Artfully Done
Dispossessed due to post 9/11 trauma, Sean Scherer achieves comfort and contentment through art.
By Penny K
Sean Scherer, 41, lives in a 19th-century Catskill farmhouse in Walton, N.Y. When he moved to this small farming community seven years ago he was known as a painter who worked in a style inspired by Russian Suprematism and American Minimalism. Then 9/11 happened and changed his life completely.
“I thought 9/11 was going to change the art world,” he said. “But the exact opposite happened. Instead of getting more serious, art got stupider and stupider.”
Traumatised from witnessing the events up close from his South Street Seaport apartment, Mr. Scherer decided to seek refuge elsewhere. That’s how he was acquainted with his 1840s Cape-style farmhouse which sits on 90 acres of fields and woodland. In 2002, he paid $212,000 for the house.
Mr. Scherer was haunted by 9/11 long after it was over and found himself unable to paint. He channeled his creative energy instead to renovating his home, reconstructing parts of it with his own two hands. He did so with the help of like-minded people who lived nearby; he called them the “anti-hamptons set”.
“I don’t care about pedigree,” he said of the 19th-century furniture that fills the farmhouse. “I like the fact that the objects were made for a specific purpose. They may be a little crude but they also usually have clean, modern lines.”
Adapted from NY Times, An Artful Clutter, 7 Oct.
Click through the gallery to see Mr. Scherer’s artful combination of everyday objects with curios, art and interestingly enough, science:
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