photo by Skip Treglia
Artist Statement
After decades spent writing indoors, I discovered painting en plein air in northern California. Today I continue the practice on Cape Cod. I also make collage series based on various themes. Painting, collage and poetry are, in my view, completely related. Probably would be simpler to do just one thing, but whose life is just one thing?
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Elaine Cohen, writer and visual artist, grew up in Gloversville, NY. While studying anthropology at the University of Chicago she became interested in learning/writing about jazz and contemporary music. In 1978 she became SF correspondent for Coda Magazines, a Toronto based international jazz journal; in 1985 she co-authored Unfinished Dream: The Musical World of Red Callender, (Quartet Books, London), the first history of jazz in Los Angeles from a musician's point of view. In the late 1980s in New York City, Cohen reviewed concerts for the NY State Council on the Arts Music Program, published reviews and interviews in Coda, Cadence, Downbeat, The Brooklyn Phoenix, The Villager, as well as teaching ESL to immigrants.
In the mid-1990s, she moved to Mendocino County, CA where she became a DJ on Public Radio KZYX, and fell in love with painting. Her teachers include the late Olaf Palm and plein-air colorist Camille Przewodek. (Cohen wrote the Foreword for Przewodek's recently published Mondays With Camille.) In 2023 she published her second chapbook of poetry, Midnight Bus to Oaxaca.
Since relocating to Cape Cod in 2003 (to marry the artist Skip Treglia), her artwork has been exhibited in juried and member shows at Cape Cod Museum of Art, Cotuit Center for the Arts, Provincetown Art Association and Museum, and Yarmouth Cultural Center. Gallery shows include Salt Meadow Gallery, Color Obsession Gallery, West Barnstable Table, and solo collage shows at Gateway Center in Santa Monica and Gallery 63 in New Bedford, MA. Other recent recognition includes: a fellowship from the Atlantic Center for the Arts; a Romanos Rizk Memorial Scholarship from Provincetown Art Association and Museum; Regional Winner 2021/Honorable Mention 2023 in the Joe Gouveia Outermost Poetry Contest and 2022 Editor's Choice/ 2023 Honorable Mention from the Allen Ginsberg Poetry Awards.
Queries regarding paintings/collage and ordering Midnight Bus to Oaxaca, contact Elaine by email at lainecohen@yahoo.com