In the Gallery: May

In the gallery this month!

LANDSCAPES, SKYSCAPES & FLORALSCAPES by Joanne Beck & EGG-O-MANIA by Lynne Hamrick

JOANNE BECK comes to us by way of Columbia, Missouri where she received an undergraduate degree in Interdisciplinary Studies (art history, history, and literature). She completed her graduate work at Purdue University where she received a Masters in Art. She moved to Crawfordsville with her husband, daughter and two overweight cats in 1995.

Joanne's current exhibit represents the joy she experiences when she senses God's gifts in Nature's creations. This spring has been a time of renewal for Joanne with its sudden burst of warmth, the dance of sun rays through the rain and the multi-colored and myriad fragrances of lilac, hyacinth, and crab apple blossoms. Capturing nature through a painting or textiles is about sharing this renewal with others.

In her recent work, she has been particularly inspired by the sky and the ephemeral interplay of light and dark, the conversation between the moon and the sea, and the way the clouds tease the stars at night. When she thinks about landscapes, her attention is constantly drawn upward to the sky as the source of light and reflection.

In some of her seascapes, the sky is the predominant feature or the only feature. An example is the two large details of the sky on a vertical axis painted in oil. This pair of skyscapes represents not only a dramatic cloud burst, but also an ascent up a mountain of clouds into heaven.

Complementing these detailed sky paintings are several other large paintings in oil or acrylic that reveal the dialogue between the earth and the sky or the water and the sky. In contrast to these large works, Joanne has painted a series of small sky paintings that represent key times throughout the day, daybreak, noon, sunset, and night fall.

Turning from these large scale land and skyscapes, Joanne's exhibit also features studies of a single seed or flower to fully embodied floralscapes. Using handmade paper, oil paint and pen and ink drawings, Joanne made a series of four drawings of the growth of a seed. Using cotton fabric and acrylic paint, she painted three botanical studies of a hosta, magnolia, and peony. She used silk, dyes, and ammunition storage bags shaped like rose petals to create a petal full of roses. With cotton fabric and acrylic paint, she painted a series of floral tapestries.

Born in Indianapolis, LYNNE HAMRICK was a dental hygienist and graduate of I.U. School of Dentistry now living in Camby, Indiana. In the late 60s and early 70s, she found a small Craft Shop in Mooresville, Indiana that offered craft classes and fell head-over-heels in love with their egg art classes. She took several and soon began designing her own eggs and soon after that began teaching classes herself. She enjoys both designing and teaching others to design. In the last 35 years she has probably made over one thousand eggs which she has shared with others and given as gifts.

She uses eggs of all sizes from quail to rhea to ostrich, but prefers goose eggs because they are hard, have a smooth shell and are easy to hinge and fill with figures. Lynne now buys blown-out eggs from a source in Texas since they are no longer available in this area. She thinks of the egg as a symbol of new birth and finds great joy in making something beautiful from them.

She has taught classes at women's groups, VBS, camps, community centers, libraries, churches and schools. She works for the Indiana State Museum, the Covered Wagon Program and at cancer support workshops as she is a ten year cancer survivor.