Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 1 2 3

2 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 3 4 5 Simply Better. Selection � Knowledge � Parking � Accessibility � Experience

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O N E O F T E N N E S S E E ’ S O L D E ST A U C T I O N C O M PA N I E S 8 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 9 Firm License #16 10 11 SOTHEBY’S URBAN ABODE Publisher’s Note ART CRAWL As this new endeavor of writing an appraisal column TM for Nashville Arts has evolved, I have learned that, as much as it An Experience Like No Other August 2010 is a challenge for me putting words together in hopes of creating an interesting, factual, and coherent experience for the reader, I August 7th, 2010 Spotlight...... 12 love the discovery process, the “hows” and “whys” of our mate- 5:00 - 7:00 PM In The Gallery ...... 18 rial culture, and getting to share how much art and craft have benefiting Gilda’s Club Nashville The Alfred Stieglitz Collection been influenced by the politics and economy of the times. The At Fisk University ...... 22 art of collecting has very little to do with having lots of dispos- able income. It is about finding something that attracts and Cindy Wunsch fascinates you. It is also about staying curious and inspired. My A Self-Portrait ...... 30 wish has been to write a column that does not simply address the Igor Babailov value of an object on today’s market but also inspires people to The Russian Connection ...... 36 become interested in collecting. Anyone can. Captured in Bronze The LeQuire Legacy...... 46 As a girl who has spent her fair share of time “honky- Libba Gillum tonking” on lower Broadway and highly recommending the Split Seconds of Time...... 54 experience to everyone, it is an honor to be involved with Exclusive Lifestyle Home Tour of Theatre...... 62 a media source that raises the awareness of visitors and Downtown Nashville’s Finest Urban Abodes Marshall Chapman, Beyond Words...... 67 residents alike to the brilliance and diversity that is Middle Appraise It...... 68 Tennessee, past and present. I love all of the aspects of this Culinary...... 71 creative community. I am enormously grateful as Nashville Anything Goes...... 74 Arts Magazine brings it beautifully to life each month. No On The Town with Ted Clayton...... 76 one can experience this region without realizing that it ain’t My Favorite Painting...... 82 just about “Yee Haw” anymore!

Linda Dyer The Cumberland Units #2300 & #2308 Musicians: The Mercy Birds, Tawny George & on the cover: Diego Rivera Appraisal Specialist for the PBS production Antiques Roadshow Le Sucrier et les Bougies (Sugar Bowl Charlsey Etheridge and Candles), 1915, Oil on canvas and columnist for Nashville Arts Magazine Part of the Alfred Stieglitz collection at Fisk University Bennie Dillon Unit #1201 this icon at the end of an article means Published by the St. Claire Media Group Musicians: Daniel Lawrence Walker & there is accompanying video on our website Charles N. Martin, Jr. Chairman Cameron Cleland Paul Polycarpou, President nashvillearts.com Daniel Hightower, Executive Director Editorial & advertising Offices Editorial Live Music & Art In Each Penthouse Paul Polycarpou, Editor and CEO 644 West Iris Drive, Nashville, TN 37204 Tel. 615-383-0278 Katie Sulkowski, Managing Editor Business Office: Artists Include: Shannon Fontaine, Brian D. Parker, Barry A. Noland, Meagan Nordmann, Social Media & Web Manager Angela Innes, Adrienne Thompson Tinney Contemporary Madge Franklin, Copy Editor Distribution: Same Evening as the First Saturday Art Crawl Ted Clayton, Social Editor Parker Cason, Austin Littrell For more details visit: www.UrbanAbodeArtCrawl.com Linda Dyer, Antique and Fine Art Specialist Subscription and Customer Service: Jim Reyland, Theatre Correspondent 615-383-0278 Contributing Writers Letters: Rebecca Bauer, Beano, Wm Bucky Baxter, Lizza Connor Bowen, We encourage readers to share their stories and reactions Lou Chanatry, Marshall Chapman, Sophie Colette, Melissa Cross, Daysi, to Nashville Arts Magazine by sending emails to Greta Gaines, Joe Glaser, Beth Knott, Tony Lance, Linda York Leaming, [email protected] or letters to the address above. We Joy Ngoma, Lizzie Peters, Currie Powers, Ashleigh Prince, Kami Rice, reserve the right to edit submissions for length and clarity.

Bernadette Rymes, Sally Schloss, Eric Stengel, Katie Sulkowski, floral decor studio Kevin Tetz, Lindsey Victoria Thompson, David Turner, Lisa Venegas, Advertising Department OSHi Deborah Walden, Debbie Mathis Watts, Freya West, William Williams Sales Director: Leigh Mayo Design Sr. Account Executive: Randy Read Jeff Stamper, Design Director Cindy Acuff, Rebecca Bauer, Melissa Cross, Beth Knott Ben Miller, Advertising Design All sales calls: 615-419-2111 Other Sponsors Include: Photographers Business Office: WV Magic, King Jewelers, Tennessee Bank & Trust, Dana Goodman Interiors Jerry Atnip, Nick Bumgardner, Lawrence Boothby, Allen Clark, 40 Burton Hills Boulevard Matt Coale, Kyle Dreier, Tim Hiber, Peyton Hoge, Brad Jones, Nashville, TN 37215 Mark Levine, Anthony Scarlati, Bob Schatz, Pierre Vreyen Contact a Sotheby’s Lipman Group Agent to find out how to get an invite to the Exclusive Penthouse After-Party - a Private Reception & Indulgence of Wine, Hors d’oeuvres & Desserts. Silent Auction Featuring a Stunning Collection of Artwork, Wine and Jewelry. 10 | August 2O1O | Nashville ArtsNashville Magazine Arts Magazine | August 2010 | 10 Nashville Arts Magazine | AugustNashville 2010 | Arts 11 Magazine | August 2O1OArtists include: | 11Trevor, Liz Castleman, Thomas Spake, Shannon Fontaine, & Jill Tingley Budsliquors9.16.09.indd 1 9/16/09 1:55 PM Sultry Country Music by The Wrights 12 13

Spotlight Spotlight

Dance Theatre of Tennessee Grand Opening August 21 Gas Lamp Antiques Appraisal Fair The Dance Theatre of Tennessee (DDT) hosts the grand opening of their new Gas Lamp Antiques Mall will have their second Appraisal Fair on Saturday, August 14,000-square-foot facility featuring five huge studios for dancers to call home. This 7, 2010. The first Appraisal Fair, held May 1, was “very successful despite the rains free event begins at 2 p.m. and continues until 8 p.m. Families can enjoy a variety of and start of Nashville’s great flood,” according to Gas Lamp owner Lauren Bugg. activities and sample various genres of dance, including ballet, jazz, yoga, hip hop, One of the highlights was a rare Bible box, or “strongbox,” that was examined by and Zumba fitness. certified appraiser Marshall Fallwell, ASA. The box featured intact and original painted decorations, elaborate wrought-iron strapwork, and original locks. The Founded in 2009 as a performing arm of the Asian American Performing Arts inscription “ANO 1741” dated the box to 1741, and the carved Old German Fraktur Society, Dance Theatre of Tennessee (DTT) has been involved in community outreach lettering suggested either European or American origins. Fallwell suggested that and education, in addition to offering summer camps, intensives, and perfor- the owners have tests done to confirm the mid eighteenth century origins, includ- mances. They thrive bringing the beauty and excitement of the performing arts ing a wood analysis to determine if it is an American or European species, and to school children and local audiences. Led by longtime Nashville Principle Dancer Summer Fiesta a chemical analysis of the paint. Fallwell also arranged for Leigh Keno, of PBS’s Christopher Mohnani, the DTT has been able to provide educational and perfor- The Factory at Franklin Antiques Roadshow fame, to examine the box more thoroughly, and Keno expects mance opportunities to its students, reaching thousands in this year alone through On Saturday, August 7, Summer Fiesta tops off the to put the rare box up for auction in October. Contact Gas Lamp Antiques for its various programs. The DTT mission is “to blend the elegance and strength of last of the Art:PM Summer Art Series, a monthly information about submitting items for appraisal: 297-2224. world class dancers with the budding creativity and energy of youth.” Last month, themed art show and reception held at The Factory DTT launched its inaugural full-performance series with “New Beginnings,” with at Franklin and hosted by The Row at The Factory. performances of Nashville premiers highlighting the best in classical, contemporary, This creative community of working artists includes and modern works. Eleanor Ann Bailey, Christina Long, Connie Shaw, Eric Lankford, John Cannon, Joyce Creager, Amber The Dance Theatre of Tennessee Center for Dance is located at 2710 Old Lebanon Gould, Deann Hebert, Julie Westall, and Deborah Road, Suite 25B, Nashville, TN 37214 (Donelson Plaza). For more information, call Gall. The event runs 5–7 p.m. and will include 615-391-5500 or visit dancetheatretn.org. festive drinks, tapas, and live music from the Third Friday Band. Located at 230 Franklin Road in Building 12. Admission is free.

July 16 – August 28 Ron Lambert Tiffany Dyer Jason LaFerrera

August 13 – 28th Homeschoolers of Dickson County Photography Exhibition

Closing Reception for all four of these shows on Friday, August 27th from 6pm – 8pm. This event is free, includes food, and is open to the public.

