Artist

Stoneware Pottery & 2-D Art

Traudi Thornton
(April 4, 1940- March 30, 2023)
Master Ceramicist  – Stoneware Pottery & 2-D Art

Traudi was born in Czechoslovakia in 1940. She first studied music at Creighton University before studying ceramics with Henry Soreco, at Creighton, the University of Nebraska at Omaha and raku in a workshop with Paul Soldner, at the University of Nebraska at Omaha in 1972. She returned to Germany and joined a cooperative art community in which she lived and worked on ceramics.

Love precipitated her move to Wilmington in 1983. She once again built a ceramic studio and began teaching ceramics at the Community Art Center where she influenced many budding ceramists.

Traudi said, “Working with clay validates my existence. During the plastic state, the relationship is that of master and a much beloved pet. I tell the clay to stay and push it, but often I have to listen. We have a rhythm. Clay needs heat to be transferred to a hard material. After the first fire everything turns from a state of grey to pink, and a slight estrangement takes place because they now look different than what they did before. Glazes also look pink or white or grey before they are fired. I imagine now how the optics will look in their final state, and after making choices the second fire takes over. Total surrender is demanded by heat and flame. After the firing is completed, the cooling period leaves my mood fluctuating between doubt and hope. And, then only after removing the pieces from the kiln, can I say they belong to me.”

Traudi showed and sold her work through Art in Bloom Gallery beginning in 2015.  She is survived by brother, Walt Bayer and his wife Tina, nephew Jurgen Wilde and the family she chose and loved here in Wilmington.

View Traudi’s Raku Ware Catalog

Traudi Thornton (Year Unknown)

Thornton Resume to 1990
Click on the link for a PDF Version of Traudi’s Resume until 1990.

Raku Ware

Traudi Thornton
(April 4, 1940- March 30, 2023)
Master Ceramicist  – Raku Ware

Traudi was born in Czechoslovakia in 1940. She first studied music at Creighton University before studying ceramics with Henry Soreco, at Creighton, the University of Nebraska at Omaha and raku in a workshop with Paul Soldner, at the University of Nebraska at Omaha in 1972. She returned to Germany and joined a cooperative art community in which she lived and worked on ceramics.

Love precipitated her move to Wilmington in 1983. She once again built a ceramic studio and began teaching ceramics at the Community Art Center where she influenced many budding ceramists.

Traudi said, “Working with clay validates my existence. During the plastic state, the relationship is that of master and a much beloved pet. I tell the clay to stay and push it, but often I have to listen. We have a rhythm. Clay needs heat to be transferred to a hard material. After the first fire everything turns from a state of grey to pink, and a slight estrangement takes place because they now look different than what they did before. Glazes also look pink or white or grey before they are fired. I imagine now how the optics will look in their final state, and after making choices the second fire takes over. Total surrender is demanded by heat and flame. After the firing is completed, the cooling period leaves my mood fluctuating between doubt and hope. And, then only after removing the pieces from the kiln, can I say they belong to me.”

Traudi showed and sold her work through Art in Bloom Gallery beginning in 2015.  She is survived by brother, Walt Bayer and his wife Tina, nephew Jurgen Wilde and the family she chose and loved here in Wilmington.

View Traudi’s Stoneware & 2-D Art Catalog

Traudi Thornton (Year Unknown)

Thornton Resume to 1990
Click on the link for a PDF Version of Traudi’s Resume until 1990.

Rebecca Yeomans has lived her entire life centered around making. She learned to knit at eight years old and was considered the “class artist” in school. She studied studio art at UNC-Chapel Hill, receiving a BFA in 1974. After earning an MFA from Auburn University in 1979 she taught there for several years. Rebecca and her husband Tom moved to Wilmington, NC in 1984 and she worked as a scenic artist in the film industry. She was a founding board member for DREAMS of Wilmington and later taught classes.  After she and Tom raised two artsy daughters, Rebecca quickly moved into full time artist mode. Her current work combines botanical printing, knitting, and stitching with a painterly feel.

Artist Statement

The pieces in this show represent over a year of gathering leaves and materials and making art on almost a daily basis. I explored new things, learned a great deal, and delighted in all the swirling ideas this process stirred up. Each creation has a story – from finding inspiration in the Barbie movie, to picking tobacco, to using ink derived from guns. The piece titled ‘Keep Looking Up’ has a featured role in the short documentary that was recently filmed about my creative process of contact botanical printing. The phrase carries a double meaning: when foraging, I “keep looking up”and all around for leaves; when making, I keep an optimistic outlook by striving to add beauty, joy, and wonder to our world through art.

About Her Process

The botanical printmaking process is almost always the inspiration and starting point for my work. Eco or botanical printing is the art of transferring color from natural plant material on to fabric or paper using pressure, moisture, and heat. Beautiful contact plant portraits are captured by bundling vegetation and fabric, either by rolling around a pipe or stacking in layers and binding tightly. The bundle is then steamed or immersed in simmering natural dye coaxing the pigment out of the leaves and on to the cloth. Results depend on many variables: type of fabric, water source, plant species, season, climate, and type of vessel used to name a few. Thus each piece is unique and always a surprise. The process involves many steps: scouring, mordanting, pre dyeing, printing with plant material, post dyeing, rinsing, and perhaps printing again. I enjoy the relationship with the natural world inherent in the process: foraging walks, growing my own dye plants, the aroma of cooking eucalyptus, and the opening of a bundle to reveal what gift Mother Nature has given. When a piece of printed paper or cloth excites me, I begin the slow process of embellishing. This involves tearing fabric, arranging and rearranging, pinning, basting, and deciding on a place to start. I approach this process intuitively, reacting playfully, exploring this or that, asking what if? The piece evolves and its story unfolds. Hopefully a lovely whole is created by the intricate details. In a nutshell, the beauty of the materials and the process of making are what my artwork is about. I am co-creating with Mother Nature and collaborating with the fabric, yarn, and thread.

Virginia Wright-Frierson has made Wilmington, North Carolina, her home for over 40 years.  She travels extensively for inspiration for her painting and frequent visits with family across the United States.

She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in painting from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, with additional training at the Arts Students’ League in New York City and the University of Georgia Studies Abroad Program in Cortona, Italy.  Virginia has lectured and taught many workshops and classes in painting and drawing and on illustrating children’s books.

She is widely known for her design and construction of the Minnie Evans Bottle Chapel and Sculpture Garden at Airlie Gardens in Wilmington, a structure built with mortar and thousands of glass bottles, inspired by the art of the visionary artist who worked in the garden for many years as a gatekeeper.

In 2000, Virginia donated the sweeping mural which is permanently installed on the ceiling of the new atrium at Columbine High School after the tragic shootings there.  It is comprised of twenty painted panels which lift the eyes to a perspective of a Colorado forest of evergreens, aspen and sunlight.

She has written and illustrated many children’s books, including three John Burroughs Nature Book Award winners:  A Desert Scrapbook, An Island Scrapbook, and A North American Rain Forest Scrapbook.

Her most recent work has included a one-person exhibition of 120 road trip oil paintings at the Cameron Art Museum in Wilmington, and a “pop up” exhibit of new oils and watercolors at 216 N. Front Street sponsored by Art in Bloom Gallery.

