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‘from SCRAP’: Powers’ Art is Shredded, Torn and Reborn

Her notable art has prodded social commentary on issues ranging from gun control to body-covering burkas, but when Connecticut artist Dorothy Powers moved to Guilford, she probably wasn’t expecting her next conscious-raising series to be inspired by taking out the trash.

On Sunday, Sept. 13, Dorothy will discuss her newest mixed-media series, from SCRAP, during an open house at the Carriage House at Women & Family Life Center (WFLC), 96 Fair Street. The free exhibit is part of the Shoreline ArtSpace Series and will be on display at Carriage House through Sept. 30. Shoreline ArtSpace Series is a collaborative art exhibition between Shoreline Arts Alliance and local town governments, other nonprofits, and community businesses.

Based in New Haven for decades, Dorothy decided to “downsize” about 3 ½ years ago, she says. With many artistic acquaintances and peers in this town, she chose Guilford as her new home. Shortly thereafter, Dorothy became aware of an issue that soon became an inspiration.

“I was dumbfounded at the amount of trash I used to have to run to the dumpster with a one-person household, so I started saving it,” says Dorothy. “What I started to do is collect trash from the kitchen, paper towels, cereal boxes...then junk mail and newspapers, empty toilet paper rolls, you name it.”

Dorothy felt she could make the trash into some sort of a social statement, but the incredible transformation of that trash into art surprised even the artist, herself.

“When I was working with it, I became interested in the different sorts of surface textures I could create, which I had never done before,” says Dorothy. “So it was the differences that came to me as something I didn’t know I would experience.”

Shredded, torn, or otherwise reborn, each piece was built by gluing hundreds of tiny bits of scrap to a flat matte surface. The resulting forms were then covered with metallic paints in hues ranging from deep green to dusky seafoam green, from to bright red to shades of copper, purple, silver, and blue.

“I used metallic paints because I’m interested in catching the light against the flat matte surfaces,” says Dorothy, who also was inspired by her local surroundings to include some natural material, in the form of compiled, painted salt marsh grass, as an “environmental statement” for some of her pieces.

A focal point of her Carriage House exhibit, Midnight, evokes silver-blue swirling skies with a dreamy, raised surface that somehow looks liquid.

“That’s all used paper towels,” Dorothy says of the piece, which is also the only one to have been available for public viewing to date (shown at River Street Gallery in New Haven).

All of the other pieces were created in Guilford and are being shown this month for the first time anywhere, including a set of colorful “totems” hanging in tandem. It’s also Dorothy’s first shoreline exhibit.

“I’ve never ever brought my work out here,” she says. “I love that it’s at this organization, because women’s issues are very important to me.”

One of her most recognizable and thought-provoking series, black and white renderings of The Women, is in the permanent collection of Bridgeport’s Housatonic Museum of Art. The series came about in 2006, after Dorothy won the prestigious Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant. That major international grant allowed her to “invest in my work,” she says.

“I really started off by looking at the plight of women in the Middle East and then it spilled over, and I realized the plight of women all over the world, including the United States, is a problem,” says Dorothy. “So I used the burka as a symbol. And I didn’t want to offend anyone’s religion or political views, so my interest turned to the health of the women that wore them.”

Dorothy discovered the body-and-face-covering garments can deter pregnancy, add to depression, and cause a lack of vitamin D, among other issues.

“A group of Yale School of Nursing graduates came to see it at Art Space [in New Haven], and the conversation that took place over women’s health was amazing,” says Dorothy.

With from SCRAP, Dorothy is hoping to inspire viewers to “be aware of the trash that we dispose of and take for granted, and hopefully try to cut down on our carbon footprints,” she says.

Dorothy attended the Hartford Art School at the University of Hartford, the Paier College of Art in Hamden, and Creative Arts Workshop in New Haven. She’s been a guest instructor, adjunct instructor, guest lecturer, and artist-in-residence (including at Connecticut Hospice from 1991 to ‘98) for more than 30 years, with her work exhibited throughout Connecticut and beyond. In addition to the Housatonic Museum of Art, Dorothy’s work hangs in the permanent collection of the New Britain Museum of American Art and has been exhibited at the Brooklyn Museum in New York, among many other venues. Her work is also part of several corporate and private collections.

“I think that if any artist’s work has value, it’s in exposing our thoughts and feelings about this, so that it makes people stop and think, ‘What else is there?’ If we can do that, that’s enough,” says Dorothy.

When looking back on the work that produced From Scrap, Dorothy comments, “I realized through this process how much waste material we all use on a daily basis. By being more aware, it has helped me to lighten my carbon footprint. Artists worldwide are giving junk a new purpose by turning it into innovative art which will continue to be an inspiration for new work to come.”

Dorothy Powers’s exhibit from SCRAP will be on view during an Artist’s Reception Sunday, Sept. 13, from 3 to 5 p.m., with a brief artist’s talk at 4 p.m., at the Carriage House at Women & Family Life Center, 96 Fair Street, Guilford. Admission is free. Exhibit hours through Sept. 30 at Carriage House Gallery are by appointment; to schedule a visit call 203-458-6699.