Miriam “Molly” Dougenis is an award-winning figurative artist who has been working in watercolor since the early part of her art career. Molly’s artwork has been exhibited in a number of galleries and museums such as Peter Marcelle Gallery, Gerald Peters Gallery and Sag Harbor Whaling and Historical Museum. Her work has also been exhibited in several shows and galleries in New York as well as small museums around the country.
Molly is over 90 years young and she has been very organized about her art and her estate ideas. Claude Ponsot, her Art Professor at St. Johns University, recommended that Molly start taking pictures of her work to create a record of her work, after which she numbered them in a catalog system. A long time ago she also decided to leave her estate, including her art and copyright to her works, to an animal-rights charity. Molly remembers being taken aback when her longtime dealer, more about him later, asked her to leave him her art after she dies.
This Winter, Center for Art Law (CfAL) spoke to Molly to learn more about her artwork, inspiration, estate plans and experience in a legal case she initiated against a gallery owner in the New York Supreme Court. In this interview, Molly shares some insights into artist-dealer relations from the artists’ perspective in the legal-art world.
Molly was married to an attorney, and that is why, perhaps she was not discouraged when she was unable to recover her art from a gallerist who represented her for a number of decades. She did not get even, she got a lawyer. Three in fact, to try and recover either her consigned and now missing pieces or compensation for her work (and legal fees).
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