In sorting through our basement after my mother, Sara Hilda Richman Harris, passed away at age 95, I was amazed to find drawings and paintings of Sara’s dating back to 1932–when she would have been 11 or 12 years old, studying at the Girls’ Latin School, in Boston.
I also found artwork from the 1940s– when she studied economics at the University of Chicago; worked at her family’s inn and children’s camps in New Hampshire; took courses at the Art Students League and worked in in New York City. In 1946, she married Raymond Harris, MD, and subsequently accompanied him to Virginia, Chicago, and Albany, New York.
In the 1950s, Sara mothered four children, taught art, served as president of the Albany Artists’ Group and founded the national Center for the Study of Aging (CSA). Somehow, I had gotten idea that she stopped painting once she had a family, but, in fact, she was extremely prolific in the 1960s and early 1970s. According to my sister, Laura, Sara often painted late at night, after the children had gone to bed.
In those years, Sara created still lifes, abstracts, landscapes and portraits in pencil, ink, charcoal, wax, watercolor and oil. She also managed Raymond’s medical office, the CSA and other nonprofit organizations.
Sara’s work was exhibited in juried shows until she was well into her 80s. At one point, when I was considering business school, she told me, “Business is fine, but it is art that endures.”
I hope you enjoy the breadth and brilliance of her work as much as I do.
–Anita M. Harris
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