Laura Beth Davidson’s Refreshing Approach to Photography

In theory, photography is the only art form that allows us to capture a moment as it actually exists, but in practice, the staging that often occurs before a photograph is taken can undermine that innate authenticity. Of course, photographs serve a variety of different purposes—educational, promotional, and commemorative, among others—and sometimes staging is needed to
convey certain information, advertise a specific product, or properly honor an occasion or
person. Staged photography also ensures that documentation occurs at all; in our fast-paced, productivity-obsessed society, we can tend to forget that moments become memories unless we schedule a time to remember. That said, how magical would it be if that feeling you get when you think back on what once was—that poignant nostalgia, that kinetic pull toward what was real and true—was encapsulated in your photographs? The work of local photographer Laura Beth Davidson proves that this kind of magic is possible.

Davidson refers to herself as a “visual storyteller,” a title that speaks to her abilities to closely observe, thoughtfully capture, and artfully relay the authentic narrative unfolding around her rather than a desire to control and direct the narrative. After starting her photography journey in 2012, she wasn’t sure if her introverted personality would allow her to turn her talent into a successful business.

“In 2012, I stumbled upon ‘Clickin’ Moms,’ an online community for photographers that offered virtual workshops and a forum for sharing photos and feedback,” Davidson recalled. “After I took the first class, I was hooked, and I knew I had found something that would be part of my life forever.
I’ve always been a bit of an entrepreneur, and once I felt confident in my ability to take good photographs, it seemed like a natural next step to find a way to make my hobby profitable. Unfortunately, I’m an extreme introvert, and the thought of being face-to-face with clients who expected me to pose and direct them made me really uncomfortable. I couldn’t figure out a way to make photography into a business that wouldn’t give me a chronic stomachache.”

Shortly thereafter, however, Davidson learned about documentary-style photoshoots and realized that both her personality and her longstanding love of storytelling parlayed perfectly into that approach to photography.

“I heard a couple of different podcast interviews with photographers who offered in-home documentary photography sessions,” she noted. “As an English major and literature lover, I relished the idea of becoming a visual storyteller who could offer families an alternative to typical photos—and as an introvert, I breathed a sigh of relief that I could work for families while letting them carry on with their everyday lives instead of stepping in and bossing them around.”

Before starting her business, Laura Beth Davidson Photography, in 2017, Davidson took additional classes and honed her craft by taking documentary-style photos of her own growing family. 

“I fell in love with the idea of capturing our real life through little details, gestures, and moments that ran the gamut of emotion,” she said.

In fact, such was Davidson’s passion and commitment to her craft that she took on a year-long photo project entitled “29 & Counting” in 2013.

“The day I turned 29, I decided to take one photo every day until my next birthday: I would mark my 30th year with 365 photos that would document my life that year,” she recalled. “My daughter had just turned two, we were in the process of selling our house and buying another that we would be renovating, and my husband and I were planning to have a second child. All of those big life events unfolded over the course of the year as I steadily honed my skills and my eye. The resulting book of photos is one of my favorite possessions.”

This April, Davidson will have completed her current year-long photo project, “39 & Counting,” and she says the experience has been just as rewarding as her previous year-long venture and has given her even more perspective on the importance of documenting the small moments—which are, in fact, the big moments—of everyday life.

“Some days, I forget to take a picture until very late in the day and have to scramble to find something vaguely worth documenting; some days I take so many photos that it’s hard to choose just one,” she noted.

“My subjects range from members of my family to our new dog, from beautiful light to a random plant that catches my eye.

For this project, I’ve learned to not expect to create something amazing every day, but that the effort of pushing myself to create something daily is never a wasted effort.”

When it comes to taking photos for clients, Davidson is flexible, open-minded, and committed to capturing and conveying the unique narrative of a family’s day together.

“I offer day-in-the-life photo sessions that I have designed to make the process as simple as possible,” she remarked.

“My clients are a lot like me: we’re busy and a little stressed, we’re sleep-deprived and tired of making decisions at every turn. I want my clients to only have to choose which day and how long they want me to come, and then let me do everything else. I emphasize that I don’t expect any kind of coordination of outfits or activities and that I want people to pretend I’m not even there.”

Davidson spends anywhere from three to 12 hours with a family as they do everyday things like go grocery shopping, play outside, cook dinner, and get ready for bed. She then edits the photos down to a collection that “tells a strong story of the day” before laying out and printing a photo book that is included in every package. 

“I want the time I spend with a family to be recorded as it happens and then preserved in a way that will last for generations,” she said.

