Local Artist Buzz, Maria Tavares

By Sonia Lee Garber

Magical things can happen in Peekskill. It is a town that has a history in which emerging artists are discovered and presented with opportunities. Peekskill resident Marisol Jimenez met an interesting person one evening when she was dining with her husband at Ruben’s Café on North Division Street.

Maria Tavares had one of her paintings showing there when Jimenez took notice of it. Jimenez immediately asked the artist, Tavares, about it and suggested they take a short trip a couple of blocks over to Antonia Arts at 925 South Street, also known as “The Artist Spot”. Jimenez knows that that is a place where Ms. Scarlett Antonia can make “Peekskill magic” happen. Antonia immediately asked Tavares if she would like to have an art show in her space. Antonia is in charge of “The Artist Spot,” which is an art gallery as well as a breeding ground for the creative and performing arts. It is there that Antonia provides classes, rehearsal space, and puts on musical and theatrical performances on a small stage.

It is here that Tavares, Jimenez and I talk and get to know more about Maria Tavares as an artist. Tavares first knew she was an artist when she was just six years old, telling her dad that she wanted to paint. In fact, at age eight she was offered a scholarship to go to art school in Mexico, but her parents could not afford the extra expenses and they needed her to stay home. However, Tavares was not deterred to continue painting. She used to paint in bakery shop store windows, where they would pay her in cookies.

An interesting fact about Tavares is that she grew up in a household of sixteen children, whereas she was number fifteen.  Tavares married when she was just sixteen, to a fifty-six year old man.  He was very supportive to her and provided her with art materials.  Tavares’ first husband passed away when she was in her early thirties. Tavares tears up as she tells me that upon his passing, she would drink coffee and stay up until 3am, painting and painting to work through her grief.  Tavares married again, and it is with her second husband that she came to America.  She and her husband currently reside in Somers, NY.  

What inspires Tavares the most is color and happiness.  Tavares wants people that are sad to look at her paintings and feel happy. She describes the happiness she brings forth through the colors in her work as a “piece of heaven.”

For your own slice of heaven, call Maria Tavares at 914-817-6257.  She does pinatas, paintings, murals, and commission work.