At Art in Bloom Gallery, Virginia exhibits a variety of oil and watercolor paintings and lino prints inspired by nature, the figure, landscape, color and light.

Virginia’s website can be found at:  virginiawright-frierson.com

Artist Statement – Art Made with Light

A photogram is a shadowlike photographic image made by placing objects between light-sensitive paper and a light source.  I made my first photograms in photography class in the 1980s.  At the time, making photograms was simply a way to learn my way around the darkroom.  It taught me how to use an enlarger and what the various chemicals do. A few decades later I rediscovered the darkroom and found it’s still one of my favorite places to be. Antique garments, vintage glassware and natural objects are among the subjects in my work.  I collect specimens of frogs, lizards, dragonflies and butterflies.  Found leaves and wildflowers are pressed under books in my studio.  The ocean offers sea whips, crab shells, seahorses and seaweed, dried in the sun.  Flea markets and thrift stores hold a treasure trove of antique Christening gowns, Edwardian blouses, Victorian bonnets, delicate glassware and old lace.

I initially began making photograms using what I refer to as my “critters”; seahorses, crabs, butterflies, dragonflies, sea whips, wildflowers and other found curiosities.  My husband works in coastal science and helps me gather specimens.  No animals are ever harmed—they’re gathered after they’ve passed.  One day my husband came home with a deceased baby stingray.  He had noticed some fishermen getting ready to toss it back.  He asked if he could have the ray and they agreed.  So the joke now is that it’s all fine and good if your husband brings you flowers.  But it’s really exciting if he brings you a dead baby stingray.

Eventually, I was led to include textiles as photogram subjects. The first image I made using a garment was a vintage full slip with a cigarette burn on the thigh, that I found at my favorite thrift store. Who wore the slip? What was her story? When I’m working on a garment photogram, I try to visualize the person who wore the garment.  I generally don’t see faces, but rather fleeting images of torsos and limbs against various backdrops; simple or elaborate, seductive or domestic, light or dark.

I embrace imperfection in my images, but try to be precise when arranging my subjects. While it might be easier if I had more light to see what I was doing, that would also take a lot of the fun out of it.  Anticipation has always been one of my favorite things about the darkroom.  My compositions are usually simple but thoughtful, and can be viewed as ethereal, playful, dark, joyful, morose, hopeful or nostalgic. This simplicity allows the viewer to find their own story, be it family, politics, feminism, gender, sexuality, body-image, materialism, culture, economy, history or simply nostalgia.  To me, they’re first and foremost, a reminder to always try to see things in a different light.

Watch a short video about Melissa’s Photogram Process

Roberto Vengoechea was born and raised in Colombia, South America, of Indian and Spanish-Basque ancestry.  He immigrated to America as a young man, learning his craft while living in Florida.  In Florida he met his wife, June (from Scotland) and together they relocated to Black Mountain, North Carolina to be closer to the unique arts and crafts scene.

Roberto’s designs feature sophisticated, contemporary fine jewelery consisting of unique square-shank rings, cast in precious metals using fine gemstones and diamonds. His creations have often been referred to as “Dali-esque”, referencing Salvador Dali. 

After 25 years of offering fine jewelry at Visions of Creation Gallery in Black Mountain, NC, Roberto and June closed the doors of their brick and mortar gallery on Cherry Street in 2022. Though they have retired from the business of operating a gallery, Roberto continues to create custom-made, fine art jewelry for Art in Bloom Gallery. He also specializes in designing commissioned jewelry upon request.

Artist’s Statement

One compliment I won’t forget was a few years after we moved here from Florida. A reporter penned an article about my work and titled it “Dr. Seuss meets Salvador Dali” and further described my work in the article. To this day, we still use this catch phrase as part of our advertising.

Jump forward 20 years – my work is very geometric, futuristic and out-of- the-box, words used by many visitors. When visitors come into our gallery and ‘drool’ over the jewelry, I now tell them that I came here from the 25th Century in a time machine and can’t get back.

Inside my imagination, my respect and admiration belongs to Antonio Gaudi and Salvador Dali. I travel in parallel lines. I see through the same window but with a different vision creating pieces that are outside the box. This is why I named my business “Visions of Creation.” Those are the visions I see in the Creation. We recently celebrated 20 business years at our Gallery here in Black Mountain, NC. We created a photo collage of work from our opening spanning 30 years. When we first viewed the collage, we realized that those early pieces are as timeless then as they are now. You cannot tell the difference between the progression of time.

I consider my designs to be Avant-Garde – they defy traditional forms and genres, yet are practical in their form and fit. Like Gaudi, I like to fuse organic with architectural design in a futuristic manner, confounding the conventional and pushing the boundaries of ‘thinking outside the box.”

Kirah is a lifelong artist and adventurer at heart. Her early years set a foundation for travel, exploration and the fundamentals to visual storytelling. Her paintings and mixed media works are deeply personal expressions of memory and dreams, inspired by nature and geological forms. In addition to her studio practice, Kirah is a dynamic instructor, lecturer, mentor and coach, leading custom studio and plein air courses directed to both beginner and professional artists. She also creates custom international art and cultural history travel workshops. Kirah brings rich insight to materials and traditional and contemporary processes. She is an award-winning illustrator, graphic designer and studio artist, a certified Golden Artist-Educator and Silver Brush Artist-Educator. She is active in community arts programming and passionate about preservation of cultural and natural resources.

Kirah is a staff instructor at the Museum School at Cameron Art Museum, and adjunct instructor at Cape Fear Community College and Johnston Community College.

You will find her splitting time between her home in the Cape Fear region of NC and Umbria, Italy.

Learn more at: www.kirahfineart.com and IG @kirahart

In 1998, after a profound painting experience at an international artist colony formerly monastery, St. Joakim Osogovoski in Macedonia, Pam Toll, along with two partners, established the No Boundaries International Art Colony, whose mission is to lay aside national boundaries in favor of cross-cultural exchange. Held on Bald Head Island in North Carolina, hundreds of artists from every continent in the world, except Antarctica, have participated in this artist residency.

UNCW faculty member since 1999, Toll taught studio classes and led two UNCW Study Abroad trips to Macedonia and Ireland. She also led a student painted mural at the Good Shepherd Center in Wilmington, NC in 2017. In 2014 Toll designed ten stained glass windows for B’Nai Temple and, in 2019, doors for the temple Ark in Wilmington, NC. Through the years she made or loaned work for 17 film productions. She was nominated for a United States Artist fellowship in 2009.

Toll’s work is represented in various collections including Bljarica Art Collection in Montenegro; Karatay University and Yildiz Technical University in Turkey; Cromarty Arts Trust, Scotland; Casoria Contemporary Art Museum, Naples, Italy; Macedonia Museum of Modern Art, Art Pointe Gumno , St. Joakim Osgovoski and Osten Drawing Collection in Macedonia; Noja Cultural Center Collection in Spain; the Art and Art History Department and Randall Library at the University of North Carolina in Wilmington; Cameron Art Museum; Cameron Management; Bald Head Island Limited; along with many private collections in the US and abroad.

