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Biography
The more ubiquitous the phenomenon, the more frequently unobserved. Indeed, stopping to smell the roses is something most of us rarely do - and it is a common bane of our post-modern, over-industrialized, and sadly, techno-dependent existence. Enter those sensitives like Lesta Summerfield Stacom, whose far-reaching contribution is just beginning to be known. Born in the early part of this century in Providence, Rhode Island, influenced - and influential - at an early age in a community of legends such as Louis Armstrong, George Wein, Hazel Scott, Gerry Mulligan (and many others), she was a contributor to a daily radio show discussing art, music, and politics in New England; partnered with Princess Yasmin Aga Khan to create the first Alzheimer's gala in New York City; chaired a Julliard Gala; and also served as a board member of the Jewish Museum of New York. At the age of 70, she met sculptor, artist, and professor Tony Coria, who revealed to her the magic of painting and her own, hitherto inchoate, gifts as a visual artist in her own right.
Thankfully, Summerfield's lifelong devotion to the Arts has added to some of our most inspirational gifts to contemporary visual arts. With a minimalist and unassuming, albeit poignant, vision nurtured by a universal bent of things natural, she depicts with subtle grace our usually under-represented connection to the untainted divinity Spirit has bequeathed upon us all: the awareness of our engagement in all that simply is - so long as we are open...Like flowers, we bloom together, we blossom. Summerfield reminds us to look to each other, into that ambiguous pool of Nature together, to that majesty we often forget.
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