The Gallery at NESCA

Andover Artist Shane Crabtree’s Work Displayed at NESCA

NESCA is committed to supporting the local arts community through our program of rotating exhibitions. Now on display are a number of encaustic paintings by Prominent Artist Shane Crabtree, whose pieces sometimes also incorporate collage and found objects.

Her work, iconic in nature and striking, has been featured in numerous galleries and shows throughout New England and hangs in several permanent collections.

The complex, multi-layered encaustic technique requires the use of a hot palette laden with molten beeswax and special damar crystals colored with powdered pigments, which are applied with brushes and set with a heat gun. Crabtree notes, “It is an application probably first seen in ancient Greece. I like using an ancient technique in making modern icons. It enhances the feeling of timelessness and adds reverence to the subject. I believe that the subject of one’s work should reveal itself in the making. The artist is informed of the content by how the work emerges. Titles announce themselves.”

Shane Crabtree is the sister of Robert Crabtree, founding partner of the Boston law firm Kotin, Crabtree & Strong, one of Massachusetts’ pre-eminent special education attorneys and, in 1972, principal author of Chapter 766, the Commonwealth’s ground-breaking law guaranteeing all young people with disabilities aged 3 -22 a free and appropriate educational program best suited to their individual needs.

Ruth Segaloff

We are pleased and proud to have on display a selection of Ruth Segaloff’s work, which has for us a special resonance given her long and compassionate involvement with children in crisis. For additional information, please visit her website: www.ruthsegaloff.com.

Having retired after thirty-eight years as a forensic social worker representing abused children in the Juvenile Courts, Watertown’s Ruth Segaloff has established a highly-successful second career as a collage and mixed-media artist.

She points out, “This is not as great a leap as one might imagine, since narrative is central to both and there has been renewed recognition of the healing power of story, both in the telling and the listening.” Her works, influenced not only by her professional experience but also by her service in VISTA, the domestic Peace Corps, tell stories, whimsical, often personal, sometimes political, but always deeply moving.

Ms. Segaloff polished her craft at Lesley University, the DeCordova Museum School, the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Mass College of Art, Metalwerx and The New Art Center. Her award-winning pieces have appeared in numerous juried and one-woman shows throughout Massachusetts.