Recent exhibitions include:

Solo Exhibitions
“Longing and Movement” at UNCW’s Cultural Arts Building Gallery in Wilmington, NC 2025
“Landscape and Memory” at CFCC’s Wilma Daniels Gallery in Wilmington, NC 2019

Group Exhibitions
“Nature and Art” at Art Point Gumno International Art Colony Exhibition, Sloeshtica, Macedonia 2022
“Water” at Acme Art Studios 2022
“5th Edition of Survival Art Symposium and Exhibition” at Cassoria Art Museum, Naples, Italy 2021
“Pepper” Group Invitational, Macedonian and US artists, Gallery MC, NYC 2019

Toll received her B.A. in Art and English Literature at University of North Carolina Chapel Hill and an M.F.A. in painting at East Carolina University.

Her studio is located at Acme Art Studios, a workspace for artists which she co-founded in 1991.

Traudi Thornton
(April 4, 1940- March 30, 2023)
Master Ceramicist

Traudi was born in Czechoslovakia in 1940. She first studied music at Creighton University before studying ceramics with Henry Soreco at Creighton, the University of Nebraska at Omaha and raku in a workshop with Paul Soldner at the University of Nebraska at Omaha in 1972. She returned to Germany and joined a cooperative art community in which she lived and worked on ceramics.

Love precipitated her move to Wilmington in 1983. She once again built a ceramic studio and began teaching ceramics at the Community Art Center where she influenced many budding ceramists.

Traudi said, “Working with clay validates my existence. During the plastic state, the relationship is that of master and a much beloved pet. I tell the clay to stay and push it, but often I have to listen. We have a rhythm. Clay needs heat to be transferred to a hard material. After the first fire everything turns from a state of grey to pink, and a slight estrangement takes place because they now look different than what they did before. Glazes also look pink or white or grey before they are fired. I imagine now how the optics will look in their final state, and after making choices the second fire takes over. Total surrender is demanded by heat and flame. After the firing is completed, the cooling period leaves my mood fluctuating between doubt and hope. And, then only after removing the pieces from the kiln, can I say they belong to me.”

Traudi showed and sold her work through Art in Bloom Gallery beginning in 2015.  She is survived by brother, Walt Bayer and his wife Tina, nephew Jurgen Wilde and the family she chose and loved here in Wilmington.

Born in Buffalo, NY my family eventually moved outside of the city to a small town which had an antique shop. I remember at the young age of 12 going in one day and being amazed by the unique one of a kind items including some of the antique furniture in various styles made from varying species. At the age of 15 & now living in Eastern North Carolina I started working my 1st job cleaning floors. I remember being excited to work not only to make some $$ but to learn a skill. I was never one to sit around twiddling my thumbs. I like to blame this on my father who set a great example of how to provide for your family sometimes working 2 & 3 jobs at times to make sure we had a roof over us and food on the table.

Anyway after about 9 years or working in about 6 different fields of work that really didn’t suit me. I started working for my father-in-law’s auction company which I enjoyed since I got to learn so much more about antiques and furniture. I learned how to repair and refinish pieces that came in for the auction. I learned the various styles from throughout the last 200 years along with the species & techniques used to make them. I especially fell in love with Mid Century Modern designs by Knoll, Eames, Jacobsen, Nelson especially the naturalistic style of the famed George Nakashima.

Eventually with my ever growing family of 7 I needed to somehow make some supplemental income. So in 2015 I started buying well used and worn out furniture as well as some cool vintage & antique industrial pieces that I could repair, refinish, recycle or up-cycle into one of a kind pieces I would sell at various local consignment shops. Working on those pieces one day out of the week. One day someone who saw my work contacted me and asked me to make a 10’ long custom entryway table from scratch using new materials. Something I had never done before and had zero experience doing. But if you know me you know I’m always up for a challenge. And from the completion of that table I was hooked with making things with my hands from local sustainably sourced woods and recycled steel.

What started out as a 1 day a week way to make some extra money to help support my family 3 years later it became a full time job where I can work from home and be close to my family and each one of them has at one time or another come out to the garage and helped me work on projects among other things making it a full family affair. I get to work with my hands using natural materials I have always had a special place for in my heart. I always tell people I don’t make the gorgeous materials I use. I can only enhance and show off the beauty our Creator has given us. And I take something that could have eventually rotted and returned to the earth and make it into something that will last a lifetime or longer.

Satava Art Glass, located in Chico, CA, produces an array of stunning hand-blown and solid forms in glass. Their work is well known and appreciated throughout the world. Richard Satava’s hand-blown vases, depict beautiful natural landscapes, have made many a person melt.  Each handmade piece is engraved and signed by Satava Art Glass for proof of authenticity.

Born July 18, 1942 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, H.M. Saffer II launched his career by exhibiting his art at a public art show at the tender age of six.

Upon graduation from Temple University in 1965, he traveled to Paris, France to enroll in graduate economics courses. Concurrently, HM’s path took a different twist, as he soon leveraged his musical talent performing with notable French stars Hugues Aufray, Jacques Brel, Charles Aznavour, and many others. He was later hired by Barclay Records as a producer, and had several hit records in 1968 and 1969. During this period, he was also the chef / owner of two restaurants in Paris, and later a third located in Ibiza, Spain.

Remarkably, as engaged as he was, HM never stopped painting and exhibiting his works. Several of his shows – sponsored by his restaurants and music associates – “sold out” and were favorably written up by the press. Before returning to the United States in 1970, he completed selected studies at L’Ecole Des Beaux Arts and exhibited in Paris and Brussels, Belgium.

HM continued on with his music career in the United States at Warner Brothers Productions where he co-wrote the international hit song, “Look What They Done To My Song, Ma”, recorded by Ray Charles, Melanie and other performers. While at Warner he painted a forty foot mural in their Madison Ave., NY headquarters and exhibited his works in the firm’s lobby. In 1972 HM was hired by the dynamic songwriter/producer Bob Crewe as Senior Vice President for the Crewe Group of companies where he worked with the industry’s top names including Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, Vicki Carr, and Oliver. Later that year, he established HMS Two Music Ltd. and spent his time writing and producing music for films, commercials, recordings and Broadway productions. HM’s work in the commercial field is familiar to us all with creations for Pepsi, Mountain Dew, Ford Motor Company, and Michelob among others.

All through this period HM’s art continued to refine and yet broaden in its scope. In 1981 he began to study the art of Japanese brush painting. He left for Japan in 1983 to study with Japanese masters, and there he met his wife, Hisayo. While in Japan, HM adapted his Sumi-e techniques by applying Western styles of painting.. He was represented by Galerie Musee and the Artbridge Gallery in Japan, and in Hong Kong by Alisen Gallery and the Kwai Fung Hin Gallery enjoying successful solo exhibits.

HM reentered the United States in 1994 and took residence in Upstate New York. His style of painting shifted from exclusively works on paper to include oils. He began melding his Oriental influences with his Western styles in order to create new and different path towards interpersonal visual expression, and his current works are a reflection of this mélange.

HM has instructed at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA, Berkshire Community College,  Columbia-Greene Community College, Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI), Art School of Columbia County (ASCC).  He currently has gallery representation both in the United States and Internationally.