Planned Coincidence (detail), Ron Lambert

August 14, 2010 THE RENAISSANCE CENTER www.tomatoartfest.com 855 Hwy 46 South · Dickson, TN 37055 · www.rcenter.org

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Spotlight Zeitgeist Gallery Right to Assemble Photo by Dove Photography Zeitgeist is pleased to announce the last of three summer ensem- ble exhibitions, part of their Right to Assemble series. The show is open August 5 through August 28, 2010. This complete series of gallery installations features luminaries from the Nashville artist studio/university/independent scene. This month features artists Phillip Carpenter, Nashville native, photographer, and master-mind behind The Brief Gallery; Vesna Pavlović, profes- sor of photography at Vanderbilt University whose current work incorporates elements of instal- Amanda Nagy lation and color studies; Brent This amazing photograph was taken by Nashville photographer Stewart, another Nashville native, Amanda Nagy. Titled Chase, it is part of a series of twelve photo- photographer, and filmmaker; and graphs consisting of macro images of the human eye. To create John Whitten, a recent graduate of them, Nagy used a 100mm macro lens to see the minute details Watkins College of Art and Design of the iris. The images were printed on a dried gel medium rather and mixed media artist. than photo paper so the viewer had the freedom to touch them. For more information about the images contact Amanda Nagy The gallery is continuing the tradi- Installation of color prints by at [email protected]. tion of opening its doors in the Vesna Pavlovic summer months for group shows featuring artists that cut across the boundaries of the contemporary visual art industry. In addition to pursuing commercial gallery careers, these artists can be found showing in alternative- artists spaces, university galleries, and museums.

On Thursday, August 5, the public is invited to the opening reception at the gallery from 5–8 p.m. This opening and exhibit will be part of the Art After Hours Hillsboro Village Art Walk. Equine Sculptor Gallery hours are 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. For more information please call Janice Zeitlin or Lain York at 615-256-4805.

Philippe Faraut Sculpting Workshop at Harpeth Art Center & Gallery

B r o n z e “ W i n d D a n c e r ” French sculptor Philippe Faraut brings his talents to the midstate 16 1/2 x 19 Supporting the Arts with Style this month. Participants have traveled from all corners of the every time you drive United States to take part in the sculptor’s series of classes at the Tennesseans are supporting their culture and love for the arts in Harpeth Art Center and Gallery, home to Mud Puddle Pottery style by purchasing new colorful license plates available through Studio in Pegram. Faraut currently resides in New York where he their County Clerk. Choose from a Blues-playing Cat, Tennessee has become famous for his classes on clay sculpture. Although Fish, or Rainbow. The demand for these bold metal canvases is his classes sold out upon announcement, locals will have the increasing, and $30.75 of the $35 specialty plate fee is allocated opportunity to experience Faraut’s sculptures alongside a robust to the Tennessee Arts Commission. Purchasing a license plate assembly of works by other artists in Fusion of Dimension, a show Bronze on display at Tennessee State Museum exhibit provides funding and support for arts activities through the that will run from August 13 to September 18 at the Harpeth Art “Romance of the Horse” | June 17th - August 23rd grant programs offered by the Tennessee Arts Commission’s Center and Gallery. An opening reception will be held on Friday, Commissions Welcome For more infor- www.janelmaher.com 615.794.7840 [email protected] grant budget. Proceeds now provide over two-thirds of the August 13, from 6:30 to 10:30 p.m. at the gallery. Commission’s grants budget. mation visit www.HarpethArtCenter.com or call 615-646-6644.

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Spotlight Spotlight Terri Jordan Tomato Art Festival August 14, 2010 The works of Tennessee artist Terri Jordan will be featured in For one day out of the year, two local exhibits this month. Jordan is the featured artist at Music City celebrates friends, the Roxy Theatre’s neighbors, family and toma- Peg Harvill Gallery toes at the Tomato Art Fest, to in Clarksville for the be held Saturday, August 14, month of August in Historic East Nashville. The during their produc- Seventh Annual Tomato Art tion of Into the Woods. Fest promises live music, Works in this show one-of-a-kind contests, kid- form part of the artist’s friendly events, art, fashion, Extinctly Endangered food, and fun. Last year, 32nd Tennessee Watercolor Society series that explores twenty thousand attendees Exhibition tours the state paintings of children filled the streets of East For the first time in its history, the Tennessee Watercolor Society Exhibition and animals in a whim- Nashville’s Five Points. A community builder, the will tour the state. Their first stop is the historic Customs House Museum sical celebration of Tomato Art Fest has grown steadily since its humble in Clarksville, Tennessee, where it will be on view through August 27. child’s play. The show beginning in 2004. Following there, it embarks on a five-month tour of the state, opening at the will be a part of the

West Tennessee Regional Art Center in Humboldt and the Pryor Gallery at August Art Walk on the ALL THE BEST IN FINE JEWELRY ALL THE BEST IN FINE JEWELRY This year’s Fest is focused on raising money for Columbia State Community College. fifth of the month. Best 5101 Harding Road • Nashville, Tennessee 37205 • 615.353.1823 5101 Harding Road • Nashville, Tennessee 37205 • 615.353.1823 victims of the flood. The Tomato Art Fest will known for her Matisse- donate $1 out of every $5 collected through PayPal This prestigious exhibition has grown tremendously since the organization inspired paintings of women and still life, the subject matter of on their website to flood relief and divide the was founded in 1971. Today it has a statewide membership of over two children and wildlife is a debut of new material for the painter. contributions between the East Nashville Flood hundred, and the biannual juried exhibition rotates around the state. Edie Relief and the Community Foundation of Middle Maney won first place for her piece Wildwood Garden (shown here). In Nashville, Jordan is part of the show entitled Sense of Place ALL THE BEST IN FINE JEWELRY Tennessee. Check out www.tomatoartfest.com For more information visit www.tnws.com at the Tennessee Art League. Jordan’s work in this exhibit is in 5101 Harding Road • Nashville, Tennessee 37205 • 615.353.1823 consort with rogue artist group Undergroud 9, which she founded last year. The show runs August 3-28 at Poston 3 Gallery of the Tennessee Art League. An opening reception takes place on August 7 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

The Power of Ten 2010 Regional Summit The Cumberland Region Tomorrow 2010 Convening the Region where jewelry is art Summit was held in Nashville, Tennessee, on May 26, 2010, at the War Memorial Auditorium. Over 450 regional and state leaders that represented key partners organizations gathered to focus on important regional topics.

As a way to recognize leaders for their professional and personal contributions to successful regionalism, the 2010 Awards for Regional Thinking and Action were presented to Mayor Karl Dean and Sam Hatcher. The painting Millet Field, created by cele- brated local artist Anne Goetze, was presented to the Honorable Karl Dean for his tremendous contribution as the 2010 public sector recipient.

In Stanford Square at 4231 Harding Road Monday through Saturday 10 to 6 615-385-4290 www.JewelryAtelier.com

In The Gallery

Didier Lourenco at Gallery West

Tucked away in an intimate, contemporary art gallery in Nashville is one of the largest collections of Spain’s best- selling artist, Didier Lourenco.

Gallery West owners Brenda Linscott and Tige Reeve first met Didier Lourenco (pronounced Did-e-a Low-ren-so) in New York City nine years ago when they immediately fell in love with his remarkable paintings that capture everyday scenes, which he depicts with his unmistakable and life-enriching touch. His paintings celebrate a variety of settings from terraces overlook- ing the Mediterranean to a festive street corner in New Orleans during Mardi Gras. “Didier is one of those unique artists who truly has the ability to transport the viewer into his vibrant world. Each visit holds the promise of a new discovery, and that is what we love about his work,” says Linscott. left: Carreons de Nuit, Oil on canvas, 34” x 67” $7,600 above: Te Espero en la Cama, Oil on canvas, 40” x 40” $6,800

top right: Chez Mon Ami, Oil on canvas, 59” x 45” $8,900

The thought of collecting these right: Patio Frente al Mar, Oil on canvas, 43” x 32” $5,900 small moments is what motivates below: Col. Leccionista de Papallones, Oil on canvas, 42” x 56” $7,600 below center: Nit i Pati, Oil on canvas, 43” x 57” $8,300 “me to go to the studio every day bottom right: Pareja y Banco, Oil on canvas, 36” x 46” $6,100 and try to stop time on canvas.

Didier Lourenco’s work perfectly encapsulates the influence” of his relaxed Mediterranean lifestyle over his art. “I would like to live life at a slower pace, have time to take in everything that surrounds us: light, color, fragrance, landscapes, thought, the cat, the moon, the dog, the woman, the bar, the taste, the child, the sea. The thought of collecting these small moments is what motivates me to go to the studio every day and try to stop time on canvas.”

Didier Lourenco was born in 1968 in Premia del Mar, Barcelona. At the age of 19 he began to work in his father’s print studio, where he learned the art of lithography. He began to paint on paper and canvas, taking over a small corner of the studio. In 1988 he had his first solo exhibition at Vilassar de Dalt and printed his first lithographic edition. Lourenco received numerous awards and had many solo and group exhibitions in Spain. In 1995 he moved into his own studio in Premia del Mar, Barcelona. Currently, his days are full of painting, travel, and wildly successful solo and collective exhibitions.

Didier’s work can be found at Gallery West, 265 White Bridge Road, Nashville, TN 37209. www.gallerywestnashville.com

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The latest sculptures of Brad Sells will be on exhibit at Two Moon Gallery Thursday, August 12 from 5 to 9 pm. The native Tennessean travels the world to find the perfect fallen wood to craft his vessels. Sells’ masterpieces are a part of numerous worldwide collections including the Smithsonian. Icon Series #5 Jaclyn Khoury www.twomoongallery.com • 615-942-5352 as 2905 12 avenue south Patti Smith photo:margaret ellis make-up:randy little

August’s featured artists will be... Lee Todd Local Painter

Amy Potter Local Potter Join us every “Third Thursday” of every month at Picture This for a wine tasting and art event

A monthly wine tasting and art event at our Hermitage gallery on the third Thursday of every month, featuring two wines and two artists. Appetizers’ provided by Bicyclette café, recent 3rd place winner in the “Toast of Music City” 2010 awards for best lunch in Nashville. Wines provide by Jackson Downs Wine & Liquors.

