Life & Art

Saturday, May 24, 2025 – Sunday, June 29, 2025

A retrospective of work by Ed Epstein

Forty three years ago, in 1982, I put together a “premature retrospective” of my work at the Wood Art Gallery in Montpelier. Now, at the age of 88, I see this show as, finally, a true and “mature” retrospective. You may know me as an artist, a musician, a boat-builder, a granite engraver, an illustrator, a stove-maker or that old guy riding my bike around Montpelier.

As an artist and musician, I’ve always been on the move from one world to another, and back, allotting my time and energies as best I could to the demands of life, my love of music, and urge to build and create things. Looking back, I see my work as a travelogue, a diary, of my life’s journey, and an ongoing experiment with a variety of media.
I’ve used pencils, charcoal, pastels, watercolor, acrylic and oil paint, etching plates, scratchboards, chosing the media because it met a practical need – it seemed to work in my situation and it suited my subject.
I’ve recorded the places I’ve been…Cape Cod, Tuscany, Sicily, Spain, Vermont, New York City, the Caribbean, Venice, Greece, Trinidad — and painted and sketched the scenes and people I’ve encountered along the way. Musicians “at work,” boats and buildings, streams and shorelines, flowers and trees, people acting naturally or posing for a portrait – all have caught my eye.