November, 2009
Bellamy Road Gallery has just obtained the loan of two rare John James Audubon prints from the Westervelt Warner Museum in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. These will be shown during our current Audubon Show Series starting this Saturday, Nov. 21 and ending December 13.  Visit http://warnermuseum.org
 
John James Audubon was raised in France and arrived in the US at the age of 18 in the year 1803. Though unschooled in art, his love of nature motivated him. His dream was to compile a volume of colored prints depicting, in actual size, all the birds of North America. It took him 11 years to complete the folios of 435 plates. Scholars estimate that only 175 complete folios exist today. These are hand colored aquatint engravings. The first exhibition of his work found critical acclaim in Liverpool England where he was billed as the "American Woodsman".  We have two of these prints, "Sandhill Crane" and "Wood Stork" on display until December 13.
 

Friday November 13, 2009
Iris Jublin exhibits a dozen bird photographs, which will hang for the entire series. Born in Charleston, she spent her youth sailing, lived in France many years and traveled the world extensively. An avid scuba diver, she did charity work for 15 years in Ft. Lauderdale and now lives in Melrose where she exercises her passion for photography and love of nature.
 

Keith Bollum

October 16 - November 1, 2009
Mirror, Mirror... Self-Portraits by Florida Artists
Last Spring before closing for the Summer we began tossing around ideas for next season’s exhibitions. A patron and I were sitting around the bonfire late at night after a gallery event when the subject of new exhibitions came up. At the mention of showing self-portraits by local artists, our friend, a psychology student at the University of Florida, enthusiastically agreed that it might be intriguing to see how they would portray themselves. The seed germinated and took root after discussions among the Bellamy Road principals. By May it was agreed to mount the show, although none of us had any idea how it would be received by artists or the public.

While visiting Washington, D.C. in June I found time enough to attend one museum, the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery, where by good fortune I saw Reflections/Refractions: Self-portraiture in the Twentieth Century (click HERE to view). Fortified by the experience, I became confident such an exhibition would also be welcome at Bellamy Road. We sought out George Ferreira to curate the show. His unique talents as an artist, his friendship with legions of other artists, and long experience running The Icehouse Gallery in McIntosh made his selection an easy decision. The wisdom of that decision is plain to see hanging on our walls.
 -- Keith Bollum, V.P., Exec. Dir., Bellamy Road (David Turner Warner Foundation)

Click HERE  to see list of the many artists who participated in this show.

April 1 - 11, 2009
This Spring the Melrose Bay Gallery and Bellamy Road sponsored an exciting plein air event, the third Annual Melrose Open Air Arts. Beginning April 1st and culminating April 11th,  seventy-five artists from around Florida gathered for ten days in and around Melrose. Working in a variety of media, they celebrated North Florida’s heritage and beauty in paintings, photographs, sculpture and mixed media. Fresh from the artists’ hands, their work was exhibited in both galleries through May 11. Over the weekend of April 3rd there was a special public observation of artists in the field at various locations around Melrose Bay on Lake Santa Fe.

Open Air Arts is a benefit for the Conservation Trust of Florida and is also an educational event promoting land conservation, with public presentations by the Trust and the Putnam Land Conservancy on the rewards of land conservation. Hundreds of artworks will be on display at the conclusion of the initial festivities Saturday, April 11 at both galleries.

January 31
An opening reception for Ernest Lee and Gary Monroe was held from 6-9 pm.

Ernest Lee paints landscapes and rural country life in oils, many of them from memory of his childhood near his hometown of Raleigh, North Carolina. Now a resident of Alachua County, Florida, Ernest says he “paints from my reminiscences and it is American southern country – farms, family, sunset vistas and simple uncomplicated depictions of a rapidly disappearing scene.” He studied art at St. Augustine’s College in Raleigh in the 1980’s and formed a friendship with ‘Highwayman’ S.M. Wells, who encouraged him to pursue a career in art. Mr. Lee’s artworks hung in our gallery through March 1.

Saturday, December 6
A reception was held at  6:30 p.m. on Saturday December 6, 2008 for Ty and Jean Tyson, in a collaborative opening with Melrose Bay Gallery. Their palm frond furniture and paintings were on exhibit at both galleries. A bonfire and music by Pateh Parsons and Bast began about 7 p.m. Hors d’oeuvres and beverages were served.

Friday, November 7
Bellamy Road celebrates Southern Arts and Culture in a seven week series of art exhibitions, films, lectures, and musical performances.  Beginning Friday, November 7 three painters display works in various media and styles that capture the essence of Southern life. The show opens with a reception for the artists at 7 p.m. and will run through Christmas.

Jack Beverland, widely known as Mr. B., is a self-taught Southern folk artist from San Antonio (Pasco County), Florida. Working in acrylic, Mr. B.’s paintings are heavily textured and often incorporate glow-in-the-dark paints. Most pictures are created from a title that comes to his mind, usually of scenes from long ago. “I am not a memory artist, but an imagination artist.”

Born in Idaho in 1939, he moved to Florida at age eight and didn’t take up painting until the early 1990’s. In a style sometimes referred to as naïve or outsider art, Jack prefers to call it “art from the heart.”

Jack is listed in Who’s Who in American Art – his work can be seen in scores of museums and institutions throughout Florida and the U.S.

Ron Haase taught architecture for twenty years at the University of Florida. The old Cracker farmhouses of Florida were the focus of his academic research and the foundation of an active practice designing contemporary houses which have a strong identity with the climate and culture of Florida’s small towns and rural lifestyle. 

In his book, CLASSIC CRACKER, he takes us on an intimate tour of the utilitarian wooden structures built by early settlers in North Florida.  These houses, raised high off the ground and surrounded by shady porches, responded both to the warm and sultry climate and to the very idea of living side by side with nature in such a beautiful environment.

Ron Haase lives and works on Lake Santa Fe in Melrose, Florida, where he and his wife, Janet, a tapestry weaver, enjoy devoting their time to creating works of art.

He continues to design homes “in the tradition of Old Florida” in partnership with his son, David.  Ron will deliver a lecture on cracker architecture on December 7.

 Reed Pedlow grew up in Lake City, Florida around relatives who were artists. After graduating from college he worked in commercial graphic arts and electronic publishing. Reed never abandoned his passion for painting and continues to explore and develop his skills as a fine artist with an approach that has grown more and more frenzied. Painting for Reed is an adventure; very much like his love for exploring by canoe the dark recesses of backwater Florida. “As a delicate and unique landscape overburdened with accelerating population growth, Florida in many ways epitomizes the conflict between man and nature.  My painting is an expression of my attempt to come to terms with this conflict.”

Reed and his wife Mary Jane live on Lake Elizabeth near Melrose.