Longleaf Art Studio

M. Ruth Little
My art journey has been bumpy. I majored in art at UNC-Chapel Hill during the Sixties when the art department was full of professors convinced that the only correct style of painting was abstract. Since abstract art didn’t convey what I saw, I left art and earned a Ph.D. in art and architectural history. For four decades I have taught and written about the art and historic architecture of North Carolina. In the late 1990s I took up my brushes and tubes of paint again. My first painting exhibit, at the Cameron Village Library, was a series depicting each room of my childhood home with the layers of junk and old clothing that my mother had added since I left home. Each painting that I finish clears away some of the psychic clutter and helps me reclaim my appreciation of form and color. The shape and patina of furniture, gravestones, and old buildings with no pretension to “art” speak to me of the human spirit. Trees and porches, each providing shade and shelter, are recurring symbols in my landscapes and urban scenes. By painting what I see, rather than what is objectively there, I hope to convey that spirit to others.

“It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing,” say jazz musicians. When I’m swinging to my playlist in my studio, the painting seems to make itself. My palette knife finds minor keys of pink or lavender or bluish-green that are almost neutral shades. I start out painting actual places but move towards a generalized place that could be anywhere. My recent series “City of Oaks” depicts Raleigh landmarks viewed through a framework of trees.