMA, the Kunstmuseum Basel, and in the David Zwirner Gallery exhibition of “What a Dump” by Ray Johnson and friends.

About the Panelists

Rip Hayman met Sari Dienes in 1971 when he was a music student attending a concert of her longtime friend John Cage. Thus began a profound friendship, which included musical and performing collaborations; starting from adding live electronic sounds to her bottle sculptures, to “Soul Painting:” dancing with painted feet, a performance at the Kitchen in 1975—even traveling to India and China returning to perform “India Transformed” in 1976 at AIR and “Sounding the I Ching” at Samaya Foundation in 1983.

Hayman, now the owner of the landmark Ear Inn pub on Spring St. had invited Sari to be a housemate during her visits to New York City. They started the landmark pub and restaurant, a home to the avant-garde in all disciplines. She became the mentor to many young artists and bohemians, and entertained friendships with John Lennon, Carolee Schneemann, Stella Snead, Eyre Delanux, and Salvadore Dali to name a few.

Hayman assisted Dienes to establish The Sari Dienes Foundation, which represents her legacy of creativity and has developed her collection. He currently serves as Director of the Foundation.

Barbara Pollitt is an artist and teacher. She had a 25-year career in the NYC theater, as an Obie Award-winning performer, American Theater Wing and Drama Desk-nominated designer, and director of opera, theater and dance, and film, specializing in masks and puppetry.

She has been the curator for the Sari Dienes Foundation since 1990.

Important Zoom Information: Registration for all virtual events will close 5 hours before the program begins. Zoom invitations will be emailed 24 hours in advance of the program. If you don't receive an email with an invitation code, please check your spam folder or send an email to: dflanaganrca@aol.com.

The Luminary Artists of Rockland is made possible through a generous grant from M&T Bank and sponsorship from Kantrowitz, Goldhamer and Graifman, PC.

RoCA’s programs are made possible, in part, with funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. Funding is also made possible by the County of Rockland.