Art By Two

Art by Two is a sweet and tangy remembrance - a daughter Maud Guilfoyle’s ode and tribute to her mother Peregrine Higgins, to their many-layered relationship, and to their collaboration in living “the art spirit”. With understatement and quiet reserve, the author recounts her childhood impressions of New York City and Fire Island, her intimacies with the natural world which still informs her artistic output. She recounts the push and pull of coming to terms with the bigger-than-life parent and artistic mentor that was her mother, and the bittersweet full circle experience of mentoring her mother through old age and failing memory to keep the art spirit in her strong. Deedee Agee Illustrated with 72 original artworks by Maud Guilfoyle and Peregrine Higgins Illustrated with original art of landscapes, figure drawings, nudes, portraits, and still life.

From the beginning, my mother, Peregrine fed my imagination and senses in every possible way with fairy tales, art, beautiful food, music, opera, poetry and trips into nature, the seaside and the mountains. We lived a nomadic life moving from apartments in New York City to shared houses on Fire Island. By the time I could walk I had the incredible freedom to explore up and down the beach on my own. My mother’s artwork was a steady constant and for her it was second only to my wellbeing. Like most young children, I drew and painted freely. Around age eleven, I began to compare my artistic results to my mother’s masterful art. After years of practice, her drawing and sureness of line was perfection. Drawing realistically is often a ‘deal breaker’ for many beginning aritsts. At the time I could not find my way around it. Even though I was encouraged and praised for my efforts, I escaped into music for six years until I went to college 2,000 miles away in Boulder Colorado. The second term there, I began to study art. I found the perfect balance away from home to explore and experiment with art on my own. On visits home I received unconditional support from my mother and stepfather, also an artist. I often wondered if I would have found my way to the easel had I been born into the more conventional family I longed for in middle childhood. Years later, after a hiatus from making art following the birth of my son, Peregrine enticed me back by inviting me to the many open life drawing sessions in the area that she attended. By then my mother was teaching part-time and continued to offer guidance when I needed it. Years of collaboration in our art followed with positive mutual support and critique. We worked together at two endeavors, Fantasy Quilts and Portfolio Rubber Stamps. An easy rhythm developed where we would work out ideas and images separately, come together for brainstorming and then return to our studios to complete final designs. We knew each other well, our strengths, weaknesses and points of reference in art history. We shared discoveries of new artists and old. I rarely felt a sense of competition or envy between us over our artwork. I know the camaraderie and sharing we had was rare and I miss it. This is our story.

bio Maud Guilfoyle grew up in a family of artists and has been creating and teaching art for thirty years. As a child, she spent summers by the sea on Fire Island and in the mountains of Pennsylvania. In her twenties she lived in the Southwest and painted incredible vistas of sky, dusty pink colored mountains and silver rivers running through the landscape. Presently she has a studio near the Hudson River and teaches at the Art School at Old Church in Demarest, New Jersey. The quality of light in the Hudson Valley is soft, at times luminescent. Nature, and human interface with it, are threaded through her art.