Fall Harvest
Autumn celebration
In their annual Fall Harvest Show, the Plainsmen Gallery in Dunedin, Florida, will feature more than 75 works of art from 25 participating artists, including John Coleman, Trever Swanson, Terry Smith, David Yorke,
Stephanie Campos and more.
A great horned owl, spotted while hiking in Colorado, is Swanson’s subject in Breezy Perch. “It was one of those gusty days as a storm was coming in,” he says. “You can see the breeze in his ears especially.”
Native subjects are a common theme in the show. Coleman’s bronze American Horse depicts the prominent Oglala Sioux chief of the same name who was married to Red Cloud’s daughter. He comments, “Part of my
inspiration for this sculpture was his famous top hat, which at the time was the ultimate symbol of ‘white man power.’ He received this hat as a delegate during a trip to Washington in the early 1890s.” The hat is now displayed at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in Washington D.C.
In Yorke’s The Waters Speak, a Crow Indian pauses beside rushing waters. He explains, “Native American cultural traditions believed in a spiritual/physical relationship to nature, having a connection to the earth and its complexity of life. They showed an appreciation for nature’s beauty and respect for the land, believing a ‘Great Spirit’ pervaded everything. The soil, water, sun, moon…all elements of nature had this sacred power.” Campos’ drawing Hopi features a young Hopi woman wearing her hair in the traditional “butterfly whorl” or “squash blossom” style. “A mother would brush and part her daughter’s long hair and wrap it in a figure eight around a U-shaped hair bow made of wood,” she explains. “Each loop was then tied at the middle and spread out to create two semi circles. This hairstyle signified she was of age to marry.”
The Fall Harvest Show opens October 27 with a reception from 1 to 4 p.m., and continues through November 17.