Artist Statement

I work primarily as a painter in oil, but also work two dimensionally in collage/mixed media and three dimensionally in ceramics and papier-mâché. When painting and when working three dimensionally, my work is mostly representational. Collage/mixed media work is largely non-representational. I enjoy going between the three freely based on which one fits what I want to say at a given time. Regardless of the medium, all share the same intention of portraying things which are more than they superficially seem. I want to suggest a story, show a certain light, a moment, a mood, a shared memory. I take my own reference photos. These are images which said something to me.

I like to work in multiples and within themed series as this allows me to more fully explore aspects of a subject or theme. In the past – and continuing – this has included a focus on local foods and food providers, such as produce stands and fish markets, as this gives me a way to speak about food as an expression of region and culture. Recent animal paintings include some of the earliest breeds brought to the Americas, but I am playing with other aspects such as the joy of a hog wallowing in the mud on a hot day or goats taking a sunbath in the sandy dust of eastern NC. A painting of a Devon Red cow becomes a nod to 19th century paintings of prize winning animals.

I enjoy invoking references to art history and am currently working on a new series of still life’s inspired by the work of Fede Galizia, a Renaissance female painter.

About the Artist

Angela Rowe is a native of Pisgah Forest, North Carolina. Although she grew up drawing and making objects, she took other career paths,  working an architectural historian, in arts administration, and managing high complexity global projects for IBM.

Since 2013 Angela has focused on making art, maintaining a studio practice at ACME Art Studios since 2014. She received an AFA in Visual Art from Cape Fear Community College in May 2018.

Primarily a painter, she also works in mixed media, print making and ceramics.

Dick Roberts, originally from Durham, NC, has made Wilmington his home since 1982. His studio has been in AMCE Art Studios since 1991, an artist collective located in downtown Wilmington, of which he is a co-founder.  He is also a co-founder of the No Boundaries International Art Colony, established in 1997, which happens yearly in Bald Head Island.

“The paintings are about the act of painting. Although individually the paintings possess different intensities, opposing levels of complexity and abstraction, and perhaps a vague adherence to a narrative, the core of the process of painting remains consistent. The paintings are a reflection of the process of painting them. Every process is unique.

The magic of painting can never be totally explained. I find joy in discovering the emerging world of a new painting. Although harmony of the mind and the heart is important, the metabolic process of converting color, form and line into the forces that drive the painting is absolutely necessary.”

Jessie Robertson is a multimedia artist who creates equally scientific and inviting depictions of animals. Jessie’s best known for her focus on frogs, which alongside art has been her lifelong passion. By painting and sculpting the diverse species she researches, Jessie works to promote their conservation.

Jessie donates 10% of her sales to the international amphibian conservation organization SAVE THE FROGS!.

Artist Statement

Ever since I can remember, I have been filled with a great love for frogs and toads. Everything about them, from their bright eyes and wide grins, to powerful movements and adaptions, amazes me. That’s what’s inspired me to capture their diversity through art. However, this passion took on a much greater meaning when I discovered the international frog conservation organization SAVE THE FROGS! in 2012, and learned of the enormous threats that frog species face. Of the more than 7,000 known species of frogs and toads, it is estimated that over 70% are in decline, with roughly 1/3 of all amphibian species in danger of extinction by 2050.

Since then, I’ve been determined to use my art to help. By combining painting, sculpture, and infographics to present frog species’ stories, I hope to spread awareness of the overwhelming threats they face. By sharing my art at Art in Bloom Gallery, I work to raise funds for their global conservation. And by expressing the beauty I’ve always seen in frogs, I hope to encourage viewers to love them as well. The tragedy of frogs’ dramatic declines is that every threat they face, from climate change to infectious disease, is human caused. But that’s exactly why I have so much hope that we can work together to save them. Frogs need us, and I believe we need them too.

Biography

Born in Memphis, TN, Jessie Robertson moved with her family to Wilmington in 2010. Since 2017, Jessie’s award-winning art has displayed in several group and solo art exhibits, including shows at Wilma Daniels Gallery, ACES Gallery, 216 N. Front Street, the NC Aquarium at Fort Fisher, and Art in Bloom Gallery. While continuing her education at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, Jessie began working as a gallery assistant and filmmaker at Art in Bloom Gallery, where her work is represented. Now, having graduated from UNCW with bachelor’s degrees in Studio Art and Digital Arts in 2023, she continues to explore artwork through painting, sculpture, and digital multimedia. Jessie hopes that the more she learns and creates, the more successful she will be in achieving her goal of saving the frogs.

More of Jessie’s work can be found at: https://jrfrogs.com/

Brian H. Peterson has more than forty years’ experience as a curator, critic, visual artist, musician, and arts administrator. His photographs are in the collections of The Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Amon Carter Museum, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and the Denver Art Museum, among others.

As the Gerry and Marguerite Lenfest Chief Curator at the James A. Michener Art Museum (1990-2013), he managed the exhibition program, curated historic and contemporary exhibitions, and was the editor and principal author of the landmark publication, Pennsylvania Impressionism (2002).

As well as author of The Smile at the Heart of Things (2009) and I Give My Eyes (2018), Peterson has also contributed critical writing to the Los Angeles Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, American Arts Quarterly, and the Photo Review. In retirement he has taken up videography while continuing his work as writer and photographer.

His 1981 song cycle “Moon Songs,” based on the poetry of E. E. Cummings, was featured on the CD Modern American Art Song (2015) with mezzo-soprano Sharon Mabry. Peterson’s most recent publication, in its second printing, is The Blossoming of the World (AR Press, 2023), a spiritual autobiography and story of healing and salvation.

“Peterson’s photographs transcend the realm of objects to speak about matters of the soul.”
—Ellen Rosenholtz, former director, Lancaster Museum of Art

Brian’s Website:  https://brianhpetersonwordimage.com/

Artist Statement

Whether I am working in black and white or color I’ve sought to suggest in my paintings – in addition to beauty -feelings of hope and peace.

Most of the black and white verticals started with music. They were born out of the genius of others such as Mozart and Bach. When I am listening to a piece of classical music and I close my eyes, what I see is the lines, the vibrations and explosions of the sounds, the notes, and the music. It always comes to me that way. And then black and white, never color, perhaps referencing the notes and sheet music I have seen throughout my life.

While the black and white pieces are inspired by music, the color pieces are about light and imagination. My color work is heavily influenced by nature and the magic of the ever-changing landscape.

I primarily work with watercolor on canvas, but my intention is never to follow the traditional path of watercolor. I am always experimenting, using the fluidity of the medium to my advantage. Sometimes I will use printing techniques to achieve patterns, sometimes spraying and rubbing and creating shadows by taking the paint off as quickly as I have applied it. It’s an exciting process because the outcome is always a surprise and that is what I look for, the happy accident when the very wet paint has a mind of its own and directs my next step.

About the Artist

Constance Pappalardo was born in Lima, Peru. She moved to New York City at the age of eight. The art and culture of the city inspired her to pursue her art studies. After high school, Ms. Pappalardo studied painting at The School of Visual Arts, in Manhattan.