Thursday August 19, 2010 5pm-8pm Picture This Creative Framing & Gallery 4674 Lebanon Pike ~ Hermitage, TN 37076 615-889-5640 www.picturethis-gallery.com 2009 winner of “Best Art Events” in America, hosted by a custom framing retailer by Décor Magazine. Recognized as one of the top 10 Custom framers BENNETT GALLERIES | 210420 CRESTMOOR | August 2O1O ROAD | Nashville | NASHVILLE, Arts Magazine TN 37215 | PHONE 615-297-3201 Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 21 in America 2009 by Décor Magazine. Named best custom framer 2009 by the readers of “Nashville House & Home” magazine. WWW.BENNETTGALLERIESNASHVILLE.COM | HOURS: MON-FRI 9:30 TO 5:30, SATURDAY 9:30 TO 5:00 22 23

left: Georgia O’Keeffe, Radiator Building-Night, New York, 1927, Oil on canvas Today, we live in a world that the dreamers “at Fisk strove to create. Facing adversity or misunderstanding, they dared to believe the absurd: art, literature, and The Alfred Stieglitz Collection music might just change the world. Lucky for us, At Fisk University they were right.

” by Deborah Walden | photography by Jerry Atnip

Under the harsh yoke of slavery one of the most powerful forever changed the landscape of the Western consciousness. American folk traditions was born. From the dense cotton fields World War I brought with it a crisis in reason, a breakdown in of the South rose up a mighty song. The Negro spiritual gave communication that seized international arts communities expression and hope to many a captive soul. The earthly realm in paroxysms of doubt. Artists responded in much the same with its tears and toil held little happiness. The promise of free- manner as the American slave in the previous century: they dom in glory, the analogy between African enslavement and the expressed themselves and attempted to construct a world that captivity of the Old Testament Israelites offered generations a had meaning through art. It was in these struggles that the dream of rest and reward in the Lord. European abstract art called “modernism” found its genesis.

Victor Simmons, curator of the Van Vechten Gallery of Fisk The story of the Alfred Stieglitz Collection at Fisk University University, claims this music allowed slaves to “express them- is the tale of the meeting of these two worlds. The experience selves and construct for themselves a world that had meaning of African Americans and the progressive spirit of modern art through that song.” It is quite literally on the foundation of the come together in the Carl Van Vechten Gallery. It is a story well Negro spiritual that Fisk University was built. Founded in 1866, worth discovering, and it is written over every inch of a campus it was the performance of these songs by the first Fisk Jubilee steeped in a rich history of African American experience. Singers that helped save it from financial ruin. To main- ‘It might be surprising tain and expand the univer- to many Nashvillians sity, the young college sing- that there is a gallery ers embarked on a tour that took them all over the world. with works by Picasso, Jubilee Hall, the first build- Rivera, O’Keeffe, ing in the United States built Cezanne, and Renoir for the exclusive purpose of educating African Americans, just around the corner. was built with proceeds from It is perhaps more their performances. intriguing to learn just how they got there. Decades later, bombs blis- ’ tered the skies above Europe, One cannot talk about art at and trenches scarred barren Fisk without raising eyebrows. stretches of land. Inhuman, The university is embroiled unimaginable, the first mass- in a nationally publicized scale war of the Industrial Age Curator Victor Simmons and Fisk President Hazel O’Leary lawsuit over their attempts

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left: Winold Reiss, Zora Neale Hurston, 1925, Conte crayon on board

below left: Alfred Maurer, Woman in Red Dress, 1916, Oil on canvas

right: Marsden Hartley, Movement #6, 1916, Oil on composition board

below center: Stanton MacDonald Wright, Spring Symphony

far right: Bernard Karfiol 1886-1952( ), Nude and Figure, 1924/5, Oil on canvas

to consummate a deal to sell a one-half, undivided interest in the Stieglitz Collection. The lot of paintings that was once seen as the jewel of the campus is now the object of intense debate. Nashville Arts Magazine has made the conscious decision to focus our explora- tion on the history of the Stieglitz collection rather than the current legal debate about how it should be handled. Our hope is that readers will get to know the vast storehouse of visual arts at Fisk and take advantage of the fact such treasures are here in Nashville. This article is not an endorsement of university policies. Rather, it is a call to Nashvillians to visit a truly world-class collection of art on permanent view just beyond the downtown perimeter.

American photographer Alfred Stieglitz was a great collector of art. He introduced U.S. audiences to both European modernism and African art. Upon his death, he left his wife, painter Georgia O’Keeffe, the difficult task of separating his collection into a series of charitable gifts. She chose the Library of Congress, the National Gallery of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and, astonishingly, a historically black university in Tennessee that is to this day smaller than most high schools. In 1949, Fisk University became the unlikely beneficiary of one of the most high-profile collections of twentieth-century art.

Victor Simmons, guru of all things Fisk-related, explains that the connection between Georgia O’Keeffe and Fisk University began in the Harlem Renaissance. For those unfamiliar with the term, the Harlem Renaissance refers to a flowering of African American literary and artistic culture in New York during the 1920s and 30s. Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, Duke Ellington, Arna Bontemps, among many others all bear associations with the movement that was first known as “The New Negro Movement.”

Through a series of friendly connections, Fisk University became the Southern epicenter of the extended Harlem Renaissance. Simmons explains the origins of the Van Vechten collection: “It’s a wonderful story of people of like mind and like spirit—people trying to enact social change with art as its vehicle. It was born in the mind of Carl Van Vechten, and its roots lie more deeply in associations and friendships of the Harlem Renaissance.”

Carl Van Vechten, a white American photographer, was a great patron of the Harlem Renaissance. He was friends with figures such as muralist Aaron Douglas and Charles Spurgeon Johnson, the first African American president of Fisk. Simmons refers to Johnson as “the architect of the Harlem Renaissance.” It was through Johnson and Van Vechten that O’Keeffe and Stieglitz became supporters of this movement and, later, Fisk University itself. Simmons

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left: Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Le Chapeau Épingle (The Hat Pin), 1898, Color lithograph on paper

below left: Gino Severini, Femme et Enfant (Woman and Child), 1916, Oil on burlap

right: Charles Demuth (1883-1937), Calla Lilies, 1927 far right: Pablo Picasso, Tête de Femme, 1904, Oil on canvas

bottom right: Georgia O’Keeffe (1887–1986), Flying Back Bone, 1944 explains, “One of the wonderful things about having the Stieglitz collection here at Fisk is that it shows you in demonstrable terms these connections. At the same time Stieglitz is on 5th Avenue, the Harlem Renaissance is taking place up on 125th Street, and they share between them Van Vechten and O’Keeffe. We are not taught about those connections in school.”

Fisk’s heyday saw Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston visiting the campus on a regular basis. Current Fisk University president Hazel O’Leary shares that the university considered hiring Hurston, but her sharp attitude and carefree manner foiled any such plans. Painter Aaron Douglas established the art program and completed the breathtaking series of murals that adorn its former library. Visitors can view his paintings, a portrait of the original Jubilee singers commissioned by Queen Victoria, and a stunning series of portraits by German modernist Winold Reiss on a walk through the campus. President O’Leary sums up the power of the Fisk art holdings: “They capture the culture of a region, of a nation, Upon his death, Stieglitz left his wife, painter Georgia and of a people.” O’Keeffe, the difficult task of separating his collection Walking through the Van Vechten Gallery, one sees works by the “into a series of charitable gifts. She chose The Library of great hands and minds that shaped twentieth-century art. They are connected through conscience to the burgeoning of Harlem Congress, The National Gallery of Art, The Metropolitan Renaissance art in the post-reconstruction South. Ken West, vice president of communications and public relations for the university, Museum of Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, the elucidates, “Fisk was founded as a social experiment by northerners Philadelphia Museum of Art, and, astonishingly, a who wanted to ensure that previously enslaved African Americans would be in a position to benefit society after a horrific national historically black university in Tennessee. conflict. In that same spirit, O’Keeffe gave her paintings and those of Alfred Stieglitz to Fisk in order to challenge segregationist social norms and in benefit of the progress of American society.” ” Experiencing the collection, one senses the power of the art and the excitement of the times that brought it here.

Fisk University was founded on dreams for the future. From the era of slave spirituals to the progressive agenda in the age of modern art, the hope of a world just out of reach nurtured the young college. It is that filament of hope or of as yet intangible dreams that makes the kernel of any important art. Today, we live in a world that the dreamers at Fisk strove to create. Facing adversity or misunderstanding, they dared to believe the absurd: art, literature, and music might just change the world. Lucky for us, they were right.

The Carl Van Vechten Gallery is located on the campus of Fisk University at 1000 17th Avenue North, Nashville, TN 37208. Gallery hours: During the academic year, Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Summer (May 10 through August 10) hours are Tuesday–Friday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m. For more information call 615-329-8720 or visit www.fisk.edu.

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28 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 29 30 31

Cindy Wunsch A Self-Portrait

by Kami L. Rice | photography by Brad Jones

In a paint-spattered studio in a garage behind a yellow Victorian Sylvan Park house is where you’ll most likely find Cindy Wunsch, busily doing what she does best: creating canvases full of whimsy, poetry, and emotion. Entering her world is like being pulled into a prism of color. It is impossible to be sad around her or her work. That’s not to say that she is frivolous or lightweight—far from it. Some of her themes dig deep, putting our sensitivities on overload.

Standing at a worktable in the corner of her studio, Wunsch, who seems to have an inexhaustible supply of enthusiasm and passion, explains that she includes “good energy” in each of her creations. Wunsch’s paintings are done in lots of layers to elimi- nate what she calls “the fear of a blank canvas.” She starts with an image using oil pastel or charcoal and then applies color. As she talks, she squeezes paint from a tube onto the canvas, using the edge of a paint chip to spread the paint. “You get a different texture using thick paper than you get from paint brushes,” she explains. She also incorporates lots of fabric into her paintings, each piece creating another story on the canvas.

I like to live simply in a complicated world. I have always “been a dreamer, and I guess sometimes dreams do come true. Many of Wunsch’s paintings include poetry that she often” writes late at night. In her mind, she says, each painting has a mood, a feeling, one that changes as the painting’s layers When We Love, Mixed media, 24” x 48” 30 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 31 32 33

left: Meant for You, Mixed media, 24” x 24”

below left: Tangerine Dreams, Mixed media, 24” x 36”

below: Gratefulness, Mixed media, 24” x 36”

change. Wunsch isn’t a typical journal writer but does jot down random thoughts and store them in a folder. Before her career change from the music industry, she “had all these thoughts, but I didn’t get to hear them.” Wunsch wonders how non-artistic people process the happy and hard times of life. “I can sit here and paint or write this poetry that mirrors my soul. And then it’s done. It’s therapeutic,” she says.

