John Verdi and Katherine Farrell Exhibiting at Hospice of the Chesapeake

John Verdi grew up in New York City, where he also attended college. He then moved to California for graduate school, eventually earning advanced degrees in Philosophy and Psychology. In 1975 he began teaching at St. John’s College in Santa Fe, New Mexico and eventually moved to its Annapolis campus. He spent his entire teaching career at St. John’s, teaching in its “great books” program.  After he retired in 2021 he began to study photography seriously. He has shown his work in many places, including the Maryland Federation of Art, Oxford (PA) Arts Alliance, Glen Echo Park, Hill Center at the Old Naval Hospital, and elsewhere. One of his works was purchased by Anne Arundel Community College for its permanent collection. He and his wife live in Annapolis and have two grown children.

Artist Statement 

It was when I retired after 46 years of teaching college that I took up photography seriously.  Most of my work is digital, but I have also spent some time with black and white film. What drew my interest to photography (and to visual art in general) is my conviction that paying attention to what one sees can provide us with new ways of seeing and open doors to new ways of being. I have always been interested in perception, attention, noticing, and language. My senior thesis in college explored some philosophical foundations of perception. My dissertation in graduate school was on J. L. Austin, a philosopher who studied the connection between seeing and language. I also wrote a book on Ludwig Wittgenstein, Fat Wednesday: Wittgenstein on Aspects, another foray into the intricacies of seeing and speaking.

My photos are eclectic, which means they fall into several groups. I especially enjoy street photography. In the show some examples are “Parallel Lives,” “Bullies,” and “The Butcher of Bari.” I’m also interested in striking architectural motifs, for example, “In a Museum” and “Window, Dijon FR.” There are also several pictures that ought to puzzle the viewer, such as “Newton’s Pendulum,” “Good Fences,” and “Flow.” Some of the photos are of works of art. “The Eternal Feminine (Venus at the Met) and “Hunger” are examples.

I mostly do not stage my photos. Rather I want to use the camera to see better. That is, for me the camera is a tool for paying attention. I try to let subjects find me, rather than the other way around. Photography has helped me become more appreciative of all kinds of art. After I curated a show on “outsider artists” who use photography in their work, I became more interested in outsider art in whatever form it took. I’m delighted that the Maryland Federation of Art has given me the opportunity of displaying my work at the Hospice of the Chesapeake. I hope you find something in it that freshens your mind and your eye.

I was born and raised in Ireland where I first was exposed to art at the Crawford School of Art where I took drawing and watercolor classes. I had admired some oil paintings in the museum attached  to the school but was disappointed that oil painting classes were not offered. Art took a back seat while I trained as a doctor. I came to Maryland for post-graduate education. I raised three girls and worked as a public health physician for the State of Maryland for 34 years.

I always loved art and took evening oil painting classes with James Adkins in the ‘90s. On retirement I finally had time to seriously develop my skills. I was trained in the classical tradition under Peter Collier and others at Howard Community College for ten years, where I made five art study abroad trips to France and organized a painting trip to Ireland for Peter and his students.

Art education never ends so in addition to workshops with Theresa Oaxaca and Luis Alvarez Roure, I studied at Maryland Institute College of Art with Professor Duane Lutsko for several years,  and also took classes at Winslow Art Center with David Mensing, Joseph Gyursak and Bernard Delarrio and at Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art with Kassem Ammoudi and Al Gury.

My favorite medium is oil but in recent years I have worked in gouache especially while traveling. I paint from mainly from direct observation, and have received awards for my plein air and still life work. I had successful fundraiser art sales for Grassroots of Howard County and have used my art in support of numerous non profits.   In addition to my studio, I show my art in various shows, mostly in Maryland (see Events) but also in At the Top Gallery in Mill Valley, California in 2019 and at University College Cork, Ireland in 2016

 I have a studio in Ellicott City Maryland named Sheebeen Busy (after a remark by a visitor). I live in Ellicott City, and my husband Bernard and I have three daughters and four grandchildren.

Artist Statement 

Katherine fell in love with painting early in life and returned to it late. She loves the rich lusciousness of oil paint and the immediacy of sketching in gouache. Her training is as an observational painter but she extends her vision to create works that extend beyond traditional realism in still life, figurative work, and landscape to include imagined or whimsical elements, odd perspectives and celebrations of color. Her enthusiasm as an alla prima painter has called her to tackle diverse subject matter, but plein air painting as a process and a challenge is what she returns to again and again. She interprets the world as a unique experience whether the subject is a forest, a city waterfront, a rusting tractor, or a simple floral arrangement. She invites you to share her vision and see beauty and whimsy everywhere.