Pappalardo now lives in Cary, North Carolina. Her contemporary abstract watercolors have been featured in numerous galleries in Cary, Raleigh, Chapel Hill, and other cities in North Carolina.

She is a member of the Fine Arts League on Cary, The Visual Art Exchange in Raleigh, Artspace and of The Durham Art Guild in Durham.

Ms. Pappalardo is the recipient of various art awards. Her works are included in local corporate collections as well as private collections in the states as well as England, Norway, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Russia, Mongolia, Moldova, and her native Peru.

She was chosen to be the signature artist for Cary’s 2007 Spring Daze Arts and Crafts Festival and is one of the original founders of The Cary Art Loop, Final Friday Art Walk.

Ms. Pappalardo is very involved in many charity art auctions, donating art throughout the years to such charitable events as VAE’s For the Love Art auction and gala, the Works of the HeArt/ action against AIDS auction and gala, North Carolina Museum of Art’s Art of the Auction, the Red Cross, the Boys and Girls Club of Wake County and Habitat for Humanity among others.

Wilmington artist David A. Norris has a BFA degree from the East Carolina University School of Art.  Long settled in the Port City, he finds that the historic atmosphere of Wilmington and the natural beauty of the Cape Fear River and the coast provide limitless sources of artistic inspiration.

Most of David’s work reflects the landscapes of the places where he has lived or visited.  Through his interest in art history, his work has absorbed influences such as English watercolors, 19^th century engravings, Japanese woodblock prints, Dutch Baroque landscapes, and Van Gogh’s reed pen drawings.

David has recently been working with oil paints, adding new locally inspired oils to his long-standing series of regional cityscapes and landscapes done in watercolor and pen and ink. He also works in other media ranging from photography to black and white pen & ink drawings, monoprints, dry point prints, silverpoint, scratchboard, linoleum block prints, cyanotype prints, and collage.

Wilmington artist David A. Norris has a BFA degree from the East Carolina University School of Art.  Long settled in the Port City, he finds that the historic atmosphere of Wilmington and the natural beauty of the Cape Fear River and the coast provide limitless sources of artistic inspiration.

Most of David’s work reflects the landscapes of the places where he has lived or visited.  Through his interest in art history, his work has absorbed influences such as English watercolors, 19^th century engravings, Japanese woodblock prints, Dutch Baroque landscapes, and Van Gogh’s reed pen drawings.

David has recently been working with oil paints, adding new locally inspired oils to his long-standing series of regional cityscapes and landscapes done in watercolor and pen and ink. He also works in other media ranging from photography to black and white pen & ink drawings, monoprints, dry point prints, silverpoint, scratchboard, linoleum block prints, cyanotype prints, and collage.

About the Monoprint Process

Monoprinting is a process by which the artist creates prints, but only as single, unique copies.

One variation, the “plexiglass print”, begins with a thin layer of block print ink rolled by a brayer onto a sheet of plexiglass or other firm, smooth material. The artist lightly places a sheet of paper face down on the glass. A guide sketch can be taped to the back of the sheet. Wherever the artist traces a line of the sketch — by pen, pencil, or even a fingertip — the pressure transfers a mark to the printing paper. When done, the paper is carefully pulled from the plexiglass and allowed to dry, leaving the new print.

The new monoprint can stay “as is”, or the artist can continue printing additional colors of ink onto the sheet. It is also possible to embellish the print by hand. The thick printmaking ink, when dried, makes a rich surface for color pencil or other drawing media.

From the time Meg McGrew first picked up a camera, she’s always been fascinated by shadows.  Meg loves the way our shadows elongate in late afternoon sun. She’s hypnotized by the crisp morning shadows that appear on her bathroom walls, outlining a piece of pottery or a cascading strand of leaves from a flowerpot on a shelf.

Lately Meg has been focused on how objects and shadows can be transformed into different and unique images. She’s taken the original photos and altered them digitally, playing with exposure, color, contrast and applications that add texture to the image. Time melts when she’s involved in this process.

Over the years, Meg has expressed herself creatively through photography, pottery, painting and drawing. But taking photos has been the most integral part of her creative life. Catching the play of light on an object or person, combined with a cast shadow, is Meg’s ongoing point of focus. Meg’s intention with her current series of photos is to illustrate how things change in time and in our imaginations, moment to moment.

Born in 1949 along the Eno River in segregated Hillsborough, North Carolina, Clarence Mayo Jr. discovered his love for art in the very classrooms where he first experienced both the challenges and inspirations of a segregated community. After earning a Visual Art degree from Shaw University in Raleigh, he taught in the Burlington Public School System, sharing his passion for creativity with young learners. A move into the restaurant industry temporarily put his artistry on hold, but he eventually rediscovered his need to create and reignited his creative spirit.

Over the years, Clarence’s artwork has been featured in numerous North Carolina venues, including The Little Art Gallery in Raleigh, the UNC Student Union, Naomi Studio and Gallery, the Carrack Modern Community Gallery, the Durham Art Guild, The Nido Coworking + Childcare Building, Pleiades Gallery, The Golden Belt Art + Studios, the Community Church of Chapel Hill Unitarian, Art Post Art Market, Hillsborough’s Last Friday Art Market, and the Freedom Book Festival. Now residing in Durham, he continues to draw on his rich personal history to produce art that reflects both his roots and his enduring dedication to creative expression.

Clarence came to Art in Bloom Gallery through an artist exchange project with the Durham Art Guild.

The Durham Art Guild is a nonprofit member-driven visual arts organization established in 1948. The Guild’s mission is to enrich and connect our communities by creating opportunities and providing leadership for current and future visual artists and art enthusiasts. The Guild programs over 40 exhibitions annually across multiple NC community partnership venues featuring over 400 regional artists. In addition to the Creative Mentorship Program and the Artist in Residence Program, the Guild also produces over 20 arts related events each year including receptions, lectures, community building events and professional development workshops. For more information about the Durham Art Guild please visit www.durhamartguild.org or follow us @durhamartguild

Riverwalk Glass

Marcy McAninch of Riverwalk Glass was born and raised in southwestern Pennsylvania and has always had a fascination with colored glass. Drawn towards the many antique stained windows glass seen in salvage and vintage stores, she decided to try her hand at making stained glass by taking a class in 2017.  She was immediately hooked and moved to Wilmington in 2018, where she took more classes to further her knowledge. She loves making glass art and recently focused on making 3-D stained glass pieces. She’s inspired by the colors and beauty of our coastal town and by the many artists that call Wilmington home.

Artful Notions

Melissa Hindle-Sherman says time stands still with every watchwork piece that Artful Notions creates. She creatively fabricates time and space into wearable art. Her elegant ‘steampunk – themed’ jewelry is inventively fashioned using vintage timepieces – sometimes accented with imagery from the Hubble Space Telescope.  Using bits and pieces of clocks, watches and other found objects, everything eventually finds its way into something new: stars shine out from brass and metal is etched and aged to create unique patinas. Her inspiration comes from mixtures of textures and media, combining the new with the old, fabricated with the found… each piece coming together to create something truly unique. Most recently Melissa is “fired up” about enamels! Learning while doing – she is teaching herself torch firing with enamels to bring unique textures and color into her work. Painting, stenciling and impressing stamps into metal, the fun is in the making. Each piece is a small work of art on its own.