Sometimes Wunsch’s paintings are vision boards of how she wants her life to look or of dreams she has for herself and for other people. “I feel kind of selfish,” she says, “because most of the paintings I do are for me, but hopefully they end up translating into something for other people.” Many of her paintings become a version of a self-portrait. “The faces that I paint are more about me and how I feel on the inside and what I wish

women felt more often. I find that women buy the face that above: Uncomplication, Mixed media, 10” x 20” above: Find Your Beautiful, Mixed media, 12” x 12” looks the most like them.”

Most of the paintings I do are for me, but hopefully they “ end up translating into something for other people.

below: I Wonder if He Knows How Much I Miss Him, Mixed media, 12” x 48” ”

32 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 33 34 35

left: Peppermint Sky, Mixed media, 24” x 24” Kay Keyes Farrar bottom: All I Wanna Do Is Love You, Mixed media, 12” x 12”

Experiencing Wunsch’s work, one quickly sees that women’s faces and birds are recurring themes in her work, though she didn’t start out painting a lot of either. “I love birds,” she explains. “I feel like they represent a lot of light and airy stuff.” For Wunsch, birds, which can see things for miles around them, also represent a perspective ground-bound humans don’t always get. Though some of Wunsch’s painted faces may appear sad or pensive, she tries “to make the faces look open and vulnerable, as in not afraid and open to good things.” Treasures of the Garden 16x20, alla-prima oil on linen As much as her art comes from her own story, it’s clearly about helping express other people’s stories too. She describes her I Wonder if He Original Fine Art & Knows How Much I Miss Him painting and all the Creative Safaris Art Classes different ways it resonated with its viewers. For www.kaykeyesfarrar.com one woman it spoke of her deceased husband, for another a son who had committed suicide, for another a husband serving in Iraq.

Similarly, Wunsch loves watching what happens to people who participate in her workshops when they “become unweighted” as they pour out their story on canvas. “I love it,” she says simply, her eyes widening to emphasize her delight.

Wunsch says, “Now that I’m truly doing what my heart tells me to do, it’s not like I have a whole lot of security, but it all works out. And now I feel the most whole.” The uncertainty inherent in earning a living as an artist “is scary, but I think it’s more scary if you never discover who you are or what your heart is trying to tell you. I’ve finally figured out that this is what I do well.”

Now that she’s found that place, there’s no longer any internal struggle, a possibility she previously didn’t know existed. Now she goes through every day wondering how she deserved this good fortune.

Cindy Wunsch shows at A Thousand Faces, Art & Invention Gallery, and Bennett Galleries. www.cindywunsch.com.

34 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 35 36 37

left: My Grandmother Told Me...1937, Oil on canvas, 7’ x 5’

Igor Babailov The Russian Connection

by Sally Schloss

Before he opened his front door to greet me, I glimpsed Igor Babailov through a pane of glass putting on his dark suit jacket We’re all just people, famous over a crisp white shirt—clearly he was not the type of person or not, rich or poor. The masters to show up for an interview carelessly dressed or splattered in “ paint. This formality, I was to discover, was as much about being painted beggars as well as royalty. a professional as it was about good manners. Classically trained, Russian born and bred, Babailov, with his charming accent and impeccable English, was a walking ambassador for the school of ” art he was raised in: Realism.

Upon entering his Brentwood home, I found myself surrounded by walls brimming with images of people—the souls, he would say, that he’d captured through his art. We talked as I followed this burly, ginger-haired man as he toured me through a room filled with his paintings. I was struck by the combination of structure, discipline, and passion that defined both the artist and his work. Here was a man who had grown up behind the Iron Curtain, was trained in the great Russian Academy tradition, had left Moscow at age 25 right after the fall of the Berlin wall, and had managed to become a portrait painter on the world stage. His clients have included Hillary Clinton, George W. Bush, Pope John Paul II, Nelson Mandela, Vladimir Putin, Reggie Jackson, and Akira Kurasawa, to name but a few.

“Despite a person’s fame,” Babailov told me, “when I paint someone, ideology, looks, age, and status are unimportant. It doesn’t matter who is in front of me. We’re all just people, famous or not, rich or poor. The masters painted beggars as well as royalty.” ti Sitting in Babailov’s large, light-filled studio where more of his portraits climbed the walls, one of the paintings caught my eye. It was a dramatic example of Grisaille (pronounced Gree-eye)—a

term for painting executed entirely in monochrome. Photo: Anthony Sc a rl

36 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 37 38 39

top left: Portrait of an Old Man, Oil on canvas, 24” x 20” right: The artist with General David Petraeus far right: Portrait of Pilot Bergthor Endresend, Oil on canvas, 34” x 24” below: Panorama by Igor Babailov and Sergey Prisekin, 20’ x 100’

Russian Imperial Academy of Arts. He credits the historically famous curriculum of Classical Realism as providing him with “the unparalleled skill in academic drawing which today is a fundamental challenge for many painters.”

Babailov thinks that an education should not be a luxury. Everyone is entitled to an education. “Every student’s dream is to study and not have to worry about money,” said Igor. “My education was paid for by the state. The students received a stipend if they made good marks in school. I worked very hard and studied hard so that I wouldn’t have to rely on my parents. When I was about 15, I went to Arbat Street in Moscow where artists draw and sell their works. I went for a couple of hours every day and made good money.

“By the time I left Russia in 1990, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, I had commissions and clients. This allowed me to earn enough to get out. Russia was in a state of turmoil. It felt like it was going My teacher told me something I have never forgotten and that I have to collapse completely—no food, no bread . . . people stood in line for everything. I earned 150 rubles a month (equivalent to carried with me all my life. He said, ‘You don’t have to have a fancy brush to $150). The ticket to leave cost me 2400 rubles. That was a lot of “ “I’ve always done this type of work,” Babailov said. “Realistic art paint. You paint with your mind.’ is about capturing perfect tonal values. That’s the secret of the great portraits. In old art books, the paintings look as good in black and white as they do in color. Nineteenth-century artists ” took photos of their paintings to check their tonal accuracy. When I paint, I am always thinking about how light or dark a color should be.”

It’s impossible not to be curious about Babailov’s background, both as an artist and as the person who left Russia and wound up in Nashville. Not surprisingly, the two are inextricably bound—his art forged the path that became his lifelong journey.

“In Russia, my family was part of the intelligentsia. Both my parents were teachers. My father was an artist, and I was exposed to art at an early age. When I was 4 years old, I began to draw. At 9, I began art school. I learned by copying Michelangelo’s Slaves and drawing from live models, by making casts of the body and sculpting.”

When I asked if he ever felt burdened as a child by all that discipline and hard work, he answered, “Not at all. I always loved it. It’s what I wanted to do. But where I lived felt too small for me. When I saw the high-rise buildings of Moscow when I was 6, I thought, one day I’m going to leave this town.”

Babailov moved to Moscow when he was 13 after winning a nationwide competition to enter the prestigious Surikov College of Fine Arts, a visual arts school for gifted children. He went on to get his M.F.A. at the Surikov Academy of Fine Arts of the

commissions I needed to earn. It helped that I had some very good ones.”

In leaving Russia, Babailov took with him not only beautiful childhood memories and invaluable training as an artist; he had also learned important lessons about resource- fulness. “When I grew up we didn’t have ten kinds of bread. We had white bread and black bread. Whatever you lack makes you innova- tive. Basic things like paint were a luxury. You couldn’t just go to the art supply store and get things. It wasn’t easy. When I was 13 or 14, I knew that the Old Masters used charcoal and white tempura. White was very expensive. As students we thought, how can we create white? We used toothpaste. There was no green and red striped toothpaste, just simple, basic white toothpaste. You mixed it with water, and when it dried it looked just like tempura. My father gave me his brushes. Students had to supply their own materials. “My teacher told me something I have never forgotten and that I have carried with me all my life. He said, ‘You don’t have to have a fancy brush to paint. You paint with your mind.’” www.babailov.homestead.com

above left: Vita, Oil on canvas, 46” x 21” top right: The artist meeting Pope Benedict XVI above: Journey of Hope, Tribute, Oil on canvas, 38 “x 38” left: For Gold, God and Glory, Oil on canvas, 70” x 79” below: Portrait of a Spanish Man, Pastel, 24” x 19”

40 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 41 a a

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Captured in Bronze The LeQuire Legacy

by Currie Alexander Powers | photography by Peyton Hoge

Artists don’t just appear out of“ thin air. Something or someone sets them on their path.

Alan LeQuire is well known today as the sculptor” of Athena

in Nashville’s Parthenon, Musica, the Tennessee Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial, Cultural Heroes, and Dream Forest. But it all began much earlier for both Alan and his brother, Paul, whose passion was fixing antique clocks. (Sister Nancy was a very good artist according to Alan, though she chose to study languages, and sister Lista pursued a career in health care.) Louise LeQuire created a fertile playground for her children. “She had this studio where we could work. She had all the tools,” Alan says. “I found those tools and started wood carving. That was the first sculpture I made. She created this ideal, an idyllic setting. Their friends were mostly artists, writers, visual artists, so we were around artists growing up, and it was just an acceptable thing to do.”

Louise Lasseter LeQuire was Nashville’s first art critic, a painter, poet, and teacher. Her interest lay in the history of Nashville’s art and artists, something her children became intimately famil- iar with. “It was part of our lives,” Alan says. “She talked a lot. She was very opinionated, so we were very aware of what she

46 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 47 Photo of Mrs. O’More now uploaded to FTP. Caption reads: One of the first graduating classes of O’More College of Design talks with their mentor, Mrs. Eloise Pitts O’More.

