What Nina was like…
Nina was prone to deliberate over important decisions, inquire of "the experts" and then do the opposite of what they advised. She was strong willed and tireless in her art work and this played no small part in the commercial success she enjoyed. An attractive, gregarious woman, collectors and students alike were drawn to her. She could be opinionated and vain, but threw big yearly openings at her Port Washington NY studio which she dubbed 'Sculpture Lab'. In truth, she was able to be working a room full of potential collectors in an evening gown one day, and be up to her ankles in marble chips and dust the next... A child of the depression era - she did not want to pay the price asked by NY City galleries and was determined to self promote her work. This decision is probably the only reason she did not gain more notoriety nationally during her lifetime. A fiercely independent and physically strong woman (she once decked an unruly date in a parking lot) she loved to show people her biceps 'go ahead, feel it ' she'd chide the observer who's eyes widened seconds later at the realization that Nina had very strong arms... Kind of like a mans. But this was the enigma of Nina, she carved 12, 14 sometimes 16 hours a day or more when she was in a creative cycle, many times too exhausted to drive home she curled up on an old sofa and would get a second wind the next day. Stone chips in her hair, hungry and exhausted she would eventually (reluctantly) go home. At these times she isolated socially and only wished to be left alone to her work. She was lonely and did not seem especially happy at these times, but was consumed by a feeling of being 'guided' by something she didn't understand, as though she was a vehicle for someone or something else to express itself. She would say 'I can't explain it, I have to do this... Whatever it is, it must come out through me'. It was a little scary to watch when she was in this state, she was driven to a point of total distraction, no food, no sleep... But this was when new pieces would get roughed out.
Nina at work in 1981
The 1971 International Stone Sculpture Symposium Cooper Hewitt Museum NYC