Melissa earned a BFA in printing making and watercolor from Edinboro University in 1994.  Melissa delved into jewelry during her final semester where she realized her proclivity for functional yet fun, pieces of jewelry. While in school she was able to hone her skills in metal fabrication and finishing while working for a jeweler part-time.  Utilizing these skills and constantly experimenting, while driving her husband crazy, she has continued to build her own lexicon to create her unique style. Melissa lives with her larger-than-life husband, who happens to be a writer, in downtown Wilmington, N.C.

Fritzi Huber (born 1950) has been making handmade paper for more than 45 Years. Her work has been exhibited and collected nationally as well as internationally.

Huber has taught hand paper-making workshops across the United States. Some of the workshop locations are Pyramid Atlantic in Maryland, Southwest School of Art in Texas, Arrowmont School Of Arts And Crafts in Tennessee, Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia, Mingei Museum in California, San Diego State University, and Tennessee Tech. in Tennessee. In addition, she has received numerous grants including from the Kenan Trust, the National Endowment of the Arts, and a California Arts Council Grant for Artist in Residence. Her workshops In North Carolina have been held at the old St. John’s Museum of Art, The Cameron Art Museum, East Carolina University, UNC Wilmington, and currently at Acme Art Studios in Wilmington, NC, where she also maintains a studio practice.

Her works are in international collections including Switzerland’s Musee Du Pays Et Val De Charney, Brazil’s Biennial International De Artes and The Ray Johnson Space at Artpool in Budapest, Hungary. More recently the Cameron Art Museum organized the exhibition Fritzi Huber: A Circus Life, which focused on the influences of Huber’s past circus experiences, and the resultant work relating to that background. Ms. Huber’s work is in numerous corporations, organizations, and institutions, among them are Duke Medical Center, SAS Industries, AOL Corporation, Lord Corporation, IBM, Volvo, as well as many private collections. The Cameron Art Museum holds her work in their permanent collection.

2024

Close to Home, Cameron Art Museum, Wilmington, NC

Messengers, Project 8179, Wilmington, NC

5: Five Years of Aquisitions, Cameron Art Museum, Wilmington, NC

Rock, Paper, Stitch, MC Erny Gallery, Wilmington, NC

Three Story Tellers, Durham Art Guild, Durham, NC

Joy of Art, Bnai Israel, Wilmington, NC

Holiday Fade Away, Acme Art Studios, Wilmington, NC

Off to See the Wizard, Acme Art Studios, Wilmington, NC

Mixed Bag!!!, Acme Art Studios, Wilmington, NC

Benefit Exhibition for World Central Kitchen, Acme Art Studios, Wilmington, NC

2023

LOVE, Cameron Art Museum, Wilmington, NC

Joy of Art, Bnai Israel, Wilmington, NC

Soda POP Gallery, Holiday Pop Up, Wilmington, NC

BHI Conservancy, Bald Head Island, NC

Outside the Box Two, Acme Art Studios, Wilmington, NC

Exhibition, Three Artists, Acme Art Studios, Wilmington, NC

Cabin Fever, Acme Art Studios, Wilmington, NC

Doug Haas is a wood turner who creates exquisite, original works of art often from wood found on local streets.  He teaches Woodturning at Brunswick Community College, Southport Center. In addition he demonstrates a variety of techniques for Woodturning clubs around North Carolina. Doug’s wood turning builds upon his previous experience and exploration in painting and design.

Doug graduated from East Carolina University in Greenville, NC with a BFA in Art with a studio major in painting and a minor in wood design. He also studied art at the Universidad de las Americas in Cholula, Puebla, Mexico.

In addition to his work in the arts, Doug has a 30+ year career including 20+ years as an area coordinator for the NC Division of Emergency Management and as an emergency management specialist for the US Marine Corps, in addition to other positions in training and development.

One of his favorite quotes is “Why not go out on a limb?  That’s where the fruit is.” Mark Twain

“I love color, it goes back to the things I saw as a child – a Christmas tree, a ball bouncing, a kite.”
—Dorothy Gillespie

Dorothy Gillespie was well known as a painter, sculptor, and installation artist whose work encompassed many significant 20th-century trends in art, including abstract expressionism, decorative abstraction, site-specific installations, the women’s movement, and art in public spaces. She pioneered joyful new directions for metal sculpture and is best known for large-scale, colorfully painted arrangements of cut aluminum strips that radiate, undulate, or curl like giant arrangements of ribbon, enchanted towers, or bursting fireworks.

Dorothy Gillespie’s illustrious career in art spanned over 70 years during which time she created, exhibited and sold her art work nationally and internationally.

Gillespie, born in Roanoke, VA, declared early her intention to become an artist. She studied art at the Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD then moved to New York City where she studied at the Art Student’s League of New York and the Stanley William Hayter’s Atelier 17.

Among her many honors, Gillespie received The Alice Baber Art Fund, Inc. Grant Award; a Doctor of Pedagogy, Niagara University, Niagara Falls, NY 1990; a Doctor of Fine Arts (Honoris Causa) Caldwell College, Caldwell, NY 1976; an Allied Professions Award,Virginia Society; The American Institute of Architects, Richmond, VA 1986; Distinguished Alumni Award, Maryland Institute, College of Art, Baltimore, MD 1983; Outstanding Services Award, University of Arkansas at Little Rock, AR 1983; and, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Women’s Caucus for Art in 2001. The Gala 8  ” Distinguished Woman” Award at Birmingham Southern College in 1987 honoring women who have made lasting contributions to our society in the fields of endeavor ranging from the arts, medicine, philanthropy, journalism, government, sports, entertainment and business”.

In addition to her demanding studio work, Gillespie served as a Distinguished Professor of Art, Radford University, Radford, VA 1997-99; on the Board of Trustees, Maryland Institute, College of Art, Baltimore, MD 1996-99; on the Board of Trustees, Maitland Art Center, Maitland, FL 1996-99; and on the Art in Public Places Committee, Broward Cultural Affairs Council, June 1993-June 1994; and as Visiting Artist, Radford University, Radford, VA 1981-83 where she initiated the University’s permanent art collection through a gift of her own work and where her work is now archived. Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellow from 1985-1993. During that period she made week-long visits to small private colleges throughout the country and gave public lectures, coached and taught young artists.

Early in her career, Gillespie contributed to the women’s art movement through her work at Artist in Residence, Women’s Interart Center, New York, NY 1972 and her lecture series at the New School for Social Research, New York, NY 1977. Gillespie is the subject of numerous reviews, critical essays, film and radio interviews and a book Dorothy Gillespie published by the Radford University Foundation Press.

Click here to download our DG Interactive Brochure featuring Dorothy Gillespie’s work around Wilmington!

Wm. Fridrich: Photographs

Robert Hughes, referring to the DADA move­ment (and Marcel Duchamp in particular), said that “like his Bottle Rack, Bicycle Wheel and other ‘ready­mades’…the world is so full of interesting objects that the artist need not add to them. Instead he could just pick one, and this ironic act of choice was equivalent to creation.”