Secondly, Jeff, a SIDEBAR to be included in this article is coming later 48 today. 49

Puryear Mims was the most important teacher I ever had—he taught me to think about form, in abstract terms. and my father were interested in. She was an advocate for the “ artists she really believed in, locally and regionally, and she tried to help them with their careers.” ” Virgil Shields LeQuire’s field was medicine, though he was “a very skilled craftsman at whatever he chose to do,” says Alan. His father even did some sculpture—on a bet. Virgil LeQuire bet

Puryear Mims—“the sculptor in town” as Alan refers to his first Photo: d e a n ixon mentor—he could win the Central South Art Competition. The prize was a thousand dollars. Virgil carved a kneeling figure in limestone and won the competition. That it caused a rift in the friendship between Virgil and Puryear is not surprising, given that Mims was a sculptor bested by an amateur. Virgil may have chosen medicine as a career, but art chose him as a disciple.

A potent cause took Alan LeQuire to Rome, though it was part his doing and part his mother’s. After three years of pre-med at Vanderbilt at the urging of his father, who wanted him to follow in his footsteps, Alan sought escape by way of an exchange program in France, where, out of the sight of his parents, he soaked up French art, Mediterranean culture. After his gradu- ation, his mother nudged a sculptor friend to see if he needed an assistant. Alan went from France to Rome to apprentice with Milton Hebald, and there he became a sculptor in body, mind, and soul. Mothers know best.

The family legacy has come full circle this year with the opening of a second LeQuire Art Gallery in Green Hills Mall. The first gallery, on Charlotte Avenue, opened in 2003 and is home to Alan LeQuire’s studio. The new Green Hills gallery is being helmed by Paul LeQuire. They both feel strongly about continuing their mother’s quest to support and nurture. “Paul and I wanted to do that with the [new] gallery. One of the most rewarding parts of doing it,” says Alan, “is supporting something you care about, locally. We show artists from all over. It’s Bronze has its own life. It’s the only really hard to get shows when you’re first starting out. The point metal that has that living quality. to me is to recognize what they’re trying to do and bring more “ exposure to it.” That was Louise LeQuire’s passion. She and Virgil were early supporters of local artist Red Grooms. Louise ” went on to write the screenplay for a documentary on Grooms, directed by Tom Neff, founder of the Discovery Channel. Neff was a former student of Louise’s. (Louise’s grandson, Andrew Rozario, was also profoundly influenced by his aunt and is now a documentary filmmaker.)

If you look back even further, a powder train of synchronicity

Photo: De a n Dixon was also headed toward the creation of Alan’s best known work,

48 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 49 50 51

Athena Parthenos. That Alan would become an artist was set early on. But his choice of sculpture was a quest for his own identity. “When I was a kid,” Alan says, “I didn’t want to do what my mother did. She didn’t sculpt. It was really Puryear Mims who became my first teacher. Of course my mother, I’m sure, orchestrated all that behind the scenes. Puryear was the most important teacher I ever had—taught me to think about form, in abstract terms.” Ironically, Puryear Mims made a small-scale sculpture of Athena back in the ’50s as a proposal. That he was Alan LeQuire’s first teacher seems like destiny. In 1982, when Alan was just out of school, he won the competition to create Athena, a project that took him seven years to complete.

Humanity is the essence of Alan LeQuire’s work. It is inspired by the past and captures a sense of history.

Given his halcyon years in France and Italy, it is perhaps surprising that he would come back to the relative quiet of Nashville. Yet

, Autumn 1954. © V&A Images/ Victoria and Albert Museum and Images/ Victoria Autumn 1954. © V&A Illustrated , this is where his history lives. “It’s just a beautiful place. I have this pastoral ideal in my head because of the way I grew up. Andrée and I have a farm; we’re building a house, and one day we’ll move out there and begin raising animals again. I don’t think I could do that anywhere else. There’s family and all the friends we have. It would be really hard to build that somewhere else.” IN THE 1940S , To say Alan returned to his roots or is carrying on a legacy would

be to put it too simply. He is more of a traveler between two Photo: d e a n ixon worlds, the past and the present, his fluid motion blending the A WOMAN’S two into a constant that hovers timelessly. Interestingly, his current work-in-progress is a sculpture of his father as a shep- There is less a sense that Alan, and Paul, as head of the new herd cradling a goat in his arms. (Virgil LeQuire’s area of research gallery, are immortalizing their parents than that they are keep- PLACE WAS ON included the study of the famous “fainting goats.”) Alan’s feeling ing them in the present, very much like the living quality of the about bronze, a metal with hard permanence, conveys that fluid- bronze Alan likes to work with. ity between worlds. “It sort of has its own life. It’s the only metal THE RUNWAY. that has that living quality.” www.lequiregallery.com www.alanlequire.com Photograph by John French. Model Barbara Goalen in strapless evening gown. For

Through The golden age September 12

Downtown Nashville 615-244-3340 of COUTURE CoutureAtTheFrist.com Paris and London 1947-1957

Alan sculpting in his Germantown studio c. 1998 Exhibition organized by the Victoria and Albert Museum, London Photo: Phil C icero Photo: Peyton hoge Photo: d e a n ixon

FC11968_Mmp_Runway_NashArts.indd 1 7/21/10 3:02:56 PM 52 53

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Swayambhunath Temple, Kathmandu, Nepal. Looking at this photograph, there is a sense of the temple being alive. Photography

Libba Gillum Split Seconds of Time

by Deborah Walden

Famous for claiming, “You cannot step twice into the same river,” the Greek philosopher Heraclitus recognized that people and things are always changing. For most of our days, I think we remain unaware of the constant ebb and flow around us. We move though infancy, childhood, adolescence, adulthood with a sense of continuity in our self-identity and a notion of stability in the world at large. It is in rare meaningful moments that we come to terms with the fact that our lives will never be still.

Nashville photographer Libba Gillum finds her voice in these moments of realization. Gillum has a way of stealing split seconds of time, of recording something so fleeting that it almost never existed. Her works possess their own sense of freedom. They have a life of their own outside of the clicking of the camera lens. One might call it transcendence. However you put it, Gillum seems capable of staging the infinite. She can capture the soul’s progress in an image that dances on the glossy page. She manipulates conditions, labors over developing, or occasion- ally stumbles on the happy accident to express, confess, speak to the viewer. It is here that she ceases to be a woman with a camera and becomes an artist.

I recently met Gillum at her South Nashville home. It was the kind of summer afternoon where the heavy air anticipates a storm. As I sat at Gillum’s kitchen table poring over boxes of photographs, the air crackled and fizzed with thunder. Gillum’s home, though, felt like a warm hearth, a safe harbor in the

Photo: John G ui d er storm. Her voice is slightly

54 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 55 56 57

top: Mardi Gras beasts, New Orleans. This is a dreamscape, a call to face our demons.

above: Sadhu on the street in Kathmandu, Nepal.

above right: This is a photograph taken at an ancient observatory in Jaipur, India. Images that create wonder are captivating.

right: This is a pilgrim woman’s braids in Jokhang Temple, Lhasa, Tibet. The Tibetan people are amazing, beautiful, and usually smiling.

far right: Photograph of an icon in an old church outside of Zihuatanejo, Mexico. I took a bus by myself to a little village outside of Zihuatanejo, Mexico, and encountered a lovely old church. Inside was this icon seemingly waiting for me.

opposite page: This location in Haridwar, India, is home to one of the largest pilgrimages in the world. Only Hindus are allowed on the platform below to purify themselves and be blessed by the holy river Ganges.

56 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 57 58 59

deep. It is sonorous, calming, honeyed even. I cannot think of below: Entering a bullfight in Merida, Venezuela. I attempt to Libba Gillum without remembering the warmth of her personal- make sense out of a chaotic moment in time. ity against an afternoon Tennessee maelstrom. Her demeanor seems key to the mood of her work. I think Libba Gillum’s kind bottom: Street scene in Mussoorie, India. brown eyes perceive grace or impart beauty where others might opposite page top: Entering the Potala Palace, Lhasa, Tibet, with Libba’s works not look to find it. an altitude of 12,000 feet. This is called the roof of the world. opposite page bottom: Prostrations by pilgrims outside of possess their This idea of “becoming,” of change and flux in our experiences, Jokhang Temple in Lhasa, Tibet. This was my first trip to radiates throughout each of Gillum’s series of photographs. She this part of the world visiting sacred and holy sights. I was “ in awe of the scene before me. own sense of is attracted to moments of transition or the passage from one state to another. Costumes and religious festivals have become her playground for exploring these themes. New Orleans for freedom. They Mardi Gras, South America and Spain for Carnival, Gillum has trotted the globe in search of events where people might feel have a life drawn to step outside of themselves. of their own Gillum’s art has taken her all over the world. She has photographed the mountains of Tibet and traveled to India three times. In Kathmandu, Nepal, Gillum observed a Sadhu meditat- outside of the ing on a street corner. The man’s far-off gaze indicates his state of transport. He seems part of this world and, at the same time, to clicking of the inhabit a separate mental space from those around him. Finding a holy man in rags, Gillum’s own intense gaze goes beyond the camera lens. man himself. She calls attention to the phases of human ritual that drag us outside of ”our everyday concepts of the world. She claims, “When you look at someone who has gone that far, it makes you question yourself a little bit.”

