So this was cool - Friday October 1st was the opening reception for
Olive Pemberton: A Century of Beauty at the Fort Worth Community Art Center. Look at the pic above - Born in 1920, she had quite a life including performing under the tutelage of Billy Rose in NYC, along with her sister. She came back to Fort Worth TX, married, and was a member of the Fort Worth Circle of artists challenging "visual conventions of the time -experimenting with modernism, etc. " She is alive at 101 but homebound. However, this retrospective of her work is now on display.
I am fortunate to know her daughter, author Bonnie Pemberton (middle) - and it was cool to catch up with my writer gang (Stacy on the right) and celebrate Bonnie's mom.
Her work is lovely - watercolors, oils, sketches, and sculpture. There is a bit of everything to see.
What's sad is Bonnie told us she showed her mother the collection book. Her mother paged through it, but had no stories. Did not remember painting them. Bonnie asked, "Mom, well, what do you think of the art work?" Her mother picked up the book and paged back through it. She smiled and said, "I think it's pretty darn good. " Rather bittersweet.
As I said, all quite cool. Better late than never for us to see local talent and learn some history.
I salute Olive Pemberton.