The camera is the definitive instrument for making these ironic acts of choice. Then the function of this device — to record what already exists — in the DADA belief, is equivalent to the act of creation.

Wm. Fridrich studied art, sculpture and photography at UCLA, motorcycle magazines and in the U.S. Army, as a combat illustrator. He then launched a successful graphic design career in the early 1970s.

Introduced to the Dada and Surrealist movements by his wife, art historian Marsha McKee, William became clinically obsessed with Marcel Duchamp, Man Ray and Joseph Cornell: he has not yet recovered.

More of his work can be found on his WEBSITE.

Local artist and potter, Dianne Evans, has had a passion for art since childhood. She was born and raised in scenic Indiana, Pennsylvania. Dianne developed an interest in art while studying under an inspirational high school art teacher. This experience also inspired her to want to become a teacher. Dianne earned a BS in Elementary Education from Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 1994. In 1995 she moved to Wilmington, North Carolina where she began teaching. Although she is no longer teaching, she works at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. Continuing her love of art, she took art classes at UNC Wilmington in 2009-2010 where she focused on sculpture and ceramics. A field trip to Penland School of Crafts sparked an interest in pursuing ceramics as an art form.

Dianne is an active member of the Coastal Carolina Clay Guild and participates in local art shows. She predominately works in the medium of clay focusing on hand-built pottery.

Artist Statement

My current work features minimalistic forms that make a statement on their own while serving as a canvas for various designs and patterns. The form dictates the design. I utilize a paper-resist surface design technique to create and apply my designs. My surface decorations draw inspiration from textile patterns, shapes, repetition, and the layering of color and pattern, as well as the relationship between form and design.

The shapes and patterns interact with one another, creating a sense of movement across the surface and guiding the viewer’s eye around the piece. My work aims to evoke joy, peace, and serenity through its use of form, color, and design.

Brian Evans was raised in Western Pennsylvania where he graduated in 1993 from Indiana University of Pennsylvania with a B.A. in Studio Art. His primary focus was in sculpture and painting.  He moved to Wilmington, North Carolina in 1995.  He began in ceramics through the Continuing Education program at Cape Fear Community College while searching for an outlet for artistic expression. Brian studied under a Japanese-American Potter named Hiroshi Sueyoshi. Hiroshi has had a great influence on Brian’s work and in his life.

From 2002 through 2008, Brian taught Pottery Classes through the Cape Fear Community College Continuing Education Program. He also became a full-time ceramic artist. Since 2002, He has received various awards at Fine Art Shows and Art Festivals. In 2003, 2005, and 2022, Brian was awarded The Regional Artist Grant for New Hanover County, North Carolina. His work can be found in public and private collections across the nation and abroad. Brian is a founding member of the Coastal Carolina Clay Guild in Wilmington, NC which began in 2007. He is currently the Executive President of Orange Street Pottery Incorporated which is a 501c3 organization that includes Coastal Carolina Clay Guild. Brian began teaching at Orange Street Pottery again in 2016 and is teaching there currently.

Artist Statement:

My current body of work consists of altered wheel-thrown forms that are inspired by curves, lines, and caverns found in nature. The finished pieces exude a quiet sensuality that invites the viewer to touch the subtle curves and flowy lines that draw one’s eyes around the form. These new vessels reflect the curvy lines found in some of my sculptural works. My sculptural work consists of modern abstract designs. These structures are designed using curvilinear and geometric lines and shapes. I am intrigued by how the light and shadow interplay while painting an interesting shadow on the pedestal or wall. The shadow is different depending on the angle at which the light approaches the piece.  The patinated surfaces on my work reveal an aged or weathered look on a modern design. I find the juxtaposition of present and past intriguing.

Elizabeth Darrow has made Wilmington her home since 1977. Born in Hartford, Conn. Darrow is a 1967 graduate of Oberlin College (Oberlin, Ohio), where she majored in painting. She has been working in oil and collage throughout her career, usually in the manner of Abstract Expressionism.

She works in a variety of styles depending on her medium, but never works “from life” in the traditional sense. Most of the imagery that comes to her seems to hatch of its own accord, emerging from the process. Darrow enjoys working with color, repeating patterns, and embedding humor (and angst) into her work. Each piece takes her on a journey of discovery where she hopes to lose herself to the process.

Darrow’s works are held in many private collections locally and abroad. Additionally, her work can be found in the permanent collections of the Cameron Art Museum here in Wilmington, N.C., Duke University Medical Center, R.J. Reynolds, Lowes, Wells Fargo, BB&T Bank, SAS Institute, Sara Lee Inc., The Holiday Inn and Nations Bank.

Additionally, many of Darrow’s works can be found backstage at the Wilson Center, Cape Fear Community College’s center for performing arts. This group of work was donated to the Wilson Center in celebration of original art by anonymous donors.  Click here to view a slideshow of her work located at the Wilson Center.

Click here to view a slideshow of past and present art by Elizabeth Darrow.

Look deeper into the many phases and processes of Elizabeth Darrow’s art work in this documentary titled Elizabeth Darrow: Believing in the Process. the documentary was created by: Jessie Robertson, Robby Carl and Christina Capra 2019.

“Start With The Eyes” documents a new process for Elizabeth Darrow.  Once again she allows the process to lead her to the outcome, rather than working from a preconceived idea.  Elizabeth Darrow: Start with the Eyes, The documentary was created by: Jessie Robertson, and Christina Capra August 2021.

“Start With The Eyes” documents a new process for Elizabeth Darrow.  Once again she allows the process to lead her to the outcome, rather than working from a preconceived idea.  Elizabeth Darrow: Start with the Eyes, The documentary was created by: Jessie Robertson, and Christina Capra August 2021.

Elizabeth Darrow has made Wilmington her home since 1977. Born in Hartford, Conn. Darrow is a 1967 graduate of Oberlin College (Oberlin, Ohio), where she majored in painting. She has been working in oil and collage throughout her career, usually in the manner of Abstract Expressionism.

She works in a variety of styles depending on her medium, but never works “from life” in the traditional sense. Most of the imagery that comes to her seems to hatch of its own accord, emerging from the process. Darrow enjoys working with color, repeating patterns, and embedding humor (and angst) into her work. Each piece takes her on a journey of discovery where she hopes to lose herself to the process.

Darrow’s works are held in many private collections locally and abroad. Additionally, her work can be found in the permanent collections of the Cameron Art Museum here in Wilmington, N.C., Duke University Medical Center, R.J. Reynolds, Lowes, Wells Fargo, BB&T Bank, SAS Institute, Sara Lee Inc., The Holiday Inn and Nations Bank.

Additionally, many of Darrow’s works can be found backstage at the Wilson Center, Cape Fear Community College’s center for performing arts. This group of work was donated to the Wilson Center in celebration of original art by anonymous donors.  Click here to view a slideshow of her work located at the Wilson Center.

Click here to view a slideshow of past and present art by Elizabeth Darrow.

Look deeper into the many phases and processes of Elizabeth Darrow’s art work in this documentary titled Elizabeth Darrow: Believing in the Process. the documentary was created by: Jessie Robertson, Robby Carl and Christina Capra 2019.

