Other Outstanding Members

It is not possible here to give all of them the space they deserve. Some have been presented earlier in this book in the sections on Presidents and Honorary Members. But attention must be given to a few others.

“Toast to Botero,” Watercolor

Dorothy Barberis: Honored Member 1996

Dorothy helped the Club in countless ways for over 25 years as a Member. She not only served as Historian, Dues Chair, and Painting Chair (twice), but was always willing to take on extra jobs and assist where help was needed. One of her strongest influences was her lively and constant urging that CLWAC move beyond largely traditional forms and be more accepting of newer concepts. Studying with Milford Zornes, Carl Molno, and Edgar Whitney, she was an original watercolorist, with her pictures often revealing her great sense of humor.

In the last years of her life she gamely undertook the initial planning for the Centennial Traveling Exhibition, an effort that demonstrated Dorothy’s energetic and enthusiastic support of CLWAC.

Naomi Campbell

Photo by Nino Celano

Naomi Campbell: Honored Member 2016

Naomi is an international interdisciplinary artist with outstanding work in a wide spectrum of studio and new-media art. In her two years as CLWAC’s Vice President for Painting, she was able to draw on her remarkable range of contacts in the art world.

Known primarily for her work that questions the identity of the individual in today’s ever increasing global culture, she communicates universal ideas about loss, meaning, and memory.

Naomi (born in Montreal, Canada) is a graduate of CEGEP de Champlain, Quebec, studied at the University of Guelph, Ontario, and at the School of Visual Arts and the New School in New York City. Naomi completed her studies in painting and printmaking at the Art Students League, New York. She now lives in New York City.

Permanent public collections featuring Naomi’s work include: the City of New York MTA Arts for Transit; the New York Public Library; the Art Students League; The New York State Museum, Albany; the Trenton City Museum, New Jersey; the City of Irving, Texas, and the Geochang Sculpture Park, South Korea. Her many commissions include work for the American Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, New York City and Florida; Maimonides Hospital, New York City; Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications Pan-Americas, New York City Head Office, and London International Advertising, New York and London. In addition, Naomi’s work has been included in many national and international exhibitions in museums and galleries, including the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Art in Japan.

She is a Signature Member of the National Watercolor Society, the Transparent Watercolor Society of America, the Pastel Society of America, and the American Society of Portrait Artists. She has garnered four medals of honor in national juried exhibitions and is an Elected Member of Audubon Artists of America, Allied Artists of America, Salmagundi Club, as well as CLWAC. Naomi has been invited to judge exhibitions in New York and across the United States, has lectured at many prominent art organizations and colleges, and since 2007 has been an Instructor of Fine Arts at the Art Students League. She has contributed articles to art journals and has been interviewed on television. Her work has appeared in many publications, such as the New York Times, the Daily News, Newsday, the Washington Post, Yomuri Shimbun, fine arts magazines, and over a dozen book publications. These include: Along the Way MTA Arts for Transit, Pure Color the Best of Pastel, Stroke of Genius II, Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in American Art, Who’s Who of American Women, Stroke of Genius, 100 Ways To Paint Your Favorite Subjects, Artistic Touch 4, and 100 Mid-Atlantic Artists.

Franke DeBevoise

Francine DeBevoise: Honored Member 2001

Since 1992, “Franke” proved an invaluable resource as CLWAC’s Historian, not only collecting quantities of material for the archives, but demonstrating a remarkable ability to delve into all those files and provide timely and helpful answers to frequent requests for information on the Club’s origins and history. Not only members, but many interested researchers outside CLWAC have benefitted from her help and knowledge.

Franke was an acclaimed portrait artist whose paintings draw attention to the personality and interests of the sitter, with backgrounds appropriate to the works. In addition to many commissioned portraits of distinguished judges and the President of Hartwick College, her alma mater, she became inspired to paint \and record the culture of Native Americans encountered at numerous powwows she attended with her late husband, Ken. Her solo exhibits included one in 2000 at Georgian Court College in Lakewood, New Jersey, featuring twenty-nine Native American paintings as well as ten other portraits.