That “little bit” of questioning defines Gillum’s photography. Whether presenting a shot that looks impossible or capturing a scene that belongs in a dreamscape or spirit realm, she reminds viewers of the subtle transformations that make life such an interesting journey. “I like looking at something and turning it into something else. When you look at it, it throws you a little bit. Your eye wants to move around it.” Describing her photography, she hints at a life philosophy: “How it actually happens is a mystery.”

www.libbagillum.com

58 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 59 60 61 YORK & Friends fine art 35 ARTISTS 6 LOCATIONS Featured Artists August 1 - September 30

YORK & Friends fine art ------image

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Vicki Shipley “Emotional” 36”x48” Acrylic/Canvas 25 ARTISTS 4 LOCATIONS DANNY PHIFER MasterPanels Gallery JADE REYNOLDS MICHAEL MANLY The Belle Meade Shoppes | 5133 Harding Road | Nashville Artist’s reception Hanging Around | 1506 8th Avenue S. | Nashville & Gifts Brittain Plaza Market Central Green Hills Antique Mall | 4108 Hillsboro Road | Nashville 7177 Nolensville Road #4B Thursday, August 26th 5-7 2215 Central Avenue Market Central | 2215 Central Avenue | Memphis Nolensville Hanging Around, Inc. Memphis 1506 8th Avenue South, Nashville follow us on FACEBOOK @ ron york art

CATE CHRISTEN SIMO TESLA Laurel Leaf Gallery The Belle Meade Shoppes JENNIFER PADGETT 4208 Old Hillsboro Road #5 5133 Harding Road The Green Hills Antique Mall Leiper’s Fork Nashville 4108 Hillsboro Road Nashville Please join York & Friends artists Saturday, August 21st 2-8 for The Dance Theatre of Tennessee Performing & Visual Arts Festival Donelson Plaza 2710 Old Lebanon Road

follow us60 |on August 2O1O | Nashville @ Arts ronMagazine york art Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 61 62 63

Theatre

Shakespeare didn’t write plays Shakespeare in the Park “about kitchen sinks. Open Air Magic His stories are by Jim Reyland grand and require William Shakespeare’s Love’s Labor’s Lost is an enchanting from four different colleges and several public and private high actors to make evening of theatre under the stars at The Nashville Shakespeare schools. We also frequently have home-schooled students in the Festival’s 23rd Annual Shakespeare in Centennial Park. company. Offering these young artists the opportunity to train big choices when and perform along with Nashville’s best professionals is a very playing them. As Love’s Labor’s Lost is a witty romantic comedy about four young important part of our mission.” men who take an oath to dedicate three years to strict study, I always tell my renouncing the distractions of love and the company of women. Love’s Labor’s Lost, focusing on the theme of “the birds and But on that very day, four beautiful women show up, and nature the bees,” will be set in the late nineteenth century. Bustles actors, when you’re takes her course! and tailcoats, gloves, fans, and whimsical hats will make the show look like a Victorian valentine. Adding a layer of physical working outside, the Shakespeare in the Park has long been a staple of the American comedy, the actors have studied birds’ courtship rituals in order theatre scene across our great country. Our own vibrant, innova- sky is the limit! tive, and creative troop, the Nashville Shakespeare Festival, has been mounting one great Bard moment after another in the From Macbeth – Denice Hicks, Director, park since 1988. Shakespeare in the Park has become an annual Love’s Labor’s” Lost tradition for 10,000–15,000 people for twenty-two years, and the NSF hopes to continue to provide this experience for many

Photo: Jeff F r a zier years to come. 2007 Merry Wives Director Denice Hicks: “Performing Shakespeare is like performing music in many ways, and the majority of the professional actors in Nashville also have musical abilities. This makes them wonderful Shakespearean actors! Every show is cast by audition each year, and we are always glad to give newcomers the opportunity to do the show in the Park. This year’s cast of Love’s Labor’s Lost includes some favorites from past seasons (Brenda Sparks, playing the scholar Holofernes, did her first show with us in 1996; Tom Angland was in the 1992 production of Much Ado About Nothing; Alex Murray, taking on the role of Costard the swain this year, played Catesby for our Richard III; and Eric Pasto-Crosby who was our Horatio in 2008, will be Berowne), and we are delighted to feature Joseph Robinson, Nettie Kraft, Macbeth Shannon Hoppe, Ricardo Puerta and Jeff Boyet, in their Nashville Shakespeare Festival debuts! We also will feature ten college and high school student apprentices in supporting roles. Our apprentices are cast by audition and receive fifty hours of inten- sive training in performance before joining the full company for rehearsals. This year’s Apprentice Company includes students 2010 Love’s Labor’s Lost 62 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine 63 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts NashvilleMagazine Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 63 64 65

BlairNAE_ad10-11r2:Layout 1 7/19/10 12:40 PM Page 1

Celebrating a New Decade of Continued Excellence The Blair Concert Series 2010-2011

1993 Comedy of Errors

It’s Just Too to incorporate the distinctive bobbing, strutting, and fluttering hot outside. of birds into their performances. Denice Hicks: “The great outdoors demands great performances which require major energy. When nine hundred people are gathered to see a Shakespearean play under a beautiful Tennessee sky and the moon rises and the geese fly over, there is magic in the air! The audience is so relaxed, For information about our free faculty and student performances, sprawled on their blankets or in their guest artists, lectures, master classes, and more, lawn chairs, full from their picnics, visit the new Blair website at blair.vanderbilt.edu enchanted by the evening.” Blair School of Music • Vanderbilt University Photo: Jeff F r a zier 2400 Blakemore Avenue • Nashville, TN 37212 Love’s Labor’s Lost features original music, with the violinist Complimentary valet parking and taking on the role of Cupid. This show will delight all ages with FREE self-parking for most events colorful, animated characters, clownish antics, romance, and ridiculousness in the pursuit of love!

Shakespeare’s Love’s Labor’s Lost directed by Denice Hicks, August 19–September 12, 2010. Performances Thursdays through Sundays and Labor Day Monday at the Centennial Park Bandshell—6:30 p.m. pre-show entertainment, 7:30 p.m. show, with food and drink available on-site. www.nashvilleshakes.org

National Tour Premiering presented by at TPAC! November 16-21, 2010 presented by

stay in. January 25-30, 2011 in partnership with September 21-26, 2010 October 26-31, 2010 See all six shows for less than $150! www.tpac.org/broadway

2010-11 HCA/TriStar 615-782-6560

n Broadway at TPAC Season

o or 1-800-410-4216 x

® D

Jim Reyland is a playwright and producing artistic direc- t is sponsored in part by:

The Tony-Winning BesT Musical n

e (Monday-Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.)

i V

March 22-27, 2011

y b

tor of Writer’s Stage theatre. His new play, A Terrible Lie, s o TPAC Box Office

h will receive a fully staged workshop October 18 through P (Downtown or at Davis-Kidd Booksellers in The Mall at Green Hills) BRADFORDSINTERIORS.COM November 21, 2010 at Writer’s Stage/The Next Level, 1008 4100 HILLSBORO R OAD N 297-3541 May 10-15, 2011 Please note that some of these shows contain adult language and content. Young Frankenstein contains mature subject matter. Charlotte Avenue. For the full schedule visit As always, we encourage you to contact TPAC directly for more specifics. Artists, schedules and show titles are subject to change. N M ONDAY-F RIDAY 9-5:30 S ATURDAY 10-5:30 www.writersstage.com or call 615-636-9177. 64 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 65 66 67

Didier Lourenco Beyond Words... D L by Marshall Chapman

On June 29, I was scheduled to play in the round at the Bluebird Café with Tommy Womack, Peter Cooper, and Will Kimbrough. Since these guys are good friends and Will played lead guitar on my soon-to-be released CD, I was especially looking forward to this event. Then I heard Kimbrough had to bow out. He’d been summoned to do something with Jimmy Buffett. As every musician knows (myself included), a call from Buffett is a call that can’t be ignored. ti

When told Kimbrough’s replacement would be The Wrights, I’m thinking, The Wrights? Who on earth are The

Wrights? I soon found out. Photo: Anthony Sc a rl Cafe Terrace 40x48 original oil on canvas

Represented exclusively by The night of the gig, I was the last to arrive. As a result, I ended up wedged in a chair between Tommy Womack and some guy in a cowboy hat whom I assumed was one of The Wrights. GALLERYWEST Then I noticed the threads in my mic stand were stripped. 265 White Bridge Road • Nashville, TN When I tried to tighten the adaptor, the boom started 615.353.9595 swinging around like a crane gone berserk.

www.gallerywestnashville.com This situation, combined with my usual pre-show jitters, had me feeling a bit, well . . . testy. I immediately vented my frustration, voicing my hope that proceeds from tonight’s performance would go toward upgrading the Bluebird’s equipment (like this godforsaken mic stand!). At that point, the guy in the cowboy hat (whom I later learned was Lori Putnam not one of The Wrights, but a guitarist-songwriter named Jon Byrd) TWO LIVE COUNTRY said, “Why don’t we trade mic stands?” He then set about switching CelebrateMUSIC the summer SHOWSwith Spanish artist them out. I watched in fascination as he calmly secured my faulty stand with duck tape. (Why didn’t I think of that?) The way he did this, Didier Lourenco. without calling attention to himself, had me thinking, Whoever this dude is, I’m startin’ to dig him.

