Sunday at the Nut House

Reception + Gallery Talk: Sunday, September 27, 3-5PM 

Sunday at the Nut House celebrates a brief period in the development of three artists who came together with the renowned artist Maurice Sendak on Sundays in Ridgefield, Connecticut, in 2004-7 to draw from the model. They were brought together by Sendak, who wanted an occasional break from working long hours in his studio on such projects as the illustrations and sets for the opera Brundibar. He gave Jonathan Weinberg the task of forming the drawing group.

At the time, Weinberg, who is both a painter and an art historian, and his husband, Nick Boshnack, lived next door to Sendak in a house Sendak owned. This house, where these first drawing sessions took place, was affectionately known as “the Nut House,” not because of the mental capacity of its inhabitants, but because squirrels frequently dropped acorns on its roof. Weinberg invited Marc McChesney, a young local artist whom he had briefly mentored, to join the group. Marc, in turn, suggested that his best friend, the illustrator Jamison Odone, come to draw with them as well. The quartet was augmented by Herman, Maurice Sendak’s enormous and beautiful German shepherd, who provided emotional support.

The paintings, drawings, and posters in the exhibition provide a sense not only of what the work of the drawing sessions was like, but also an introduction to the art the four artists made in the years before, during, and after the Nut House days.

Sunday at the Nut House was originally conceived and organized by participating artists Jonathan Weinberg and Jamison Odone in 2025 for the Stephanie Ann Roper Gallery at Frostburg State University. The exhibition’s iteration for the Montserrat Galleries is organized in collaboration with Lynne Cooney, Director of Exhibitions and Galleries.

Image: Jonathan Weinberg, Maurice Sendak Drawing, 2007. Courtesy of the Artist and the Maurice Sendak Foundation