At the Art Students League, Franke studied with E. Raymond Kinstler and William Draper. She was a member of the American Artists Professional League, Hunterdon Museum of Art, and a Life Member of the Art Students League. A winner of many awards, her work can be found in the permanent collections of the Robert Wood Johnson Museum of Frontier Medicine, San Angelo, Texas; numerous government buildings; colleges, and many private collections.

“Reesa,” Oil, 28” x 36”

Gabriela Dellosso

Gabriela Dellosso: Honored Member 2011

CLWAC was fortunate to have Gabriela as its Vice President for Painting from 2003 to 2005. Recognized as a most notable and compelling younger realist artist, she brought a high level of professional commitment to the exhibitions she oversaw, as well as demonstrating warm support for the Club.

Gabriela is a native New Yorker, growing up in Astoria, Queens. Her family tree includes both painters and poets. She was exposed to art at an early age with weekly trips to The Metropolitan Museum under the tutelage of her father. In middle school she received an award from Pepsi Cola for being an outstanding art student. She earned her BFA from the School of Visual Arts, after studying psychology at New York University. Further study at the Art Students League included instruction from Richard Pionk, Gregg Kreutz, and Harvey Dinnerstein. She also studied at the National Academy School of Fine Art, where she currently teaches. Work as an illustrator for several years enabled her to hone her skills.

Gabriela’s painting often focuses on strong and vital women in many guises, sometimes using herself or her mother as models, sometimes evoking historical references, paying homage to earlier artists who have paved the way. In other works she draws on well-known genre paintings, giving them a whimsical turn.

In the last decade Gabriela has garnered twenty-five major awards, including the Medal of Honor from CLWAC. Her first one-woman exhibition took place in 2006 at The Butler Institute of American Art, in Youngstown, Ohio. Her paintings have been shown widely in other prestigious museums and juried shows: the Allentown Art Museum, PA; Trenton City Museum, NJ; Katonah Museum of Art, NY; Pastel Society; Allied Artists of America; Art Students League of New York, and many others. Gabriela is represented by the Eleanor Ettinger Gallery in New York City, where she had a solo exhibition in 2008. Her work is in the permanent collections of the Butler Institute of American Art, OH; the New Britain Museum of American Art, CT; the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum, NJ; the Salmagundi Club, NYC; and the Springfield Art Museum, MO. Art publications continue to feature her work individually or with other notable artists. Fine Art Connoisseur, Artists Magazine, Pastel Journal, and Spectrum all recognize her stature.

“Sunflower and Hooper Cars”

Mary Lou Ferbert: Honored Member 1998

Mary Lou has been a loyal supporter of CLWAC and is a watercolorist of great distinction. Coming from a scientific background with a BA in Chemistry and two years of medical school at Drake University, and after working with the Cleveland Museum of Natural History’s Environmental Information Service for twenty years, she brings an acute eye to her painting. The juxtaposition of the natural and the manmade fascinates her. She has frequently painted wildflowers flourishing in industrial landscapes, representing an indomitable spirit of life.

She studied at the Cleveland Institute of Art, where she became an instructor in 1989. Her work is widely appreciated and, as the Curator of The Butler Institute of American Art stated: “Mary Lou Ferbert’s great gift...is the ability to enunciate a language of her own creation, expertly accomplished, that is not only of the highest aesthetic order, but is also understandable to her viewers.”

Molly Guion (1912-1982)

Molly was a noted portrait painter. In a forward to the catalog for her 1971 exhibition at the Grand Central Art Galleries, Ernest Watson, the founder and Editor of American Artist Magazine, said: “There are some excellent portrait painters in America, but I suppose the really distinguished of these can be counted upon the fingers of one hand. I count Miss Guion among this group.”

Born in New Rochelle, New York, Molly studied at the Grand Central Art School under Arthur Woelfle, life drawing at the Art Students League under George Bridgeman, and portraiture under Dimitry Romanovsky and Gregory Gluckman. While living in England she completed a series of twenty-five portraits of the Queen’s Guards, Earls, Knights of the Garter, and other notables, for which the Queen Mother requested a private viewing at Buckingham Palace. Guion’s portrait of Queen Elizabeth II is in the Mess Hall of the British Navy in Portsmouth, England.