Of course, the gig turned out heavenly. Tommy sang “Nice Day,” Peter sang “Suffer a Fool” (which he co-wrote with Don Schlitz), Jon Byrd provided tasteful accompaniment on his Telecaster, and the young woman sitting across from me, Shannon Wright, sang “Since You Left Me,” which completely blew me away. In fact, every song she sang blew me away. Including a wonderfully original version of Roger Miller’s “In the Summertime.” (I later learned that “The Wrights” are a highly respected husband-wife duo. And that Shannon was the only Wright present for tonight’s performance. Husband Adam had to attend a baseball game.) “Cooling Off Spot” The Harpeth Hall School Marnie Sheridan Gallery By the end of the night everybody loved everybody. Shannon and I Come celebrate 25 years on Nashville’s 300-foot iconic paddlewheel riverboat as you take a “Paintings From Life” exchanged books and CDs, and now The Wrights’ last two CDs have been musical journey with us on midday and evening cruises. Plein air oil paintings by Lori Putnam on heavy rotation in my house ever since. Last week, Shannon and I got August 19-October 13 together and wrote a groovy little song called “Let’s Make Waves.” 615-458-3900 | www.GeneralJackson.com Opening reception: Sunday, August 22 | 3-5 p.m. 3801 Hobbs Road | Nashville, TN 37215 | 615-297-9543 | www.harpethhall.org Fall Exhibit CELEBRATING 25 YEARS OF CRUISING THE CUMBERLAND. Sometimes all you have to do is shower and show up. tallgirl.com

66 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 67 68 69

Antiques

First assumed to be a painting, this piece proves to be a watercolor- Appraise It enhanced print that is signed in the plate. Still considered an origi- by Linda Dyer | photography by Jerry Atnip nal work of art and a great piece of Nova Scotia’s fine arts history, this charming work on paper has a retail value of $300 to $400. Mary Marguerite Porter Zwicker (Canadian, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, 1904–1993), view of Nova Scotia fishing shacks, 14kt Yellow Gold and Cultured Pearl Bracelet, circa 1950. watercolor over print on paper, signed “M. Zwicker” in block. Lovely, lustrous pearls. These gifts from the seas and rivers were once the rarest and most desirable of gems. From the time of As I struggled in the dim lighting to decipher the signature on Cleopatra to the current day, they have been treasured for their this image, I heard the owner quietly ask, “Have you looked on the rarity, beauty, mystical symbolism, and even their medicinal back?” There on the back of the framed picture, neatly inscribed properties. So much information, so few words! Simply, any in ink was, “by M. Zwicker, A scene from Nova Scotia’s ‘fishing pearl grown inside a mollusk, fresh water or salt, oyster, mussel, village’ shoreline. From Grandma’s treasures…Halifax, N.S.” abalone, or scallop, is considered genuine. Pearls come in a multi- tude of shapes, sizes, and luster. This fine bracelet is the product Known for her watercolor scenes of Nova Scotia villages and land- of a resourceful Japanese businessman, Kokichi Mikimoto. scapes, Marguerite Zwicker was an active promoter of the visual arts in and around Halifax. Educated at the Nova Scotia College of A pearl happens when the shellfish becomes irritated by a grain Art, she also studied in the United States with the noted German- of sand or an inserted seed. To relieve that irritation the mollusk American Abstract Expressionist painter Hans Hoffman. secretes nacre, a smooth, lustrous material which is a form of was supporting their opposition, entire villages or towns would be calcium carbonate. When the nacre is found on the lining of the destroyed and the citizens annihilated. Nebaj in Departamento de Marguerite Porter’s marriage in 1937 to fellow art student animal’s shell it is referred to as mother-of-pearl. When it depos- El Quiche, the source of these belts, was one of over three hundred LeRoy Zwicker tied her to the family who founded Zwicker’s its itself around a freestanding nucleus like a bit of sand or the villages or towns that suffered this fate in the 1980s. Gallery, Halifax’s oldest commercial fine art gallery. aforementioned inserted seed, the result is a pearl. Establishing the gallery in 1886, when Halifax was home to the Many Maya have fled Guatemala to become refugees in other second largest military garrison in the British Empire, Judson During the turn of the nineteenth century, working from earlier Guatemalan countries. In spite of all the hardships, fears, and poverty, the Zwicker recognized a need and provided for that market. His processes, Mikimoto patented a method of producing cultured Hand-woven women especially continue to wear their traditional dress and target audience was Halifax’s gentry, the British officers and their pearls by inserting a round nucleus inside an oyster shell to Belts, “Fajas,” Nebaj, to maintain the ancient art of weaving. Their reasons are many; families, and the gallery succeeded. Following his death in 1942, prompt the animal to secrete nacre. Mikimoto’s significant find- Departamento de El Quiché, among them, to create income from the tourist trade and to his son, LeRoy Zwicker, and his wife, Marguerite, took over the ing was that beads of clam shell have the greatest success rate circa 1980. maintain their cultural identity. ownership of the gallery, which then ran until 1968. Zwicker’s for creating the desirable round shape. That discovery became the Possibly the most colorfully costumed people Gallery, now out of family ownership, is still in operation today. basis of the modern cultured pearl industry. It also had a deleteri- in the Americas are the Highland Maya of Guatemala. As one unidentified Maya woman shared during an inter- ous effect on the price of natural pearls, due Even before the arrival of the Spaniards, weaving in Guatemala view for a weaving study, “I can’t get accustomed to taking off to increased availability as well as the fact that played an integral role in the lives of this Mayan culture, commu- my traditional clothes. I can’t adjust to putting on other clothes. it takes an expert to determine the differ- nicating their personal identity, their heritage, and their ideo- I can only wear other clothes for an hour or two. I can’t leave my ence between cultured and natural pearls. logical beliefs. A large percentage of these indigenous people still dress; it’s part of me. Without my dress I don’t feel calm inside; wear their traditional dress called traje. In Guatemala Maya traje I feel like I’m missing something, something from me . . . .” Determining the value of a pearl hinges on is village-specific or language-group related, so with dozens of the following determinants: size (the bigger towns and villages and twenty-one Mayan ethno-linguistic groups These extraordinary belts, used to hold up a wrap skirt that can the better), color (white with rosy-pink under- represented, the variety of indigenous costuming is remarkable. average seven yards of fabric, are made of cotton, and they are tones), luster (the denser the nacre, the better), not embroidered but hand-woven on a back-strap loom. The shape (the rounder, the costlier), and origin During their recent civil war, the government forces studied distinc- design decoration is achieved by the weaver adding shorter (South Seas pearls grown in warmer Australian tions of the Maya Indian regional dress to determine which village lengths of thread across the top. The average length of a “faja” is waters are often brighter and larger). people came from. People could automatically become suspect one hundred and twenty inches. The owner of these exceptional just for belonging to a village where the military, or even the anti- weavings purchased them at a yard sale for $5 each. A collector of This beautiful three-strand cultured pearl government forces, suspected there was any sympathetic activity such woven artifacts would expect to pay $70 to $80 each for such bracelet was presented in a Mikimoto box, for their opponent. Suspecting or fearing one member of a village fine examples of hand-loomed textile art. and the quality of the pearls and construc- tion supports that provenance. A size of over 8mm puts pearls into a premium classifica- Linda Dyer serves as an appraiser, broker, and consultant in the field of antiques and fine art. She has appeared tion. Should this bracelet composed of 8 to on the PBS production Antiques Roadshow since season one, which aired in 1997, as an appraiser of Tribal Arts. 9 mm sized pearls be offered at auction, the p Atni Photo: Jerry If you would like Linda to appraise one of your antiques, please send a clear, detailed image to antiques@nashvil- owner may expect a return of $800 to $1200. learts.com. Or send photographs to Antiques, Nashville Arts Magazine, 644 West Iris Dr., Nashville, TN 37204. 68 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 69 70 71

Culinary

Restylane • Laser Hair Removal • Facials OBAGI • Safe Spray Tanning • Laser Skin Tightening Botox Restylane Hair Remova l Facials OBAGI

The First Medi Spa in Middle Tennessee I am certain that the good 14 Years Lord never intended grapes of Proven to be made into grape jelly. The Palm’s Wasabi-Panko Quality Crusted Ahi Tuna Executive Chef Lee Morris and – Fiorello LaGuardia Excellence by Nancy Vienneau | photography by Peyton Hoge

F 9-10 oz ahi tuna steak Our apologies to the Smuckers family. flour egg wash Panko Bread Crumb Mixture Sesame Cucumber Salad Soy Dressing canola oil and olive oil

; 3433 Murphy Road, West End at I-440 Open daily at 9 A ruby plank of ahi tuna seared in crisp wasabi-scented crust, ; 218 20th Avenue North | Nashville, TN | 615-329-3900 www.grandcruwineandspirits.com 627-3900 plated with Sesame Cucumber Salad makes a striking Zen-like Schedule your appointment online at www.dermessrenewal.com Tastings Every Saturday at 3 • Laser Skin Tightening Botox Restylane Hair Remova l Facials OBAGI Safe Spray Tanning • Laser Skin Tightening • Botox • Restylane Laser pairing. Its meld of sweet and salt, spice and heat both dazzles and soothes the palate and is not a dish you’d expect to find at a legendary steak house. But The Palm can surprise you.

Renowned for premium aged beef, colossal lobsters, and Old World sensibilities, The Palm breaks from tradition with this Asian-inspired entrée, with stunning results. What remains consistent is the commitment to the highest quality of ingredi- ents, generously portioned and artfully served.

Executive Chef Lee Morris points out the rich red color of the sushi-grade #1 ahi tuna steak, solid, with no sinew. To create a crust of beautiful textures and compelling crunch, he blends wasabi powder with panko—Japanese breadcrumbs that are coarser yet lighter than their Western equivalents. He adds flecks of black and white sesame seeds to bring visual intrigue and heightened aromatics to the breading. Quickly seared, the panko mixture becomes golden, its lacy crust encasing rare fillet. Why don’t you have Nashville’s most beautiful magazine delivered to your Aligning Eastern aesthetics, the Sesame Cucumber Salad is an ideal counterpoint to the fish. Cooling slices of cucumber are balanced by door each month? the heat of shaved red onion, earthy sweetness of red bell peppers, Vintage Harvey Probber and a peppery dash of daikon sprouts. The Soy Dressing harmonizes 12 amazing issues for $45 fruit notes with pungent ginger, garlic, and sesame. Triangle Table With its bold seasoning and light preparation, it’s an appealing dish for summer dining. And a pleasure to be surprised.

1110 Woodland Street • Nashville, TN 37206 TM Thursday-Saturday 11–6 • Sunday 12-5 615.226.5300 615-383-0278 | [email protected] For the detailed recipe and video of Chef Lee Morris preparing this delicious dish, please visit Nashvillearts.com.

Sculpture artists will include: Philippe Faraut Sylvia Hyman Sydney Reichman Lundy Cupp Linda Carol-Twisted Sisters Rose Littrell Ben Caldwell and others.

Harpeth Art Center & Gallery 20 Minutes West of Downtown Nashville 462 Highway 70, Pegram, TN 37143 615-646-6644 72 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 73 www.HarpethArtCenter.com 74 75

Anything Goes

What was the last book that you read? Who would you most like to meet? A little novel called Property by Valerie Martin. It’s placed in I’m totally in love with Stephen Colbert. Louisiana and written from the point of view of a slave owner’s Do you have a favorite painter? wife. It’s a breathtaking book. I have a great Decker painting over my fireplace that delights me every day.

