Evelyn Brody

Long Story Short:

I am a pastel artist, living in Chicago, with Pastel Society of America (PSA) Signature Status, Chicago Pastel Painters (CPP) Distinguished Signature Status, and Master Circle status with the International Association of Pastel Societies (IAPS).  My pieces focus on usually-unremarked private moments in public interiors – most often, in buses and subways, museums, and restaurants. When the Covid pandemic arrived in 2020, I enjoyed spending most of my art-making time in Zoom figure drawing sessions, but am glad now to have resumed in-person life drawing and classes as well. (In the image titles in the Zoom Alla Prima Gallery, “NODG” is the New Orleans Drawing Group and “S&S” is Silhouette and Shadow.)

In 2018 "The Venus Minuet" juried into the PSA, where it won an award and traveled to hang in a 10-week exhibition of works chosen from the PSA show in the country's only dedicated pastel gallery, at the Butler Museum of Art, Youngstown, Ohio. I’ve juried into five PSA shows and won two PSA Awards — and “On the Town” was selected for the Butler’s exhibit of work from the 2023 PSA show.

I am grateful to the Old Town Art Center, in Chicago, for my first solo show (October 30-November 20, 2018); to the McCord Gallery in Palos Park, Illinois, for my first joint show with my husband, Jack Siegel (September 27-October 31, 2019; and to the NUPOC Gallery (at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine’s Prosthetics-Orthotics Center) for hosting an initially-scheduled two-month exhibit of seven of my large pastels (scheduled for March-April 2020 but extended through June 2021 due to the coronavirus). In Spring 2022, “My Woman from Tokyo” earned an Honorable Mention in the Portrait & Figure category of the 23rd Annual Pastel 100, published by the Pastel Journal — and was selected as the promotional image for the call for entries run by Artists Magazine for the 24th Pastel 100.

Process:

When I’m not drawing from life, I usually work from multiple iPhone candid photos, which I combine and adapt in preparatory black-and-white sketches and watercolor studies to arrive at my composition.  My life-drawing and live-portrait regimen is essential to turning my “street” photography into paintings.  My favorite way to start a pastel is to draw with Inktense pencils on a Multimedia Artboard Pastel Panel – when hit with a wet brush, the marks explode into vivid colors on the bright-white gritty surface.  For examples of this underpainting technique and other approaches, see the “Process” gallery of this website. 

How I Got Here:

I was a long-time law school academic and tax lawyer when, in 2011, I received a box of pencils from my wonderful husband, Jack Siegel, as a birthday gift, after he came across my high school sketchbook.  After decades exercising only the left side of my brain, I had a lot to learn about how to express my non-verbal thoughts and ideas.

Fortunately, living in Chicago offers a wealth of artistic resources for a later-in-life amateur artist.  I am grateful to my dedicated life-drawing instructor, Jim Hajicek, at the venerable Palette and Chisel Academy, and to my extraordinary pastel instructor, Kathleen Newman, who teaches at the Old Town Triangle Association. In 2019 I retired from teaching to focus full-time on art.

The Chicago Pastel Painters offers events, companionship, and an annual juried exhibition (alternating between a national and a members show). In 2014, I juried into my first CPP show with "Cool Rays" (Prismacolor Award).  In 2015, "Elevenses" and "Scotch & Soda," were accepted into CPP's biennial national show; "Enlightenment" and "Blue Bus" (Prismacolor Award) juried into the 2016 CPP member show.  With acceptances in three CPP juried shows, I achieved CPP Signature Status. "Aux Merveilleux" and "Madonna of the Tate" (Diane Townsend/Prismacolor Award) juried into the 2017 national show. Awards in three CPP shows earned me CPP-Distinguished Signature Status. “Sunday on the 1 Train” and “When in French” juried into the 2018 CPP member show. “The Venus Minuet” and “Tyger, Tyger” (Great American ART WORKS Award) juried into the 2019 national show. “My Woman from Tokyo” and “Deux Soeurs dans les Deux Magots” juried into the 2020 (online) member show, where the former received an honorable mention award. CPP returned to physical shows in 2021: “Breathless” was included in the 2021 national show; “Gazelle Lost in Thought” appeared in the 2022 member show; and “The Gray Lady” was accepted into the 2023 (online) national show.

The Pastel Society of America accepted "When in French" into its 45th Annual Exhibition: Enduring Brilliance! (available at http://www.pastelsocietyofamerica.org/45th-annual-pastel-exhibition/).  In 2017 the Pastel Society of America granted my application for Associate Membership; in 2018 the PSA granted me Signature Membership.  "The Venus Minuet" juried into the PSA's 46th annual exhibition, where it won the Pastel Journal Award -- and was selected, with other works in the show, to hang from mid-December 2018 through mid-March 2019 in the pastel gallery of the Butler Museum of Art in Youngstown, Ohio. “Sunday on the 1 Train” hung in the 2019 PSA’s 47th annual Enduring Brilliance! exhibition. The PSA accepted “Tyger, Tyger” into the virtual 2021 show, and in 2022 “Joyeux Noël” won the Wholesale Frame Company Award in the PSA’s 50th Annual Exhibition, back in the National Arts Club. “On the Town,” included in the 2023 exhibition (online), was selected to travel to the Butler for its PSA show running January-February 2024. In 2020, “The Venus Minuet” juried into the Pastel Society of the West Coast’s 34th Annual Pastels USA International Open Exhibition, online due to the coronavirus.

