Tuesday, July 16, 6:15 pm –RIPS will hold our annual summer potluck supper social meeting and everyone is invited. It will take place at Hauberg Civic Center, 1300 24th Street, Rock Island, and it’s indoors so we don’t have to worry about the weather.  We’ll eat promptly at 6:30, so please come before that. Afterwards, we’ll have a special treat as Cynthia Wiedemann Empen presents a program on a nationally known artist, who grew up in Rock Island. NOTE:  if you don’t want to participate in the potluck, be at Hauberg at 7:15 for the program.

Cynthia, an Independent Art Historian, will share the story of A ‘Modern Painter’: The Early Life and Art of Irma René Koen.   Ms. Koen (originally Kohn) (1884–1975), grew up in Rock Island in the historic Queen Anne home at 824 23^rd Street with her parents, Louis and Regina Kohn. Cynthia will tell us about the early development and career of Ms. Koen, a painter, writer and lecturer, whose biography and artistic legacy have been largely forgotten. Described as “well known,” “famous” and “modern” in her own time, she was a trained landscape painter who studied with some of the era’s most influential art teachers. She traveled and exhibited extensively both nationally and abroad throughout her 70-year long career. Through research in local newspaper archives and correspondence with the artist’s family, Cynthia has uncovered a great deal about the reception of Koen and her art.  She will also focus on the status of Midwestern women artists in an emerging modern culture.  She’ll show pictures of some of Irma’s works and tell you where you can actually see one of her original paintings.

The Koen family home cost $5000 in 1894, when it was built by contractor Nicholas Juhl.  Even today, if you look closely at that house, Mr. Kohn’s initials and the numerals 94 cast in iron decorate the south chimney.