Why Nashville? I came here for the job eleven years ago. My friends back home keep asking when I am moving back. I’m not! I really love living here.

What do you like most about Nashville? There’s an incredibly rich, creative community here. Plus, it’s easy to get around and has a great climate.

What are you most proud of in your life as far as your accomplishments? I am most proud of my children. I have two wonderful sons.

What are you most proud of in terms of your career? I have fought to put on quality television programs that make people think. I am very proud of that.

Do we get the television that we deserve? Let an Artist do your Portrait or Wedding I’m not a fan of that particular phrase. It’s like asking if we get the Guaranteed Results art we deserve. John Cranshaw.net 615-881-9977 What talent would you most like to have in life that you 10avenue3411 Arts 7.5x4.625 7/13/10 11:58 AM Page 1 don’t have? I have everything I need to become who I am.

ti What is your most treasured possession? That would be my grandfather’s ashtray.

How has this city changed, in your perception, in the last five years? The art scene is fantastic. There is an energy in this town that you

Photo: Anthony Sc a rl just don’t see in a lot of other cities.

What is your all-time favorite movie? Beth Curley, president & CEO of Nashville The movie that makes me laugh no matter what is Uncle Buck. It Public Television (NPT), has served in public stars one of my college roommates. television for more than thirty years. CEO since 2005 and Does your banker your business? previously NPT’s COO, Beth has revitalized the station’s What’s on your Bucket List? local programming and made it among the highest- I want to travel more. I love going to the beach. Must see Venice rated public television programming in the nation. She and Florence and the coast of Croatia. created NPT’s award-winning documentary and public affairs production unit and has overseen the national What’s it like being you these days? PBS distribution of major local productions including The When you get to the top job you better have done all your thinking. Carter Family: Will the Circle Be Unbroken, Hank Williams: Honky Tonk Blues, and Christmas at Belmont. Over the last Because you don’t have time to think anymore. Sometimes I crave resto- five years, Beth has led NPT to more than fifty Midsouth ration, and I have to put it on my calendar: “Go home and stay there.” Region Emmy nominations and twenty-five awards. Prior Any regrets along the way? to NPT, she served in various positions for the WGBH Call 615.252.BANK (615.252.2265) today. Educational Foundation. I have very few of them. If I could have done it all over, I would have Cool Springs Carothers Parkway at International Drive • Cummins Station 209 Tenth Ave. South: Suite 250 thedifferenceisreal.com had more children. West End 2930 West End Ave. • Green Hills 3823 Cleghorn Ave. A Boston native and graduate of Smith College, Beth has numerous professional awards and is an alumna What do you think would most surprise people to know about you? EQUAL HOUSING LENDER MEMBER FDIC ©2010 AVENUE BANK of both Leadership Music and Leadership Nashville. An I belly dance and I like to knit. I also have a very wicked sense active member of the Nashville community, she currently of humor. serves on the board of directors for the Tennessee Repertory Theatre, Family & Children’s Service, the Dyer Observatory, and Alignment Nashville.74 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts74 Magazine | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 75 76 77

On The Town

with Ted Clayton I have a secret to share—I had an amazing culinary The late and great Nashville wearing the cinched waist of Dior and the shorter skirts by experience celebrating my fifty-seventh birthday a few Nancy Saturn Chanel. The exhibit is on loan from the Victoria and Albert Museum weeks ago in Hartsville, Tennessee. (I do summer in was honored for in London. Nashville is the only city in the country to have it. the most unbelievable places, don’t I.) Tully’s Bistro is a her forty artisan hidden treasure right up the road. We had the pleasure festivals and Celebrating the end of the war and the birth of a new era, there were fash- of dining with Tully himself, who is most entertaining her many years ion houses such as Balenciaga, Balmain, Fath, Hardy Amies, Dior, and and knows everything there is to know of fine dining and supporting Gilda’s Chanel, which are all included in this exhibit. This is not a fashion show catering. The entire meal was inconceivable. A few items that Club. Hope and but an education in how dressmakers worked with such delicate fabrics Tully surprised us with were the watermelon gazpacho, French Howard Stringer, by hand to create the wonderful world of couture. Until mid September onion soup, fried mushrooms, Tuscan potatoes, and the amazing Brooks and Bert the Frist Center on Broadway is London’s Mayfair and Paris’ Savile Row. “bread tinnie,” fried bread pudding served over ice cream. OK, it Mathews, Ellen was my birthday, and yes, I tried it all. Believe me, this is worth and David Levy, Sylvia Rapoport opened her beautiful Hill Place home for the kickoff of the short drive to Hartsville. Thanks, Tully! Cathy Jackson, the Conservancy Gala, Designs in Black and White. The gala will be a Ty Brown and Sara Jo Houghland and Debbie and first and will benefit The Parthenon and Centennial Park. Event Chairs Speaking of great food, I was invited to attend a most interesting Bill Tate were in Emme Baxter and Demetria Kalodimos have put together an A-Plus luncheon hosted by The Hermitage Hotel and the Land Trust for attendance cele- committee consisting of Jean Bottorff, Sandra Lipman, Robin Patton, Tennessee. These two groups have teamed up and have planted brating Nancy’s Betsy Wills, Ben Page, Jane Sloan, Juan Pont Lezica, Julie Boehm, Lisa Mr. and Mrs. Ted Murray, and Mrs. O’Neal Clayton vegetables on one acre of the historic farm at Glen Leven. Hotel life. A favorite Campbell, Albie Del Favero, and Hope Stringer, and to top it off Clare Easter Sunday 1949. The ladies are wearing Balenciaga daywear. executive chef Tyler Brown has researched and planted heirloom quote by Nancy Armistead will oversee as Honorary Chairman. I know this will be an vegetables from the nineteenth century: butterstick zucchini, was, “Use what incredible event to look forward to in November. zephyr squash, Cherokee purple tomatoes, and much more. Brown you have to make harvests the veggies daily and serves them in the Capitol Grill in a difference in this dishes such as the Glen Leven Gazpacho, which was so refreshing world.” This amaz- on that hot summer ing lady will always day. This marriage of live on in the arts the Land Trust and Gloria Hougland, Owen Joyner, Emme Baxter of our great city. The Hermitage Hotel is so important to our If you think all Nashvillians leave town in the summer city. The hotel is cele- months, think again. What a crowd was seen on June brating one hundred 17 at the State Museum and Frist Center. First the years, and historic Glen State Museum (leave it to Lois and Leigh to bring in Leven, no stranger to the crowd!)—the exhibit, Bernard de Clavière: Animalier the hospitality indus- Extraordinaire, presented sixty-seven paintings on loan try, provided produce from the Hookers, Byrds and other well-known eques- Daisy King, Beth Alexander, Patrick King and Julie Anne Vanderpool Amy Joyner and Dianne Wild to the Maxwell House trian families of Nashville.

Enjoying conversation with the internation- Clare Armistead and Lois Riggins-Ezzell ally renowned painter were Clare Armistead with Eddie Bass and Ellen Martin, Nan and Neil Parrish, Hotel until it burned in 1961. Land Ray Bell, Marilyn and Kem Hinton (Kem had his collec- Trust CEO Jean Nelson summed it all tion in the exhibit and was so busy showing to all), Amy and up: “The Hermitage Hotel has provided Owen Joyner, newlyweds-to-be Gloria Hougland and Chuck outstanding support to preserve what Welch, Jed Hailey, and Sara Jo Houghland with Ty Brown. we cannot replace—land.” Oh, I almost forgot the great party favors—garden- Next stop that same evening was the Frist Center for the exhibit ing apron and hand tools. How fitting The Golden Age of Couture. The Golden Age was 1947–1957, was that! which was the height of fashion in London and Paris. This exhibit features evening gowns, suits, and daywear of the period. A marvelous dinner/auction was held Growing up as a small boy I was introduced to the fashion- benefitting Gilda’s Club of Nashville able custom-made women’s clothing by my late grandmother, and the American Artisan Festival. Emily Murray. She always made such a fashion statement in

Bill and Debbie Tate Opening night at the Couture exhibit. 76 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine Nashville Arts Magazine | August 2O1O | 77 Jennifer and Tommy Frist 78 79 the gift shop at the car wash!

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My Favorite Painting

Pam Lewis President and CEO of PLA Media Monet at Giverny Bridge by Thomas E. Armstrong

When I was a young student in high school, I ordered the Time Life series of books of famous artists which I still own and treasure in my library. A new book came each month and Monet was the one I loved the most. Years later I lived in France and was fortunate to visit the captivating gardens and home at Giverny which were Monet’s muse.

When I saw this particular painting I felt that I was back there. I like the way the artist has put Monet on that famous bridge looking down at the flowers. I have the perfect place for this painting in my home. I love to collect paintings that remind me of my trips around the world. This one is very special to me.

Thomas E. Armstrong is a life-long Tennessee resident. After he graduated from high school he spent three years in the U.S. Army producing artwork for the Army Security Agency School in the division of training aids. Upon his return home, Armstrong continued to hone his artistic skills at the Harris School of Art in Nashville both as a student and an instructor. Armstrong also studied in the south of France and at Watkins Institute where he met painter and sculptress Nancy Rogers. On two occasions they took trips to France, one to visit twenty-eight museums and another to see the most beautiful part of Paris—its art and architecture.

For most of his career Armstrong was an artist-illustrator for the United Methodist Publishing House. Every year Armstrong exhibits his work at area art events, including Brentwood Academy in Nashville, the Maury Regional Medical Center in Columbia, tnit p Tennessee, and the “Fall into Art” festival in Hendersonville. WWW.HAYNESGALLERIES.COM. [email protected]. TELEPHONE 615-429-1727. GALLERIES: 91 MAIN STREET. THOMASTON, MAINE 04861 & P. O. BOX 50936. NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE 37205.

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84 | August 2O1O | Nashville Arts Magazine