Neighbors: Marcia Freedman

Artist Ed Whitney once commented on a painting, done by Marcia Freedman, saying that the artist was “a person having a love affair with color.” A quick glance around Freedman’s home on Longboat Key reveals it’s one love affair that has never ended. Her walls are filled with colorful watercolors, mostly done by her, on a variety of subjects.

Freedman has been painting since she was a young girl growing up in Albany, N.Y. After graduating from high school at 15, Freedman attended Endicott College and majored in fashion illustration and fine arts. At 18, she married her high school sweetheart, Arnie, and took a job painting department store fashion advertisements for newspapers. She soon got tired of painting in black and white and left the job to do freelance and study with as many artists as she could find: Charles Reid, Millard Sheets and Ed Whitney.

During that time she also became friends with Shirley Manson, an interior decorator, and began painting interiors and exteriors of houses and doing custom artwork for Mason’s clients.

A few years later, Arnie Freedman’s job required the couple to move to Fresno, Calif.

“I thought we were going to the moon,” Freedman says.

Although the move seemed daunting, Freedman says she made some of her best friends while living there, and she painted constantly.

In 1994, Freedman was diagnosed with stage four ovarian cancer.

“I was told I was going to die,” she says.

Even with the diagnosis, she continued to paint. During that time she was commissioned to do a calendar for the Central California Blood Center. The watercolor pictures in the calendar were popular, and the calendar earned a first place ADDY award from The Central California Advertising Federation. Freedman believes that the project and her painting are what helped her beat cancer.

The Freedmans retired Labor Day weekend 1997 to Longboat Key. As always, Freedman continued to paint. She met a new group of artists here and started painting every Friday with four other women.

In 2000, Freedman was again diagnosed with ovarian caner. The second time around, she found it was harder to paint at her regular pace, yet she continued to paint whenever she felt strong enough.

“I’m a miracle; there’s no doubt about it,” said Freedman about being cancer-free for nine years.

Recently, Freedman was approached by Carol Doenecke, a fellow Pen Women Sarasota chapter member, to see if she would be interested in having an exhibition of her work in the gallery at All Angels by the Sea Episcopal Church. With paintings done on a variety of subjects and in varying mediums, it was difficult for Freedman to choose just 20 paintings. The show is on display in the art gallery just inside the entrance to the parish hall. 

The exhibition is on display from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday through Friday and until 1 p.m. Sundays through September. 

Marcia Freedman on ...

... befriending John Ringling North's wife
After Freedman quit her first job, she studied with many different painters. While doing so, she met Betty Warren, a member of the Petticoat Painters and also John Ringling North's first wife.

... her home with a view
Freedman and her husband, Arnie, bought their home on Longboat Key because of the view — she loves to paint natural settings instead of from photographs — and because it had enough wall space to hang her paintings.

... young love
At 13, Freedman met her husband, who was 17 years old at the time, when he was a DJ at a sock hop. They have been married 58 years this year.