Take A Trip.

Wow. It is Memorial Day weekend all ready and I swanee the weather is sentient because somehow it seems to know when people are on holiday. Yesterday morning the air was so heavy with moisture, aka humid, that I could barely catch my breath and the sun wasn’t even up all of the way. Humidity = Bad Hair Day. It was like walking through cotton candy and my straightened hair started to curl again. Super. The day hadn’t even begun yet and I felt like I needed another shower. About the only other thing I remember about that cruddy morning was the sun. The sun was just cresting the tops of the pine trees and it was this faded, misty white ball. It reminded me of a watercolor titled “Moon at Dawn” by Alice Ravenel Huger Smith.

As part of my homework in painting class I had to visit the Gibbes Museum of Art. I remember that I walked around the Gibbes hoping to find some awe-inspiring work that would arrest my senses and make me think deeply and philosophically about life. As I perused the portraits and miniatures (think really teeny-tiny painted portraits) I felt haunted by the past and not at all inspired as the luminescent eyes seemed to follow me around the room. I decided to just walk around and let the exhibits take me where they will. The powerful message from the exhibit on the second floor made me both angry and sad. I was angry at the stigma of being a color and then sad to think of myself as one who just thinks of things like that and does not act to make the world any different as the artist who created the exhibit did. Oddly enough that wasn’t what moved me, though I really wanted it to.

When I came to the section of the Gibbes featuring Japanese art, I once again had to stop and admire the watercolor, “Moon at Dawn” by Alice Ravenel Huger Smith. The muted hues of green and grey were cool and inviting; the colors blurred into each other and gave the impression of a misty, humid morning with cicadas buzzing, crickets chirping, and chick-or-wills calling to each other. I was reminded of many childhood summers spend out in the woods next to our house, taking early morning walks down a winding dirt road to a little pond, Price Pond, just to catch a glimpse of the herons that stood gracefully in repose as they scouted for food. Although this painting was not oil on canvas, I felt more moved by this solitary piece than I did the other fine pieces of art and photography. Simply put, I was reminded of home and childhood. The impressions that this piece made on me served to reawaken the peaceful memories I had somehow locked away from my busy life. As I looked at the heron, it was as though the floodgates had opened and I longed to go home and walk down that winding dirt road to Price Pond.

As I read the plaque I realized that Alice Ravenel Huger Smith was a very important person as an artist and community leader who captured the cultural heritage of the South in her artwork and efforts to bring about an artistic renaissance in Charleston. I admired her creativity, passion, and ambition. May be we need to shed all the thoughts that inhibit us in order to get something profound out of art. Walter Pater is right, “Not the fruit of experience, but experience itself, is the end . . . To burn always with this hard, gem-like flame, to maintain this ecstasy is success in life.”