St. Agnes Cemetery isn’t a place just for remembering the dead anymore. With a remodeled old chapel now a room lined with local art, it’s also become a place to calm the living.
“That’s why we call it ‘The Living Room.’ It’s supposed to inspire you, calm you. Art is like therapy, I think, and we want this room to serve that purpose,” cemetery Historian Kelly Grimaldi said.
Offset from the Menands cemetery’s main office, The Living Room is a high-ceilinged, open room with one large window that pours sunlight onto couches and chairs. While the room used to be a chapel that was never used, Grimaldi had it completely renovated and turned into a gallery that will rotate Capital District artists’ exhibits every 60 days.
“It is my intent to promote local artists and we have a lot of talent around here, so I’m excited to see what people have to show,” Grimaldi said. “We want this room to be used by our visitors.”
The exhibit’s official opening is May 17 with photographer Chuck Miller, yet the room is currently filled with work from six different local artists in the first unofficial show called “Celebrating Spring.” The work features photography and paintings of floral and landscape pieces by artists Carole Fults, Karen Hummel, Robin Guthridge, Susan Beadle, Jennifer Nelson and Janet Judge Shaughnessey.
While these pieces focus on natural elements, Grimaldi said she’s open minded about different mediums and themes.
“The only thing I can’t take is anything that is universally considered distasteful,” Grimaldi said. “This is a Catholic cemetery … we have to be mindful of our audiences and visitors … we have grieving families, families dealing with a whole variety of misfortune. I wouldn’t want them to come in here and be offended.”
Grimaldi said she already has exhibits booked through 2014, including work by a World War II veteran. Throughout the year, the room will also be used for lecture series on art, history, genealogy and more.
While The Living Room is St. Agnes’ most recent installation, highlighting art at the cemetery itself is nothing new. The cemetery will be holding its sixth annual photography contest this year, in which photographs of the cemetery are displayed at the Empire State Plaza Concourse. Last year, Grimaldi started Art Appreciation Tours, taking a group of people around some of the 114-acre cemetery and discussing the significance of gravestones, mausoleums, cemetery iconography and symbolism. Afterwards, the group has a Victorian-styled picnic at one of the cemetery’s open areas.
“Stylistically things changed over the decades. A lot of it was related to people’s attitudes towards death. You don’t see skull and crossbones on a gravestone anymore. You see something more that’s kinder to the eyes,” Grimaldi said. “You’re not seeing death so much as you’re seeing remembrance and honoring the people that are buried there by beautiful angels, saints.”
Purchasing mausoleums, Grimaldi said, has become outdated at the cemetery because they are no longer feasible money- or space-wise. But some of the 150-year-old cemetery’s mausoleums are works of art themselves, Grimaldi said, including a replica of the Parthenon.
“It’s absolutely magnificent. Great attention to detail. You’re just not going to find that type of work anymore,” Grimaldi said. “What we have is works from art from the past that should be discussed.”
Connecting art and graves might be an eerie pastime, but Grimaldi said the trend is beginning to catch on.
“People are starting to become more aware of these 19th century cemeteries as being outdoor museums,” Grimaldi said. “There’s an awful lot of things to see … not only are you seeing artistic conventions of the past, but you’re seeing how they changed through the decades and what’s popular now.”
Karen A. Hummel, an artist from Columbia County, has three of her pieces is “Celebrating Spring” that focus on nature. This summer, however, she’ll be teaching a figure drawing class right in the cemetery, using the angels and statues as references.
“Kelly approached me with the idea and I was totally onboard because it’s such a unique way to express and bring attention to that beautiful cemetery,” Hummel said. “It’s a new way to view it … it doesn’t always have to be a sad occasion.”