Cornwall Days highlights creativity, culture and community

From Aug. 9 to 11, residents and visitors of “Connecticut’s Greenest Town” gathered to celebrate Cornwall Days — a weekend-long festival dedicated to “Cornwall and all its eccentricities.”

The townwide occasion, staged at a scatter of Cornwall institutions and green spaces across the town’s wooded sprawl, featured live music, theater, film, art, food, shopping, and more.

Spanning all three days and providing the weekend’s structural and cultural backbone was the enduring Rose Algrant Art Show, now in its 65th year and hosted at the Cornwall Consolidated School. Born in Constantinople (present-day Istanbul), Algrant emigrated to New York in 1940, shortly afterwards settling in Cornwall and fomenting a local artistic scene of writers, painters, illustrators, and printmakers.

The Rose Algrant Show filled Cornwall Consolidated School with art all weekend.Sava Marinkovic

“Rose was quite the character,” said exhibit organizer and artist Ellen Moon. “She was small, but fierce,” — a fitting patron for the tiny but energetic town of Cornwall, which produced 51 artists for the show out of a population of less than 2,000.

“This year, we have even greater variety than usual,” continued Moon. Paneled display boards hung paintings, drawings, and photographs from around the Northwest Corner, rendered in a slew of styles and media, forming a thematic throughline that bound together many of the works. Also on display were sculptures, ceramics, furniture, puppets, shoes and jewelry creating an eclectic array of forms and disciplines very much in the spirit of Algrant’s ecumenical vision.

As the art show continued to draw out, other events around town were getting underway.

Although Friday’s family movie night, to have screened Disney-Pixar’s Toy Story outdoors at the Trinity Retreat Center, was postponed to Thursday, Aug. 15 due to inclement weather, live music continued at The Union in West Cornwall. As wind and rain rattled shops and residences in the neighborhood of Cornwall’s iconic covered bridge, patrons cozied up to weather the storm with guitarist Ava McCoy and pianist Maddie Rubin.

On Saturday, skies opened and cleared the way for a Taste of Cornwall on the Village Green, which Parks and Recreation Chair Michelle Shipp called a “highlight of the best things Cornwall has to offer.”

Grain Thief plays the Village Green, Aug. 10.Sava Marinkovic

The main event, a farm-to-table tasting buffet, sourced ingredients from local growers, ranches, and dairies. Upon being outfitted with a glittering purple bracelet and handed an introductory slice of bruschetta, tasters were free to meander between colorfully-tented tasting tables at their leisure—so long as they followed the injunction to wait for seconds until after time was called.

And seconds certainly tempted from among the local fare: saucy ground beef tacos with meat and vegetables from Birdseye and Tanner Brooks Farm, Coltsfoot Farm, and Ridgway Farm; hot, sweet pigs in a blanket from Maple Hill Farm; macaroni gooey with cheese made from Calf & Clover Farm dairy; sweet and sour meatballs assembled with meat, jelly, eggs, and produce from Hurlburt Farm & Forestry, Coltsfoot, and Ridgway; and various salads courtesy of the aforementioned, as well as Buck Mountain Herbs.

Between tastings (or perhaps to wait out the service lines that began to curl across the green), visitors enjoyed placing bets in the quintessentially country cow chip raffle, playing lawn games, and browsing local vendors from among the event’s 36 sponsors—all Cornwall businesses. Drifting over the festivities was music performed by Americana string band Grain Thief, whose repertoire includes bluegrass, fiddle tunes, and old-timey interpretations of country classics. Redoubling the fair’s rustic ambiance, a small contingent of line dancers formed, broke, and reformed as tunes coursed from lively to somber and back again.

Come Sunday, the weekend concluded with rounds of live music and family theater.

Grumbling Gryphons Children's Theater performed at The Wish House Lawn on Sunday, Aug. 11, to a receptive audience.Sava Marinkovic

Up first, the Grumbling Gryphons Traveling Children’s Theater performed a colorful adaptation of West African folktale Anansi, the Trickster Spider at the Wish House in West Cornwall.

Calling on the tale’s African roots, Director Leslie Elias welcomed the crowd with a hearty Swahili “jambo, to this village and our global village!” Invited to “sing nice and loud and enjoy the show” by performer Daniel Saed, audience members roared, signed, buzzed, and mimed their way through the whimsical fable of a conniving spider-turned-folk hero.

After the show, Arieh and the Lions animated the Wish House lawn with their danceable pop and rock covers before DIY indie outfit Ruby Leftstep took the stage at Cornwall Market to close out the evening, the sun finally setting on Cornwall Days.