You can cast your vote for the 2015 Readers’ Choice Award online at www.literary-arts.org/voteOBA! The winner will be announced at the Oregon Book Awards ceremony on April 13 at the Gerding Theater at the Armory.
Between now and April 13, we will be featuring all of the 2015 Oregon Book Awards finalists.
2015 Oregon Book Awards Finalist
Ghosts in the Canvas by George Taylor
Category
Drama
About the play:
As children, Florie Boit and her three sisters were painted by John Singer Sargent; now the painter is famous and the painting, once controversial, is much loved. So why does Florie want the damned thing “hidden away where no one will ever see it again,” and how far will she go to get her wish?
About the playwright:
George Taylor turned fifty before finishing his first play. That work, Renaissance, was a 2008 Oregon Book Award finalist. In 2011, his third play and second finalist, Good Citizen, benefited from developmental workshops at OSF and ART. He has received playwriting fellowships from Literary Arts and the Oregon Arts Commission.
Excerpt from Ghosts in the Canvas:
MARY LOUISA
You’re a dangerous painter. I should have remembered that. Thank God I married a landscapist.
SARGENT
They probably live longer.
MARY LOUISA
What a strange, artificial world we’ve created for ourselves!
SARGENT
I suppose we have.
MARY LOUISA
You’ve painted a good many actresses, haven’t you John?
SARGENT
A few, yes.
MARY LOUISA
Has it ever occurred to you that we’re all actresses? All the women you paint? Every morning, we put on our makeup and dress in our costumes. And we enter into a comedy of manners written largely by men, performed for men. Isn’t that how you paint us? I’m fortunate. I like the ‘character’ I play. It’s quite easy to make her charming in a…bland kind of way. She’s very much like me, but she isn’t all of me.
SARGENT
But surely men play characters too.
MARY LOUISA
Of course they do. But aren’t you allowed to give a tiny wink to the audience? We [women] don’t have that freedom. We’re only allowed a handful of roles…
George Taylor’s website:
https://www.cyranoworks.com/playwright.html
Read more about George Taylor:
Oregon Arts Commission: “Arts Commission Fellowship Recipient George Taylor Talks About Playwriting”
Gigi Rosenburg: “Fund Your Writing Projects: Featured Money Magnet George Taylor”
