VanVeckhoven’s paintings highlight Miller Art Gallery season opener
Meridian artist Judy VanVeckhoven began painting to channel her frustration with daily
journaling.
“There were not enough words to describe what I needed to say. So, I thought, ‘Maybe I can just slap paint on canvases and get some feelings out.’ I was not wrong,” the Meridian Community College alumna said.
Her works of paintings and mixed media are the focus of the first exhibition of the MCC Miller Art Gallery for the 2021-22 season.
An opening reception is planned for Monday, Aug. 23, from 4-5:30 p.m. The show will be on display Aug. 23-Sept. 30.
“This is the first time I have ever painted this many paintings in a little less than a year,” VanVeckhoven said. “The paintings in this show taught me to surrender to the paint and to let go of the painting in my mind,” she added.
“After I got over the panic of thinking, ‘how will ever get enough painting done,’ it became so fun and such a continual creative activity that I now expect to participate in almost every day.”
John Marshall, MCC art instructor and Miller Art Gallery curator, said VanVeckhoven’s works are visually entertaining and they invite the viewer to enter the canvas painted visions.
"Judy's brush strokes of wonderful swirls, circles, and shape movements echoes past dialogues of creativity during the Abstract Expressionist period of artists like Lee Krasner, Willem DeKooning, Joan Mitchell, and others,” Marshall said.
“Judy livens the spirit of her brush with new vision and personal emotional content.
Her historical narrative of the past 1940s and 50s movement in American Art is refreshed,
revived, and moves us into a newer vibrant experience,” he added.
VanVeckhoven admits she took as many art classes at MCC as she was able and gained techniques and insights from College instructors. “I benefited from the skills of Randy Shoults, Dan Griffen, Lallah Perry, John Marshall, and Kent Allen.
“Not only did I benefit from their talents, but their philosophies on all art. That is the fertile ground for my art … from these men and women came my love of expression with color and texture and movement,” she noted.
The Miller Art Gallery, located in the Davidson Fine Arts Center in Ivy-Scaggs Hall, is open Monday through Thursday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. For more information, contact Marshall at 601.484.8647.