By Eliza Ridgeway
 Agnes Derbin-Caulfield and Darcy Fowkes, both of Los Altos, display their self-portraits on exhibit during “Menopause The Musical.” |
Los Altos artists Agnes Derbin-Caulfield and Darcy Fowkes have the unusual privilege of being celebrated for their advancing ages, as participants in the “40 x 40″ art exhibit premiering Friday at Pier 39 in San Francisco.
Forty local women will “out” themselves as over-the-hill in this celebration of life after 40, which coincides with the San Francisco premiere of “Menopause The Musical.” Each woman submitted a self-portrait and a 50-word meditation on herself.
“Women over 40 don’t really discuss (their age), and don’t have all-women shows. I liked the idea of mature women hanging out,” Derbin-Caulfield said.
“The works weren’t all positive, and were amazingly intense,” Fowkes said. Portraits by local artists become part of the permanent “40 x 40″ art exhibit, which accompanies the musical in the major markets.
“You’re opening yourself up to the public, for better or worse,” Derbin-Caulfield said. After getting a degree in art, she worked in galleries and with artists before returning to her own painting. She specializes in landscapes, so this portrait project offered an unusual opportunity.
“I started off with an idealized photograph, said, ‘The heck with that,’ and got a small mirror out,” Derbin-Caulfield said. “I wanted to isolate (the portrait) from everything around me, be an observer looking through a small window. It’s not quite a mug shot, but it is a subversion of the standard portrait, where you go to Sears and they pull down a backdrop.”
In her portrait, Derbin-Caulfield’s face looks out at the viewer from a flowing, fiery background, with light playing along her left cheek and brow.
“I wanted a little heat,” she said. “It’s like Dante’s Inferno, with energy and heat from behind. It’s a little bit unnerving - with only the face you have no information, nothing is a given, you have to really figure out what is going on. This was a change, to take a look at myself.”
Fowkes creates fabric art, and her portrait features a photo nestled between two lush, golden, high-button boots, against a woody brown fabric background. Artichokes, cornhusks, mushrooms and filigreed script play abstractly in the rich gold and brown fabrics she chose for the boots. Fowkes designs and sells shoe-art patterns online and at sewing shows.
“I’m much more of a technician in the art community,” she said. “My challenge was a balancing, technical challenge. Putting fabrics together into shoes is contained, it’s a sculpture. There’s art in shoes - the female leg, the turn of an ankle, the curve of an arch, the point of a toe. Feet can be an erotic display of feminine beauty. It’s simply feminine.”
Fowkes’ and Derbin-Caulfield’s portraits will be on display in the gallery at Pier 39 for the next four months. “Menopause The Musical” is an open-ended show with matinee and evening performances. A comedic, homegrown show celebrating and poking fun at the female aging experience, “Menopause” underwrites the non-profit Women for Women foundation with proceeds from ticket and gift sales. The foundation provides grants to women’s service organizations.
The opening reception of 40-by-40 is scheduled 5:30-7:30 p.m. Friday, Theatre 39 at Pier 39, Beach St. and the Embarcadero, San Francisco. For more information, visit www.menopausethemusical.com. For more information about Fowkes’ work, visit www.fabricstockings.com.
