Conversations with Meredith Nemirov

Today we’d like to introduce you to Meredith Nemirov.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
THE TREES IN MY CHILDHOOD YARD; OR MAYBE WHY I’VE BEEN DRAWN TO PAINT TREES
I grew up in a house owned by gardeners, not my parents.
We inherited all the trees in the small front yard, the side yards and the larger backyard. They needed care, especially the fruit trees, a lot of care. My father was not a gardener, it was an effort, it was work.
The house was a small Cape Cod cottage. On the right side of the front walk was a large magnolia tree, on the left a dogwood. The house was surrounded by rhododendrons, azaleas and hydrangeas of different bright and deep rich colors.
Around the house to the right were the fruit trees; pears and plums and in the middle of the backyard a large bing cherry tree. This is the tree that I remember most because it bloomed every spring right outside my upstairs bedroom window and the smell of the
blossoms filled my childhood nights.
There were lilacs against the garage wall. A grape vine clung to an arbor over the walkway that led up to the side door into the kitchen. Lilies of the Valley were a ground cover on both sides of the walkway.
Growing around the entire property was a tall green privet hedge. Every other weekend my father would take out the electric trimmer and prune the hedge. My brother and I would rake up the clippings. Whenever I see a hedge today I can hear that sound and smell the small leaves of the newly shorn hedge.

“These trees are magnificent, but even more magnificent is the sublime and moving space between them, as though with their growth it too increased.”
R. M. Rilke
I moved and grew up in the space between these trees and I feel their presence and carry them with me.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
On Friday, March 13, 2020, the corona virus was declared a world-wide pandemic and
it became clear to us that we would have to cancel our plans. Every spring for the past
five years my husband and I have been teaching a workshop, Art and Culture in the Balerearic Islands in Mallorca, Spain. I emailed our students to give them the sad news. I also cancelled my artist in residency in Ireland and it looked like our son’s wedding in NY the first week in June would probably be cancelled too! I unpacked and was so concerned for the safety of our friends and family in Spain and NY that I found it hard to focus and be in my studio.

This was a big bump in the road I had been on for the previous twenty years. The pandemic caused many artists to rethink ways to share their work. Thanks to the internet, groups which started during those isolating times and now continue to flourish, have helped us to develop new directions for our work and to find new audiences.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Rivers Feed the Trees is a recent series that addresses the issue of climate change specifically regarding water in Southwestern United States. In the summer of 2020 Colorado experienced the most severe wildfires in the state’s history. This, along with the Covid pandemic, created a figurative conflagration in my studio which resulted in these works on paper. It is a process where I am painting a “rewatering” of the landscape.
Working on historic maps showing the topography of Colorado, the image makes a connection between the trees and a multitude of rivers appearing in the surrounding landscape. The linear elements and patterns assigned by map makers to the various aspects of the geology of the land are visual elements in the landscape and the form of the tree. These pieces play with perspective transforming the topographic maps – aerial views of our landscape – into both the ground the trees are planted in and the sky that frames them as they grow vertically.
I am most proud of my recent exhibition in collaboration with Milk Moon Gallery in Telluride. It was a benefit for the national non-profit American Rivers. We
were able to donate a percentage of sales and spread information about the great work they do with the Telluride community and people from all over who had come for the Mountain Film Festival in May 2025.

Can you talk to us about how you think about risk?
The word risk implies an uncertainty, that an action you take might result in a loss or injury.
I don’t think of myself as a risk-taker but I have taken the risk of a less conventional life without the security of a steady paycheck, the support of an organization, the daily companionship of fellow workers.
Well that is the life of an artist and I would not have exchanged it for another.
When I am unsure of the results of an action I have decided to take I ask myself what is the worst that could happen? Is it likely or unlikely?
It helps to take a step back and try to get a more objective view of the situation.
As I get closer to a challenging event I say to myself that in one week, or two days, or even the day after tomorrow, it will all be over, in the past.
I know that sounds ridiculous but it helps to diffuse the anxiety and to be more prepared.