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Edith Dallas Ernst
Edith Dallas Ernst of Sag Harbor died at her home on Thursday morning, June 2. She was 88.
Often referred to by friends and family as a “force of nature,” Dallas, as she preferred to be called, challenged the notion that perpetual motion was a physical impossibility in the varied and hectic demands of her daily life. Moving continually, if not effortlessly, from one task to the next, her daily routine often resembled a blur of activity as she would often move on to another project even before she had completed the first.
Born in Riverdale, New York in 1923 to Henry and Sadie (née Harris) Bauman, she was the widow of the prominent American abstract painter Jimmy Ernst and the daughter-in-law of Surrealist giant Max Ernst as well as being an accomplished ceramicist in her own right. Originally a theater major at Columbia University, Ms. Ernst left formal academia behind when an opportunity arose to study instead with the Yale Repertory Theater in New Haven, Connecticut.
Later, while working at Warner Brothers as a talent scout in 1946, she met her future husband who, at the time, worked in the art department at the same storied film company. He always enjoyed pointing out that Ms. Ernst’s position at the time was considerably higher in the corporate and creative hierarchy than was his own.
Married in 1947, Ms. Ernst was a pioneer in the days of early television where she worked as a film editor and later as a producer for shows such as “Blind Date,” “What’s My Line,” as well as “Westinghouse Studio One.” She eventually left the entertainment business in the mid-1950s, a decision driven partially as a result of the demands of raising a family, but also due to her revulsion at the Hollywood blacklist and its impact on her friends and associates in the acting and creative community.
Moving to Rowayton, Connecticut, Ms. Ernst opened and operated the Five Mile River Gallery, perhaps the only suburban exhibition space in America during the Eisenhower years to feature works by artists such as Tanguy, Matisse, Ernst, and Duchamp. She and her family then left for Sedona, Arizona in 1961.
It was during this period that she first began her career in ceramics. She studied with pottery master Charles Loloma, who was considered the first Hopi Modernist, and returned to the East Coast where she began exhibiting at numerous spaces over the years in both Connecticut and New York. It was also during this period that she developed her unique stylist mix of traditional Hopi glaze techniques matched to the gently flowing abstract shapes and undulations she used for the forms of her bowls and vessels.
Even as an accomplished ceramist, Ms. Ernst continued to expand her aesthetic horizons, going as far as New Mexico to study with the famed pottery masters on the Acoma Indian Reservation for over a month while living in the back of a Ford minivan. At the time, she was almost 70.
She is survived by her two children, Eric Ernst of Sag Harbor and Amy Ernst of Manhattan; a granddaughter, Jamisen Beechler-Ernst; and a sister, Ruth Schnierer of Florida. She was predeceased by a brother, Roger Bowman.
A graveside service at Green River Cemetery in Springs was held on Sunday, June 5. A memorial service is being planned for later this summer. Funeral arrangements were under the direction of Yardley & Pino Funeral Home in Sag Harbor.
Memorial donations to East End Hospice, P.O. Box 1048 Westhampton Beach, NY 11978, or The Retreat, theretreatinc.org, would be appreciated by the family.
on Jun 2, 2011