In the future, Davidson hopes to continue to photograph families across the country—and perhaps even around the world—and has a specific goal to photograph a specific family.

“My big dream is to pursue a job as a White House photographer,” she remarked. “To me, that experience—especially if I could have the opportunity to work for a President with a young family—would be the ultimate opportunity for visual storytelling.”

No matter what comes next for Davidson, her work—and the work of all photographers and artists who strive for authenticity in capturing and expressing the human experience—can help us remember that there is magic in the mundane, perfection in imperfection, and a memory worth holding onto in each moment.  

To learn more about Laura Beth Davidson Photography, visit laurabethdavidson.com.

Academy Center of the Arts Unveils Artistica.Shop

By Emily Mook / Photos Courtesy of Artistica.Shop

The Academy Center of the Arts (ACOA) consistently proves that maintaining a rich and longstanding history of serving a particular community while also coming up with innovative ways to increase that community’s visibility is possible—and one of the organization’s newest endeavors, Artistica.Shop, epitomizes this dual ability. Launched in July 2023, this online gallery and art sales website spotlights the work of local artists for audiences near and far and allows the artists to focus on their work rather than on the many logistics associated with selling their work.

“The focus for Artistica is incorporating a way for our organization to support artists with their creative endeavors here by providing them an online platform that connects them with a larger audience,” says Michelline Hall, Chief Programming Officer of ACOA. “With Artistica, the artists don’t have to worry about the overhead of trying to advertise, sell, and ship their work, so they can focus on being creative.”

The Academy’s desire to expand and evolve while still honoring its grassroots-inspired origins led to Artistica’s creation.

“One of the biggest roles of an arts center that distinguishes it from a museum or gallery is that arts centers are reflective of their communities,” she notes. “We kind of walk hand-in-hand with artists from our regions and serve as beacons of support for them. The pandemic taught us how to think outside the box about how we can provide that support, and a 21st century mindset also lends itself to this sort of online presence.”

Whether an artist is just beginning to embark on their career or is already well-established, they are encouraged to submit their work for consideration for inclusion in the Artistica gallery. 

“We want to feature work from and give a platform to emerging artists all the way through very established artists who are already touring in prestigious spaces,” remarks Hall. “Of course, as an artist’s portfolio grows, they may get picked up by larger entities. That’s something we love to see.”

Several ACOA staff members work together to make Artistica the pioneering project it is. The point person for the site is Online Curator and Art Sales Manager, A’Nyeja Adams. Adams and Ted Batt, ACOA’s Director of Visual Arts, work together to select the artwork that will be featured on and set for sale through the site.

“A’Nyeja and Ted work closely to review artist submissions, which are submitted online,” Hall says. “They engage in discussions with artists about their work, and they’re the ones who make the final decisions. Our focus is on artists from Central Virginia and Virginia as a whole, but artists from other areas are welcome to submit their work as well. All mediums are encouraged! We feature oil paintings, pottery, photography, and much more. The key requirement is that the work must be original and created entirely by the artist.”

Hall notes that ACOA’s Assistant Director of Programming, Mele Thompson, and Director of Marketing, Joel Williams, also play integral roles in the development and maintenance of the project. Artistica is sponsored by Moore & Giles.

“It definitely takes a community to keep Artistica running!” Hall exclaims.

Indeed, community is at the heart of all of ACOA’s programs and initiatives, including Artistica. The Academy’s official mission is “cultivating a healthier and more interconnected populace through cultural infrastructure and community-building arts programs.”

“Artistica highlights the cultural infrastructure piece of our mission statement in that it allows us to provide a foundation for artists to be artists and not businesspeople,” states Hall. “They are able to generate sales and income through their work without having to deal with the associated logistics. The gallery also creates a more interconnected populace because we understand how art has the power to bring people together and break down barriers.”

One of the most common barriers is a steep price point, and, as such, the Artistica team strives for more accessible pricing on the website.

“We want art to be accessible to people from all walks of life, and for that reason, the art featured on Artistica represents a wide range of price points,” Hall notes. “We want people to be able to think, ‘Before I go to a random box store for art, I should check Artistica to find something original and support a local artist.’”

Although Artistica has a wide reach, it simultaneously maintains and highlights local touchpoints by featuring artwork that can be found at the Academy itself or at one of its three satellite locations.

