Honoré Sharrer died from complications of dementia April 17, 2009. She was 88 years old. She leaves behind her life's work - paintings that will forever be a part of American cultural history. One is safeguarded in our national repository at the Smithsonian Museum, and other works are a part of the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art. Rochester's Memorial Art Gallery owns one; the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts owns over 100.

For years, Honoré lived quietly in Scottsville with her husband Perez Zagorin, who was a professor of history at the University of Rochester. Zagorin died eight days after his wife. Sharrer and Zagorin moved in the mid 1990's to the Washington, D.C. area to be nearer their only son.

Sharrer exploded onto the international art scene as a young painter in the 1940's, but the years between 1950 and 1970 were decades of obscurity for her as art fads left her style of realism out of fashion. History has a way of redeeming art talent, and in the 1970's her painting "Tribute to the American Working People" was selected among a few works to represent the US on a tour of the Soviet Union. She began winning significant awards, among them, in 1987, the Outstanding Achievement in the Visual Arts Award by the College Art Association's Women's Caucus.

Sharrer's paintings were seldom on view here in Rochester. In 1981, the Forum Gallery in New York City curated a one-woman traveling exhibit of her paintings that was shown at Memorial Art Gallery and in 1990, Dawson Gallery hosted a solo exhibit of her paintings and drawings.

Sharrer was one of only two painters who were ever given shows at Dawson, an art space that specialized in three-dimensional works. Hers were not "easy listening" paintings. Nearly all featured a female nude, and while her wicked sense of humor came through loud and clear, so did her politics. Nearly all were commentaries on the problematic roles of women.

In spite of their requirement for serious interpretation, nearly 20 of her paintings and drawings were sold from this Rochester exhibit. Serious collectors purchased the paintings, but ordinary people did also. For some, this was their first purchase of "real" art. Several paintings were paid for on a "time payment" lay-away plan.

Sharrer was a true American art master. We here in Rochester were lucky to have her living among us and can be proud that we acknowledged her extraordinary talent before she left.

SHIRLEY DAWSON, FAIRPORT, AND BEVERLY MCINERNY, HONEOYE FALLS

Dawson and McInerny were co-directors of Rochester's Dawson Gallery.