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About two years ago, anticipating a visit to Susan Murphy, a little girl asked her mother, "Are we going to the art house?" Hearing about the child's question inspired the Sandy Spring watercolorist, teacher and gallery owner to change the name of her Falling Acorns Studio to ARThouse.
"All of a sudden I realized what a great name that would be," Murphy recalls, "because it's simple and describes the place perfectly."
At about the same time of the name change, Murphy opted to take additional measures that would make ARThouse "more of a real business." To start, she invited local artists "whose work I respected" to show at ARThouse. A few "good friends" — Peggy Duke, Michaele Harrington and Carol Zilliacus — were the first, and then she added a few more — Miche Booz, Jay Gartenhaus, Ted Kobrin and her son, Paul Colombini, "who has taken many wonderful photographs from his travels in Asia."
The circumstances are win-win, Murphy points out. The artists get a "good venue in which to show their art and gain the recognition they deserve. In turn, these artists provide me with inspiration, comradeship and greater recognition for ARThouse."
Murphy also established regular daily hours, and began offering services like custom picture framing, art classes, demonstrations and lectures. And her younger son Ben Colombini created "a beautiful and very functional" Web site (www.arthouseart.com).
Surprisingly, the recession has not had adverse effects on the gallery.
"Honestly, in spite of the generally bad economy," she says, "I would have to say that ARThouse is doing very well and is a growing business."
"So far," she adds, "my efforts have been successful and income from the business has doubled each year."
Many years prior to the emergence of Murphy's entrepreneurial spirit, the Connecticut native was the middle child of an elementary school teacher and an electrical engineer. She excelled in biology and art.
"The combination allowed me to both study nature and express its beauty," she says, recalling her art projects and experiments in her basement "lab."
At Syracuse University, Murphy majored in biology, expecting to "pick up art later in life." She worked in an Albert Einstein College of Medicine research lab where she and her husband met, then taught science.
Watercolors she saw at a street show inspired her return to art. Their painter, Barbara Nechis, became her teacher and "that launched my career. She was an excellent role model for me because she was doing art professionally, out of her house, while at the same time raising kids and keeping up a home."
The family's move to Maryland in 1979 for her husband's new job coincided with Murphy's decision to pursue a full-time career in art. Her success was imminent.
"Within the first two to three years, I had paintings accepted in several national juried shows, all in New York City, including the American Watercolor Society, Allied Artists of America and the Catherine Lorillard Wolfe Art Club," she says. "The paintings I was doing were unusual and kind of edgy. They were pictures of the construction rubble around the new housing development we had moved into."
Once her work was accepted into the Butler Institute of American Art's annual midyear show in 1982, Murphy accepted an invitation to join Bethesda's Capricorn Galleries, which was, she says, "considered at the time one of the foremost galleries in the nation for contemporary realism." Capricorn held two solo shows of her work.
From the outset, watercolors have been Murphy's medium of choice.
"I don't seem to get tired of this amazing medium, and still feel that I have not entirely mastered it, and have a lot to learn and do in watercolor," she says, observing that her science background "serves me well in understanding the complexities of the medium: stability of colors, granulation of the pigments, interaction with various additives."
Her style does vary.
"I have painted many different subjects over the years, as well as doing some non-objective abstraction," Murphy says. "I am inspired by things I see in the world. I see a great deal of beauty in the world, especially in nature, and like to try to capture it. However, I sometimes like to paint from my imagination or just create an interesting, often funky, abstract composition."
Murphy is busy with the business right now, preparing for a group show this weekend. As for her art, she is "embarking on a new series of paintings of essentially portraits of people at work or doing things that interest them." She plans to continue teaching painting "because of the positive interaction with all my students and the things they teach me."
This self-described "very lucky and happy person" has a long-range goal for her "labor of love and fulfillment" that is clear. Susan Murphy wants ARThouse to become "a serious destination for art collectors from all over the Washington area."
She built it, and is confident they will come.
Spring Show 2009, featuring the work of Miche Booz, Paul Colombini, Peggy Duke, Michaele Harrington, Jay Gartenhaus, Ted Kobrin, Susan Avis Murphy and Carol Zilliacus, is set for 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday at ARThouse, 17520 Doctor Bird Road, Sandy Spring. Call 301-774-3418, or visit www.SusanAvisMurphy.com.
This column is intended as a place to tap the pulse of some of the multitude of creative people and organizations that constitute Montgomery County's professional arts community and celebrate their achievements. Your comments and suggestions are welcome; e-mail ewexler@gazette.net.
