(Watercolor portrait of The Phoenix Theatre Company on a ceramic mug by artist Mary Kunz Goldman, now available in our boutique.)
If you’ve ever struggled to find a gift for the theatre lover in your life, the Phoenix Theatre Company boutique is a good place to start.
Our boutique has always been a place to find something a little different. From show-themed gifts to one-of-a-kind prints, you can find unique theatre-themed items you won’t find anywhere else.
This season, two artists have joined the mix, and their work is handmade, heartfelt, and created by people who genuinely love the theatre.
The story of how both artists landed in the boutique starts the same way, with the incomparable Johanna Carlisle-Zepeda, Patron Experience Manager at The Phoenix Theatre Company.
“I am so excited we have done this first of many collaborations,” Carlisle-Zepeda said.
Meet Mary Kunz Goldman, who captures the character of beloved places in ink and watercolor, and Haley Roberts, the theatre-maker and illustrator behind Little Miss Pinkerbell.
Mary Kunz Goldman
Mary Kunz Goldman is a writer, pianist, and artist from Buffalo, N.Y. and her résumé is the kind that makes you do a double take. She’s a former classical music critic for The Buffalo News, a competitor in the first Van Cliburn International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs, and the author of a memoir about her friendship with Grammy-winning concert pianist Leonard Pennario.
Kunz Goldman’s visual art celebrates architecture and place, like the beloved streets of Buffalo, the dome of the New York Botanical Garden, the Gilded Age brownstones of Brooklyn. Her book Sketches of Buffalo collects years of that work, and she has created special art prints for The Frost Place, Robert Frost’s historic homestead in New Hampshire.
When Carlisle-Zepeda spotted Mary’s drawings of New York City, she reached out on a hunch.
“I reached out to her to see if she would be interested in doing a collaboration,” Carlisle-Zepeda said. “She was so excited and sent me a sketch of our building within a week.”
That sketch became a watercolor portrait of the Phoenix Theatre Company mug, now available in the boutique. It’s a whimsical, warmly colored rendering of our colorful building. Kunz Goldman has written extensively about theatre over the years, and as she puts it, she hopes her painting brings a smile and a little sparkle to every cup of coffee. We think it does.
And this is just the beginning. Johanna is already planning the next chapter of this collaboration: Phoenix Theatre Company ornaments for the boutique.
(Show-themed stickers by Haley Roberts of Little Miss Pinkerbell. Find her unique stickers and magnets in our boutique.)
Haley Roberts / Little Miss Pinkerbell
Haley Roberts, the maker behind Little Miss Pinkerbell, is a Virginia-based illustrator, intimacy choreographer, actress, and mother of five.
She began making art as a way to help others navigate grief and child loss, using illustration as a tool for comfort and healing. Over time, that work evolved into something she describes as a merging of her worlds: art, theatre, and womanhood. Her illustrations celebrate, uplift, and honor the experiences of women, and they carry a theatre-maker’s sense of story in every line.
Roberts has no formal visual art training beyond one semester in 8th grade, a fact she mentions without apology, and yet her work has found its way into theatre companies across the country. She specializes in collaborating with theatre companies to create products that honor the arts, including custom theatre portraits that let performers hold onto their fleeting moments on stage a little longer.
Carlisle-Zepeda discovered Roberts’ work through some Come From Away stickers and magnets that caught her eye.
“She is now slated to be our magnet creator for the rest of this season and hopefully beyond,” Carlisle-Zepeda said. “We are also going to keep selling her sticker designs in the boutique!”
Both artists’ work is available now in the boutique, alongside other show-themed gifts and prints that rotate with the season. Whether you’re shopping for the theatre lover in your life or treating yourself, stop by and take a look. The boutique is located inside The Phoenix Theatre Company, and the items in it, like the shows on our stages, are genuinely one of a kind.
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