Family Tradition

Kathy Shumway-Tunney follows in the footsteps of her ancestors, painting the likes of Anna Quindlen, Peter Kann and others.

By: Susan Van Dongen

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Self Portrait by Kathy Shumway-Tunney


   Just as a forensic artist makes pictures from physical evidence, pastel artist Kathy Shumway-Tunney creates portraits of people using psychological clues. Her paintings try to convey the subject’s personality, even inner qualities and essence.
   "I do like doing portraits," Ms. Shumway-Tunney says. "It’s something I’ve always felt comfortable with. I’ve enjoyed people’s personalities and I’m able to capture them. It takes a particular knack to feel you’ve made contact with a person, and that’s when their essence comes through."
   The veteran artist will show a pastel self-portrait, one of dozens of works on view at the spring show of the New Jersey chapter of the American Artists Professional League. Hosted by the Bordentown Gallery and juried by award-winning artist and College of New Jersey professor emeritus Charles McVicker, the exhibit runs through May 14, with a reception April 10.
   The gallery, founded in May 2002 by John Schroeder, showcases painting, photography and sculpture from artists throughout the Northeast. This will be the first collaboration between the Bordentown Gallery and the NJ-AAPL. The group exhibited at the Noyes Museum in Oceanville in March 2004.
   Ms. Shumway-Tunney chaired both shows. A NJ-AAPL officer and board member, she lives in a cozy home in Chesterfield decorated with her original art, as well as a few precious items, such as a sculpture by Frederic Remington and an unusually colorful work by N.C. Wyeth. There’s a spacious backyard and a brand new studio built into an old barn on the property. She can’t wait to get out there and start working.
   But with monsoon-like rains drumming on the roof, Ms. Shumway-Tunney is happy to be ensconced in her dining room, talking about her work, the exhibit and the history of the organization.
   The AAPL formed in New York in the 1920s, in an effort to protect the interests of American-born artists. At the time, art patrons in the United States were enamored with all-things European and the immigration boom at the turn of the century brought an abundance of foreign-born talent to this country. Many European painters headed to Washington, D.C., to compete for commissions to create official portraits of our nation’s leaders.
   The original members of the AAPL felt American artists were being neglected and persuaded the U.S. Senate to attach a rider to a Congressional bill, which specified that all official portraits, paid for with taxpayer money, were to be painted by American artists.
   The New Jersey chapter of the AAPL was incorporated in 1975 to boost opportunities for artists and exhibits in the Garden State, frequently overshadowed by nearby New York.
   "We incorporated as a separate entity since we always seemed to be the stepchild of New York," Ms. Shumway-Tunney says. "For example, we weren’t having any state organization exhibits. It always seemed like you had to go to New York to exhibit, because that’s where the New York organization was having the shows. So, this chapter formed 30 years ago to promote New Jersey artists in their own right. One of our purposes is to try and find exhibit opportunities in the state.
   "It’s difficult for an individual artist to approach a museum so with an organization, we have the clout and the membership — a little over 100 — to fill a gallery," Ms. Shumway-Tunney continues. "(The shows) are sometimes in South Jersey, sometimes they’re in the north, and this one is right in the center of the state."
   The NJ-AAPL is a juried organization with a couple of requirements — members need to be 18 or older and they must be professional artists, not hobbyists. Unlike other well-known New Jersey organizations, which restrict their membership to use of medium, the NJ-AAPL welcomes all visual art mediums, but restricts the interpretation to representational works.
   Ms. Shumway-Tunney recalls drawing and painting as a child, as soon as she could hold a pencil or brush in her hand.
   "That’s what you did in my family," she says.
   Among the numerous talented people in her family was her paternal grandfather, Harvey J. Shumway — the architect who designed the canals of Ventnor, the seaside resort just south of Atlantic City. Her mother was an especially gifted young artist who, as a high school girl, was recruited by Disney Studios, but chose to remain in New York and attend Pratt Institute.
   Most interesting is the family connection with Pablo Picasso.
   "My European ancestors trace back to Picasso, through my maternal grandmother," Ms. Shumway-Tunney says. "Her maiden name was Blasko and Picasso’s father’s name was José Ruiz Blasco — they spelled it with a ‘c.’ Picasso never got along very well with his father, so he took to his mother and adopted her maiden name instead."
   Ms. Shumway-Tunney majored in art at Mt. Saint Dominic Academy and Caldwell College, both in Caldwell, and also studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Master classes with two internationally known portraitists followed. She worked with Nelson Shanks, known for his realizations of the late Pope and the late Princess Diana, and Everett Raymond Kinstler, who has created likenesses of President Clinton, James Cagney and Katharine Hepburn among many others.
   "I like to call (Mr. Kinstler) my muse," Ms. Shumway-Tunney says. "His style is very different from Shanks’, whose work is so incredibly real. You want to walk up to it and touch it. Whereas Kinstler’s work is very expressionistic. But he has the ability to catch a personality and make them breathe. I think my sensitivity falls right in the middle between these two men."
   The method for commissioning her pastel portraits is a deliberate process. Ms. Shumway-Tunney likes to meet with her subjects, interviewing them about exactly what they want but also using the "face time" to probe their psyches.
   "I always try to do a live interview with the subject," she says. "The initial meeting is an exploration of the subject’s personality, as well as a session to plan the size, pose, background and lighting."
   Ms. Shumway-Tunney mostly works from her own photographs, taken in the subject’s home or business, where she feels the people are more relaxed.
   Some of her more recent commissions include Peter Kann, president and CEO of Dow Jones; Dr. George Gallup Jr., chairman of the Gallup International Institute; Richard Billotti, publisher of the Times of Trenton, and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Anna Quindlen. (She didn’t have the opportunity to meet Ms. Quindlen in person, however).
   Ms. Shumway-Tunney came to central New Jersey from Caldwell about 20 years ago, meeting her husband in community theater, marrying and settling in Bordentown. They moved to Chesterfield in 2001. While in Bordentown, she befriended the late Juanita Crosby, an artist and local legend in the riverside town.
   "Juanita was the ‘art lady’ in town," Ms. Shumway-Tunney says. "For 50 years, almost everyone took art lessons from her and she had the first and only art gallery in Bordentown. Then Eric Gibbons bought it and kept it going, then C.J. Mugavero opened the Artful Deposit and now John Schroeder has his gallery. With this exhibit, it’s helping the Bordentown Gallery get more recognition and it’s also giving our membership an opportunity to exhibit in a new place. With all these aesthetically oriented shops and things opening, Bordentown is progressing along the lines of Lambertville and New Hope. That’s what I’m hoping for."
The New Jersey chapter of the American Artists Professional League exhibits its spring members-only show, including a pastel self-portrait by Kathy Shumway-Tunney, at the Bordentown Gallery, 204 Farnsworth Ave., Bordentown, through May 14. Opening reception: April 10, 3-6 p.m. Gallery hours: Wed.-Thurs., Sat. noon-5 p.m. Fri. noon-8 p.m. or by appointment. For information, call (609) 298-5556. On the Web: www.bordentowngallery.com