“Start With The Eyes” documents a new process for Elizabeth Darrow.  Once again she allows the process to lead her to the outcome, rather than working from a preconceived idea.  Elizabeth Darrow: Start with the Eyes, The documentary was created by: Jessie Robertson, and Christina Capra August 2021.

Elizabeth Darrow has made Wilmington her home since 1977. Born in Hartford, Conn. Darrow is a 1967 graduate of Oberlin College (Oberlin, Ohio), where she majored in painting. She has been working in oil and collage throughout her career, usually in the manner of Abstract Expressionism.

She works in a variety of styles depending on her medium, but never works “from life” in the traditional sense. Most of the imagery that comes to her seems to hatch of its own accord, emerging from the process. Darrow enjoys working with color, repeating patterns, and embedding humor (and angst) into her work. Each piece takes her on a journey of discovery where she hopes to lose herself to the process.

Darrow’s works are held in many private collections locally and abroad. Additionally, her work can be found in the permanent collections of the Cameron Art Museum here in Wilmington, N.C., Duke University Medical Center, R.J. Reynolds, Lowes, Wells Fargo, BB&T Bank, SAS Institute, Sara Lee Inc., The Holiday Inn and Nations Bank.

Additionally, many of Darrow’s works can be found backstage at the Wilson Center, Cape Fear Community College’s center for performing arts. This group of work was donated to the Wilson Center in celebration of original art by anonymous donors.  Click here to view a slideshow of her work located at the Wilson Center.

Click here to view a slideshow of past and present art by Elizabeth Darrow.

Look deeper into the many phases and processes of Elizabeth Darrow’s art work in this documentary titled Elizabeth Darrow: Believing in the Process. the documentary was created by: Jessie Robertson, Robby Carl and Christina Capra 2019.

“Start With The Eyes” documents a new process for Elizabeth Darrow.  Once again she allows the process to lead her to the outcome, rather than working from a preconceived idea.  Elizabeth Darrow: Start with the Eyes, The documentary was created by: Jessie Robertson, and Christina Capra August 2021.

After more than twenty years of trial practice, Karen Paden Crouch traded her law office for the welding shop and began learning direct metal sculpture.

She works in bronze, copper and steel to create organic pieces for the house and garden. An avid gardener, Karen grounds her work in the structure and movement of living things.

Her work was recently featured in Dwell Magazine, where Karen’s welded-bronze sculpture, “Abracadabra,” is photographed.  View the article in Dwell Magazine.

Artist Statement

I work because I must. It is my passion, and every day that I am allowed to make something is an unexpected blessing. I work for the pure satisfaction of putting things together.

From my teen years forward I wanted to write. I attended colleges and graduate school with that goal in mind. Instead I found myself becoming a scholar, partly because I was afraid and partly because I was young and had little to write about. I left graduate school in the middle of my dissertation after my revered and well-meaning advisor praised a paper rich with analytical insight although sacrificing some of the spontaneity of my earlier writing. That did not seem to me, even at 25 or 26, to be a fair trade, and so I went to law school where, as I saw it then, I would have a more direct experience, an experience not derivative from another person’s art.

For more than twenty years I successfully and passionately advocated for a client’s position. I was in the thick of things, but I was safe behind the cover of advocacy. My plea, no matter how gutsy, was for someone else. Now I am sculpting and writing. Nothing I have done has been so frightening because this is about something directly from me. Whether it is good or bad, understood or misunderstood, trite or significant, it has come from within me. It is put out there for any passerby to embrace, ignore, or dismiss. I am proud and excited to run new hurdles.

My metal sculptures are grounded in the structure and movement of living things. When I work in bronze, I begin with a flat sheet from which I cut shapes. I heat these shapes with a torch and beat them into contoured pieces which I then weld into the sculpture’s form. Files, various abrasives and chemical patinas give the sculpture its final finish. Although I begin with a vision, the sculpture takes its own direction; if I will listen it will be a better piece. The found metal pieces grow from collected shapes. Sometimes I have an idea; sometimes I just start juxtaposing parts until an image emerges. My studio mate Marshall Milton once told me that sometimes the very piece that sparked the idea will be the piece that gets cut out as the sculpture evolves. That is true, even though it is always hard to make that choice. But I have always lived by instinct and, with assembled pieces, as well as the bronzes, the sculpture will tell me where to go if I am patient and listen.

My work is dedicated to the memory of Bill Thorp and in honor of Pat Webster. More than ten years ago atop a high North Carolina mountain these two, my shaman, set me on the restless path to living. While I hope each sculpture stands on its own, every piece I make reflects some part of that precious experience. Thank you, Pat.

Judy started painting while living in Peru, SA, at the age of 26.  That was over 40 years ago.

Upon returning to the USA, Judy worked as an artists’ model, where she met established artists, who critiqued her art.  This was invaluable. She was taught how to “see” color, composition and expression.  Her quest to learn more gave her the incentive to enroll at the University of Maryland for a second BA, in Studio Arts.

Ms. Hintz Cox resigned from her Psychiatric RN career to pursue art full time in 1999.  For the past 20 years, Judy has developed a unique style as an abstract minimalist.

She has exhibited extensively throughout the USA.

Artist’s Statement

Art takes my breath away. Just thinking about it increases my breathing. I love looking at every kind of art there is. I love walking into my studio, smelling oil paint and turpentine. I love seeing stretcher bars and rolled canvas in the open space. I love seeing painted canvases stacked against the wall. I love putting a blank canvas on the wall and mixing paint on my palette of glass. And I love swinging my arm around with a paint brush to begin the process of creating something. I consider myself an abstract minimal artist.

Most of my paintings are serene and meditative. My work has a lot of white paint which I believe makes them feel spacious. For that reason I don’t frame my paintings because I want them to “breathe”. Some of my paintings appear more expressive, but they are minimal in color, meaning no more than 3 colors in the piece. All my paintings are painted with rapid energetic brush strokes. I believe that art is subjective and do not try to tell anyone what my paintings mean. If they create an emotion in the viewer, I consider what I’ve done successful whether a person likes it piece or not.

Actor, singer, and glass artist, Richard Bunting has shown his glass art in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Ohio.  He has created and refined his performing art for over 35 years and his glass art for over 16 years.

Richard writes, “Dancing with molten glass is like dancing with a great (but HOT) partner.  As a singer, actor, dancer, director the last four decades, glass blowing fits as a theatrical experience.”

Bob Bryden’s work exists comfortably within the traditions of minimalism and optical art. Utilizing the simple elements of point, line, and plane he creates abstract images which are highly structured and concise while at the same time are optically active and visually illusive. The perceptual experience of his work involves the interaction of seeing and understanding and is directly related to how vision functions.

Bob grew up in the Piedmont region of North Carolina. He is a graduate of Guilford College in Greensboro, NC. He went on to do graduate work in South Asian art history at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. His desire for a greater involvement with creative arts lead to Kentucky and graduate work at the University of Louisville where he received a masters degree in art with a concentration in printmaking. In addition to art, he has worked primarily in graphic design and commercial printing. Today he pursues his creative endeavors in his swamp side home/studio in Wilmington, NC.

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