The International Association of Pastel Societies organizes both online and physical juried exhibitions. My work has been accepted into three online shows: “When in French” (2017), “The Riddle of the Louvre” (2018), and “The Venus Minuet” (images available at http://www.iapspastel.org). In 2019, “Sunday on the 1 Train” traveled in June to Albuquerque, for the juried exhibition held in conjunction with the biannual IAPS convention. With the acceptance of “Loop Bound” (2019) into the 2021 Open Exhibition (in Chicago), I achieved IAPS Master Circle status. “Roar of the Greasepaint” juried into the 2022 Master Circle Division of the show at the first post-Covid convention in Albuquerque.

My first solo show, “Suspended Animation,” ran from October 30-Nobember 22, 2018, at the Old Town Art Center, in Chicago. My photographer husband and I hung a month-long joint show, “I’m Glad You See It My Way,” at the McCord Gallery in Palos Park in October 2019. “Pause Play” a particularly aptly named exhibit of seven large pastels, originally scheduled to hang In March-April 2020 at the NUPOC Gallery (at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine’s Prosthetics-Orthotics Center), was extended through June 2021 due to the coronavirus. “The Venus Minuet” tied for the People’s Choice Award in the Old Town Art Center’s February 2022 show “Love: In Real Life.”

Artists are generous with their time, talent and wisdom, and I have been fortunate to have had the opportunity to take workshops or classes from (in alphabetical order) Lyn Asselta, Steven Assael, Mat Barber Kennedy, Michael Barlow, Gwenneth Barth-White, Clayton Beck, Sandra Burshell, Janet Cook, Bill Creevy, Doug Dawson, Lenin Delsol, Margaret Dyer, Ellen Eagle, Dawn Emerson, Richard Halstead, Jean Hirons, Bill Hosner, Casey Klahn, Karen Margulis, Andrew McDermott, Richard McKinley, Nancie King Mertz, Cuong Nguyen, Desmond O'Hagan, Susan O’Neill, Aline Ordman, Diane Rappisi, Corey Pitkin, Clarence A. Porter, William Schneider, Colette Odya Smith, Rae Smith, Sally Strand, Kitty Wallis, and Jimmy Wright.

In our Zoom life drawing world, starting in 2020, my special thanks go to Sandra Burshell for opening up her New Orleans Drawing Group, to the world — it has grown to a real family of (mostly) pastelists, and produced an online (2022) and hybrid physical-online show (2023). Chicago’s own model extraordinaire Whitney Masters created www.silhouetteandshadow.org, a consortium of live sessions and library images by models in the United States and abroad.

Best of all, I've enjoyed becoming a part of an exciting artistic community.  I now serve on the board of directors and as secretary of the Chicago Pastel Painters, and am the treasurer of the Chicago chapter of the Urban Sketchers.

Print and Online Appearances:

I’m delighted to have my work appear in the following:

“My Woman from Tokyo” (Pastel, 2019, 38”H x 26”W), appears in the Honorable Mentions, Portrait & Figure Category (Alain Picard, Juror), of the 23rd Annual Pastel 100, Pastel Journal, at p. 63 (Spring 2022).

Pas à Pas: Evelyn Brody, Dimanche dans le Train, Pratique des Arts no. 147 Supplement Pastel, pp. xiv-xv (August-September 2019) (step-by-step demo, with my photos and narration translated into French and edited by Stephanie Portal, of the creation of “Sunday on the 1 Train” (Pastel, 2018, 27"H x 19"W)). With permission I’m posting the 2-page spread here; the supplement is available at https://en.divertistore.com/beaux-arts/nouveautes-beaux-arts/cahier-special-pastel-n-53-les-laureats-de-l-exposition.html.

Barbara Moline, Meet the Member: Evelyn Brody, Wild Onion: Chicago Pastel Painters Newsletter, pp. 2-3 (Summer 2019).

Kathleen Newman’s Drawing as Meditation, Pastel Journal, pp. 18-23 (December 2018), includes two of my continuous-line jazz-musician sketches.

Many thanks to my tax-professor buddies for their shout-out for my artwork! See Sam Brunson’s posts at https://surlysubgroup.com/…/11/11/evelyn-brody-in-the-gall…/ and at https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/nonprofit/2020/03/brody-pause-play.html; and Paul Caron's post at https://taxprof.typepad.com/…/evelyn-brody-tax-prof-artist.….

Finally, I’m thrilled to have been the Featured Artist on the Pastel Society of America’s Facebook page from March 21-April 13, 2020; the write-up and images are available at: https://www.facebook.com/groups/Pastelsocietyofamerica/permalink/3385931594753650/. After the January 12, 2023 online session of the New Orleans Drawing Group, I was the guest artist, speaking about my studio, Zoom, and in-person life-drawing processes.

Photo References:

To see Jack Siegel’s photos (taken in 2015) of me at work in my studio, go to http://www.jacksiegelphoto.com/#!/portfolio/C0000WUFOPxUva_I/G0000XYb2fchQnXs.

The second photo on the right shows Jack's photo of me furiously at work on a 7' x 5' charcoal on the last day of the New York Studio School's June 2016 Drawing Marathon (click on this image for his blog post).  Thanks to Graham Nickson and crew for a horizon-expanding and exhausting two weeks!

The first photo on the right is of a 15-minute (really!) portrait of me by the amazing Rita Kirkman during her demo "Quick-Draw Portraits" at the 2017 IAPS Convention.  Thanks for selecting me (at random!), Rita, and for permitting me to post this.

Contact:

You can reach me by email at evelynbrody@iCloud.com and find me on Facebook. Thanks for looking!    

Top: 15-Minute Portrait by Rita Kirkman (2017)

Below: Last day at the New York Studio School Drawing Marathon (2016) (photo by Jack Siegel)