“Among the art featured on Artistica is art that is currently showcased in our physical galleries,” remarks Hall. “In addition to our on-campus gallery, we have three satellite galleries: one at Westminster Canterbury, one at the Virginian, and one at Magnolia Foods. If someone sees a piece of art they love in passing at one of these locations, they can visit Artistica.Shop to learn more about the artist, look at their other work, and make a purchase if they so desire. The reverse is also true: if someone sees one of these pieces they like on the website and wants to view it in person, they can do so. As such, the online gallery allows us to serve our First Friday and other local audiences in a greater way.”

Local performing arts enthusiasts will also notice that a wall in the lobby of the Historic Academy Theatre has been converted into an interactive Artistica.Shop gallery, complete with a touch screen panel and a featured artist display that changes each month.

ACOA hopes to continue to raise awareness of the site and expand its reach and accessibility, and Hall personally hopes to continue to challenge people’s perceptions about what art is and who it’s for.

“Art is truly for everyone,” she says. “I love helping people discover the healing aspects of art and learn that they can communicate things through the arts that are hard to communicate through conversation. And I think it’s beautiful that art can then actually lead to conversations, even about really tough topics.”

In this fast-paced and sometimes isolating world we live in, it’s nice to know that the beginning of some of those meaningful, community-building conversations could be a mere click away.  

Eight Tips for Conquering Clutter and Reclaiming Your Space

Whether decluttering and organizing your home are on your New Year’s resolution list or not, it is undeniable that tackling these tasks can dramatically improve your outlook on and quality of life. For many of us, however, it can be hard to know where to start, how to avoid burnout, and how to maintain results. Lauren Malone, professional organizer and owner of Optimistic Organizing, understands these obstacles and has made it her mission to help people overcome them. Malone’s business, which she started in early 2020, was borne of a lifelong talent for—and interest in—organizing.

“Organizing has always been a passion of mine,” she said. “I’ve always enjoyed organizing in my own home and helping friends and family. As I saw others creating businesses and being able to put that skill out in the community, it really struck a chord for me. I saw an opportunity to help more people with something that comes easily to me.”

Malone offers free consultations for prospective clients, and she also helped Lynchburg Living compile a list of eight tips to help our readers approach organization with not only an informed plan, but also with optimism.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help

If the mere thought of organizing unnerves you, consider reaching out for help, either from a professional like Malone or from a friend.

“I think a lot of people feel stuck and overwhelmed,” noted Malone. “They may feel like they just cannot seem to get a hold of their space. I want to be able to come into someone’s space and immediately let them know that they don’t need to apologize or feel hopeless. I want to empower people and let them know that they’re not alone.”

Optimistic Organizing offers a wide range of services including decluttering, downsizing, unpacking, and organization of individual spaces or throughout the home. Clients can decide whether they want to work with Malone or have her complete tasks independently.

If you would prefer to reach out to a friend for help, Malone recommends doing a swap. 

“If you’re not able to hire a professional, consider swapping with a friend,” she said.” Say, ‘I’ll come help you with your closet, and then you can come help me with mine!’ If you both have kids, the kids can play together while you work!”

Try to keep a positive mindset

For most of us, decluttering and organization are fairly intense undertakings that can stir up tough emotions like guilt and shame. It is no easy feat to overcome these feelings, but being intentional about celebrating small victories, listening to music, audiobooks, or podcasts while you work, and embracing the inevitability of imperfection can help. The goal, as Malone puts it, is to achieve
“a hopeful and confident outlook on life and organization.”

Establish what brings you joy and what weighs you down

Speaking of emotions, it is vital to sit with them when decluttering to figure out which possessions truly enrich your life and which possessions are kept only out of a sense of obligation or emotional attachment.

“Some people can get really emotionally attached to items, especially items that belonged to family members or that were given to them as gifts,” remarked Malone. “Sometimes they get so attached to those items that they continue to fill their space to the point that they don’t have room for things that truly bring them joy. When you walk into a room, you should be able to see things that make you happy.”

Remember that there is value in space

Of course, when you walk into a room, you should also be able to have space to breathe and function. When you strive for a balance between stuff and space, you are much more likely to appreciate the things you own and to find your home harmonious.

“I like to remind my clients that there is value in having space to breathe and move in,” Malone noted. “A lot of people think that acquiring more things is going to help them, but often it can really hold them back.”

Start with the space that causes you the most stress

Starting with the space that vexes you the most will likely provide you with a confidence boost and a sense of accomplishment that will make smaller tasks that much easier to complete. 

“I ask people which space is driving them the craziest,” said Malone. “A lot of times it’s the kitchen because the kitchen is the hub of a home. Sometimes, though, I might think we need to tackle a certain space first but the client wants to prioritize a different space first. Whatever is going to bring them the most relief and the best sense of accomplishment is where we start.”

