SHARON — Cornwall resident and professional photographer Catherine Noren invests a great deal of thought into her work.An exhibit of Noren’s photographs, and related objects, opened at the Sharon Historical Society’s (SHS) Gallery on May 5 and runs through July 5. The photographer will hold a Gallery Walk and Talk on Saturday, June 9, at 3 p.m. The exhibit is titled “With My Back to the Future.”In addition to her photographs, there are objects, books and documents on display which had an influence on the kinds of subjects she chooses, and the way she photographs them.By tradition, photography has enjoyed a reputation as a truth teller. Although this tradition persists, today’s digital technology allows photographers to take viewers to new realities. Regarding her photography, Noren said, “As a child I was enamored of family albums, I spent hours poring over the magic reality they revealed.”In 1977, Alfred A. Knopf published a family album Noren wrote and produced called, “The Camera of My Family.” Noren said it contains, “some of the answers to mysteries I spent so much time pondering as a little girl.“Today I see reality different than I did, or perhaps I see a different reality. I’m less interested in documentary photography. My enchantment is with shades, shapes, size, color and particularly scale, in the juxtaposition of elements.”In 2006 Noren switched from primarily photographing people to still lifes and landscapes. This happened at the time she acquired her first digital camera.Noren’s photography career began in 1969 as a “street shooter,” walking the streets of a city and photographing any interesting people she encountered. She worked professionally from 1980, shooting documentaries, portraits, brochures and annual reports for corporate clients.Over the course of her career, Noren took photographs in Sing Sing prison, the South Bronx, dance festivals, writers workshops, at Merrill Lynch and elsewhere. Overseas, Noren worked professionally in Argentina, Brazil, Iceland, Mexico and Hawaii, as well as across the United States.In 1992 Noren gave up her professional career due to corporate changes over photographic image ownership rights. In the intervening years, she has kept busy shooting artistic photographic images that express her own vision.“I travel and shoot wherever I am. One day I would love to return to create more images in Argentina and Brazil.”In speaking about her photography, Noren told The Lakeville Journal that in creating her work, “I look for incident, color and composition. As I get older, incident [something happening] becomes less important. Even nothing happening is an incident.”Noren took to the digital photography revolution in a big way. “I love working with Photoshop.” Except for very large prints, she prints all her photographic images herself. A number of her images are manipulated in Photoshop to create new looks.Noren’s photography has been exhibited in solo shows at The Jewish Museum in New York City, Fotografia Italiana in Milan and other venues. She has also has shown in group shows in New York, Germany and Cornwall.Noren and her husband, Brian Thomas, moved to Cornwall eight years ago.For more information, go to www.catherinenoren.com. The Historical Society is located at 18 Main St. Gallery hours are Wednesday to Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and by appointment; call 860-364-5688 or go to www.sharonhist.org.
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Greg Fricke and James Boehmer, co-owners of Peggy Mercury in Kent, recently launched their first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts.”
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Fricke and Boehmer are not there to stock their shelves with the same products customers find at standard makeup retailers. They’re there to help customers find what works for them. That usually means asking customers about themselves and learning about their beauty habits, skin, style and the way they like to present themselves. Fricke and Boehmer believe it’s their job to help customers bring out the qualities that suit them and determine what works best for their look.
So much of the Peggy Mercury world is about emboldening people to become more creative, and possibly bolder, versions of themselves. Some of this comes through the store’s creative collaborations with artists, designers and stylists.
It’s part of an ethos that encourages them and their friends to use the shop as a kind of laboratory, trying out new creative experiments without knowing how they might turn out. Whether in fashion, painting, fiber arts or photography, the projects almost always turn out marvelously.
A line of sterling silver charms they sell started as a small project by their friend Nolan Percival. In the beginning, the pieces were for close friends and loved ones. But Boehmer and Fricke encouraged Percival to get a little more serious about the project and create a whole line for the store. Today, it’s one of their top-selling collections.
Classic styles, bold colors, and creative concerts make up the “Imaginary Concerts” line at Peggy Mercury.Provided
“Imaginary Concerts” has the duo taking their own advice.
The project started as a way for Boehmer to connect with his mother, who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. Taking old concert shirts from his own collection, Boehmer and his mother began cutting out the graphics with the idea that they would make a quilt together. Unfortunately, she died before they could complete the project in 2025. The pieces, which were ready for production, were put on the back burner as Boehmer and Fricke dealt with their loss and the whirlwind of projects that never seemed to cease at Peggy Mercury.
But the harsh winter of 2026 presented an opportunity to take some time and focus on themselves. Part of that meant revisiting and redefining the concert T-shirt project. This time, instead of looking to the warmth and comfort of a quilt, they turned to another passion — fashion.
Taking a page from their own book, they wanted to create something that felt comfortable to them. They took two disparate loves — one rooted in simple preppy style, with clean lines and classic silhouettes, and the other in the nitty gritty worlds of punk rock and pop — and blended them together to create something entirely new. Pulling from the staples of vintage Brooks Brothers and Charvet collections, they applied the graphic elements with bold stitching reminiscent of punk jackets of the ‘70s and ‘80s, but with a much more sophisticated air.
But the remixing isn’t just the pairing of prep and punk. The pieces are not canon. They take liberties with the realities of concert tours, combining one band’s dates with another band’s logos, mixing them all up until the reality is lost and imagination is the only truth.
Shirts from Peggy Mercury’s first fashion line, “Imaginary Concerts,” hang on display.Provided
Adding to the mix is an element of perpetual creativity. Art can be messy, both figuratively and literally, and many of Fricke and Boehmer’s artist friends carry evidence of their work on them at all times. As a nod to these tireless creatives, the duo added haphazard splashes of bright color, giving the line an even more distinctive feel.
For them, “Imaginary Concerts” passes the “Peggy Test.” The mythical Peggy Mercury is a fictional figurehead for the company, a character who thrives on creativity and change. The name, much like the clothing line, is a mixture of interests: Mercury is a planet, a deity and an elusive, transformative element, while Peggy is the wonderfully stylish and boundary-pushing Peggy Guggenheim.
Everything Fricke and Boehmer put in their store has to pass this test: Would Peggy Mercury approve? For their first collection, the answer is a resounding yes.
Peggy Mercury is at 9 Maple St., Unit 2, Kent.
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