Molly was represented by Grand Central Galleries and the Kennedy Galleries, and her work is in many collections in this country and abroad. She was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Art (London), as well as a Member ofthe American Artists Professional League, Allied Artists of America, and many other professional art groups.

“Sidewinder,” Bronze

Lucille Charlotte Hampton: Honored Member 1994

Lucille stands out especially as the sculptor who conceived the Creative Hands Award and provided the Club with the exquisite sculpture that is given each year to a Member or supporter of the Club who has contributed quietly, behind the scenes in invaluable ways. Lucille herself served the Club as Treasurer for many years. CLWAC was the first art organization to accept her work. It gave her encouragement to pursue her art, leading to wide recognition and a successful career. She early gained representation in the Kennedy Galleries and Grand Central Galleries, followed by many others. She received numerous commissions, continuing into her eighties, and her work is in the Nelson Rockefeller Collection. Although her sculpture is for the most part in the Western style, influenced by Remington, she was also commissioned to sculpt a Human Rights Medal for Pope John Paul.

“Great Hall, Grand Central Station,” Watercolor

Inge Jannen Heus: Honored Member 2002

Inge’s dedication to CLWAC spans so many years and involves so many aspects that it is almost impossible to convey all she has contributed, with her warm engagement and willingness to take on any task. She served five years as Catalog Chair and an unprecedented number of years as Treasurer. But her deep concern for the Club has been reflected in everything she has done, and in her storehouse of knowledge about the organization and its history. Her belief in the purpose and goals of CLWAC has led to her gracious but unflinching insistence that it adhere to its standards and carefully think through its objectives, thwarting many a potentially disastrous move.

Inge studied watercolor with Mario Cooper at the Art Students League and took workshops with many great teachers, such as Edgar Whitney, Carl Molno, Daniel Greene, and Richard Pionk. Her watercolor still lifes and landscapes, many of New York City, particularly Central Park and Grand Central Station, have won numerous awards.

Greta Kempton’s portrait of Harry S.Truman

National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution

Elaine Lavalle

Greta Kempton (1903-1991)

A native of Vienna, Greta received her early art instruction there and then traveled extensively and painted in Italy, France, and England. Upon coming to the United States, she studied with Stanley Dickinson at the National Academy of Art, and with George Bridgeman, at the Art Students League. Primarily a portraitist, she also painted landscape and genre subjects. Her work was shown at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, in Washington, D. C., and she was elected to the Royal Society of Arts, London, England.

In 1948 Kempton was asked to paint the official portrait of President Harry S. Truman, to hang in the White House, and she subsequently (in 1970) completed a second version, now in the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D. C.

Elaine Lavalle: Honored Member 2006

Elaine was elected an Artist Member of CLWAC in 1981 and to the Board in 1996. She served for three years as Vice Prsident for Sculpture, for five years as First Vice President, and for several years maintained the membership records. She remains an invaluable resource for the Club.

Growing up the daughter of a highly respected portraitist and watercolorist, John Lavalle, she received an early introduction to painting, not only on Saturdays at her father’s studio, but also at the Art Students League, studying anatomy with Robert Beverly Hale. Many years later, while helping her fifth-grade son with a clay project for school and borrowing a piece of clay, she created a perfect small portrait of her daughter. That discovery led her back to the Art Students League to study sculpture with John Hovannes and to the SculptureCenter to work with Frank Eliscu.

Having learned stone and slate carving, how to work in wax, to make molds of her pieces, and then to cast them in bronze in the small foundry she helped restore at the SculptureCenter, Elaine was asked to teach these techniques when Eliscu moved to Florida. She also assisted in the SculptureCenter Gallery and served on the Board of Trustees for fifteen years.

Feeling the need for a college degree, Elaine graduated magna cum laude from Fordham University, Lincoln Center, in 1986 with a degree in Art History. She followed that with graduate studies at New York University’s Fine Arts Institute.