This month the artists at Gallery One embrace a color as a theme. While artists love COLOR, sometimes "The Color Purple" can be intimidating. To the viewer it can seem unnatural or aggressive - it lacks the familiarity of say a blue or a cream. But that makes purple unique. Purple has been seen symbolically as the color of royalty, power and mystery, with various shades having different meanings and feelings and evoking these energies in viewers.
Artist Lesley McCaskill’s acrylic painting, "A Favorite Color", speaks to both of these ideas. She writes, "Symbolically, purple was worn by the royals as it was an expensive dye only the ruling class could afford. For the young, I see it as dreamlike, with fairytales depicting the princess in lavender gowns and the witch in a dark menacing violet, which is perfect for fantasy. I have noticed over the years, as a mother and a teacher, that many young girls love the color purple! For an artist, purple can be a deep, dark tone that can be lightened into many values, or a rich dark, great for shadows and delightful for modeling a form."
One nightshade vegetable characterizes the essence of purple, in "Eggplant & Celery", an acrylic painting by Joyce Condry. "Purple is a color you see hints of in shadows, skies, and distant landscapes," Joyce writes, "but it’s not often seen as the predominant hue. The exception may be in the color of a few flowers and fruits, or my grandmother’s Sunday-go-to-meeting dress, but the most vibrant purple exists in the eggplant."
Lavender in the landscape is center stage in "Fourth Street Snow", Marybeth Paterson’s oil painting. "It’s always hard to say goodbye to summer, but winter skies provide spectacular sunsets and wonderful shades of violet. My painting caught one of those purple sky days, playing with the contrast and colors I saw in the snow in my Lewes neighborhood’s beloved Fourth Street Forest."
"Lavender Morning", an acrylic painting by Jan Moffatt, highlights the majesty of lavender fields. "I have visited many at different times of day and in different seasons."
"Open, Ocean View" is a pastel by Laura Hickman. Laura’s pastel painting reflects the way purple mysteriously and magically injects itself into our perception with the changing light. The painting is a view of what is now the Ocean View Deli, back in the late 90’s. Even though the building was a grey color, it appeared to be a dark bluish purple, a color which is complementary to the warm yellows of the interior lights and the fading colors of the winter sunset.
"Purple Mountain Majesty", is a watercolor painting by Pat Riordan. This painting was inspired by the song "America the Beautiful." The reflections show only the violet images of the mountains above the "fruited plain".
"Spring Irises in Tuscany" is an acrylic painting by Dale Sheldon. Each year when the purple irises bloom, you know a new season has begun. This Tuscan scene is infused with purple from the irises in the foreground, inviting you to visually enter the scene and wander through the vineyards, to the slightly purple hills in the far background.
Michelle Marshall’s acrylic painting "Violet Cloud over the Bay" reflects that magical moment when color and atmosphere combine to create some "violet magic". The setting is late summer at a vibrantly green marsh with a lavender cloud suspended above it. It’s dusk, just before a real sunset, and this cloud presaged the vibrancy that was to come. "The color purple rarely occurs in nature and as a result it’s been said to have sacred meaning - that twilight moment of the day with its purple cast has always given me that sense," Marshall says.
Along with these theme paintings on display each month at the front of the gallery each artist’s work area. Gallery One also has a popular Artisan Room that includes exciting textiles, hand-blown glass, pottery, glass jewelry and wood pieces by local artists.
Gallery One is open six days a week 10 a.m. – 4 p.m., and closed on Wednesday during the winter. It is always staffed by one of the artists. Visit Gallery One’s website (www.GalleryOneDe.com) or call 302.537.5055. The gallery is located at 32 Atlantic Ave. (Rt. 26) Ocean View.
