Bridgette Comellas – Story TellerInterview by Vidabeth Bensen and Forrest Greenslade August 2023 As a child, pastel artist Bridgette Comellas was always drawn to the details in the illustrations of classic stories like “Beauty and the Beast.” “I believe this is what inspires me now as an artist. I tend to lean into details when […]
Jody Nash Interview
Jody Nash – Listening to the TreesInterview by Vidabeth Bensen and Forrest Greenslade, May 2023 Jody Nash moved to her home and her Jody Nash Studio in Chatham County from California in 2020. She grew up in San Rafael, California, her family’s home tucked away in a eucalyptus forest. “My parents encouraged me in the […]
Donna Stubbs Interview
Donna Stubbs – Making HistoryInterview by Vidabeth Bensen and Forrest Greenslade May 2023 Mixed-media artist Donna Stubbs Art Studio creates amazing abstract compositions from a plethora of diverse materials she has accumulated through her everyday life. “I love to search for discarded items in thrift stores that speak to me in some way. I take […]
Janet Place Interview
Janet Place – Reflections of Her PastInterview by Vidabeth Bensen and Forrest Greenslade, May 2023 Janet Place, of Janet Place Glass Designs Studio in Pittsboro, will make her Chatham Studio Tour debut the first two weekends in December 2023. She will introduce her brilliant utilitarian and decorative fused glass art and jewelry. Janet assembles glass […]
Pam Freese Interview
Pamela Couillard Freese – Couillard Cloisonne Metalsmithing A little over a decade ago, Pam Freese stopped in Monnda Welch’s shop on the Chatham Studio Tour. She purchased a piece of jewelry and asked whether Monnda gave metal smithing instruction. She was still working as a pharmaceutical project manager, so she was not ready to begin […]
Michael Stano Interview
Michael Stano – Photographer In the mid-50s, Cub Scout Mike Stano made a pin-hole camera from plans in Boy’s Life magazine. “The camera ‘body’ was a Folger’s one-pound coffee can. The ‘lens’ was a nail hole poked through the can, and the ‘shutter’ was a piece of electrical tape over the hole. The inside of the can […]
Karen Greager Hall Interview
Karen Greager Hall – Grounded in Nature Karen Greager Hall will introduce her nature-inspired paintings at her Riverview Studio during the 2023 Chatham Studio Tour. Her passion to paint wildlife and landscapes evolved from her childhood of nature adventures with her family in the country near Philadelphia. Those endless nuances of color, light and shapes […]
Julio Alberdi Interview
Julio Alberdi – Alberdi Studio Sculptor Julio Alberdi was a founding artist in Chatham’s first Open Studio Tour in 1993 and he returns now in 2019. In the intervening years, Alberdi served as VP of a construction company building high-end residential and commercial properties around the area. During the entire time, he worked in his […]
Laura Wimbish-Vanderbeck Artist Interview
Laura Wimbish-Vanderbeck — Searching for the LightInterview by Vidabeth Bensen and Forrest Greenslade 2/24/03 Laura’s V Studio is a rustic building on Chicken Bridge Road. It was built by her husband Tom and adjacent to their home, also built by him. They moved to the rural property in 1995 from Chicago, where she practiced Clinical […]
Aline Kala – Artist Interview
Aline Kala – The South of France Here in ChathamInterview 3/2/23 by Vidabeth Bensen and Forrest Greenslade In her Kaline Studio near Pittsboro Aline Kala creates artistic bridges summing up her life experiences and cultures. She was born in France near the German Border. Her parents were Polish immigrants, and because of her father’s ill […]