When in doubt, start with storage

If you are overwhelmed by the state of the majority of your home, Malone recommends starting with your storage spaces. 

“If you’re dealing with an excessive amount of clutter throughout your home, start with storage rooms so you can start with a space that likely contains items that aren’t being used regularly and should theoretically be easier to get rid of,” she remarked. “Remember to keep tabs on things that you put away in storage and make sure that you’re only doing this with things that you will actually use later. Items that aren’t serving you outside a box won’t serve you any better packed away in a box.”

Once you commit to organizing a particular space, don’t leave it until it’s done

One of the most important—and most challenging—parts of decluttering is committing to a single task and seeing it through to completion before moving on to a different task. Stepping away from one space to put even a single item elsewhere will almost inevitably lead to further deviation from your original goal.

“My recommendation for most people is to focus on one room or one space,” noted Malone. “Do not let yourself leave that space. A lot of times people will pull an item out and say, ‘Oh, this goes in my basement,’ and then they will walk down to the basement. Then, suddenly, they are in the basement working on something else, and then they are in the kitchen making a snack. I recommend having a bag or basket for items that don’t belong in the particular space you’re organizing. Put the items in that container, and then once you’ve finished that particular space, you can put those items where they go.”

Use the S-P-A-C-E strategy

Lastly, Malone recommends using the “S-P-A-C-E” strategy, which was created by organization expert and author Julie Morgenstern. After emptying and cleaning a space, take the following steps:

S: Sort the items into categories.

P: Purge any items that you don’t need or that don’t belong in that space.

A: Assign homes to items.

C: Contain the items. For this step, Malone stresses the importance of labels, saying: “A big complaint I get from a lot of people is along the lines of, ‘I know how to stay organized, but the rest of my family doesn’t keep it that way!’ Labeling things goes a long way because it is human nature to put things where you know they are supposed to go.”

E: Evaluate each space at least once a year to maintain results.

For more information about Optimistic Organizing, visit www.optimisticorganizing.com.  

Julian Raven, Opens Gallery and Studio on Wards Road

When artist Julian Raven shares his story, he paints a picture as vivid and lively as the stunning works he displays in his new gallery on Wards Road.

Raven’s journey from a young English boy living in Spain with a penchant and talent for art to an internationally celebrated artist with a vast and versatile catalog of work has been full of peaks, valleys, and serendipitous moments. He seems to recall every step of his journey with gratitude for bringing him to where he is today.

Raven’s earliest memory of loving art occurred when he was about eight years old and living in Spain.

“I can remember sitting with my father on a veranda in a villa in southern Spain, where I grew up,” he recalled. “It was a sunny day, and I did a colored pencil drawing of some beautiful bougainvillea that was wrapped around a white-washed wall. It was a clear picture of my inclination towards the visual arts.”

When his family moved to Portugal when he was a bit older, Raven attended tiny international English-speaking schools and continued pursuing his passion for art. He won several art contests, but because the arts were not prioritized in these schools, Raven was not fully supported in his pursuit—that is, until the day his math teacher found him sketching in the school’s library.

“My math teacher saw me doodling in the library at the English International College and set a crushed can of Coke in front of me to sketch,” said Raven. “After I was done sketching, he basically took me by the hand and walked me over to meet David Bodlak, an artist and teacher in the art department.”

Bodlak mentored and championed Raven when the latter was in his mid-teens and continues to be a source of great inspiration to him to this day.

“He was a wonderful mentor,” Raven stated. “His enthusiasm and encouraging spirit were incredible. In an art class where you have all different skill levels, he would go from student to student and always find something redeemable about each person’s work. He has had a tremendous impact on me.”

Raven graduated high school at the age of 16 and took a year off to focus on his art. He then went on to study at the prestigious Chelsea College of Arts in London.

During his time at the College, Raven experienced a series of highs and lows. Although he “was in heaven because the facilities were huge,” he was struggling greatly with his father’s death, which happened when Raven was only 10, and with the political climate that surrounded him. He notes that he lost his faith in God and often felt hopeless and lost during this time.

Raven ended up leaving the College and going back to Spain, where he began to work in the bar business. Then, in early 1992, Raven’s life changed dramatically as he sat alone on a mountain.

“I came to faith in God in Spain, alone and sitting on a mountain, contemplating nature,” he recalled.
“That experience changed my life and led me down a spiritual journey where I began to pursue missionary work.”

This missionary work brought him to America. He originally planned to do missionary work in California for six months and then move to Mexico as a missionary, but he ended up moving to Elmira, New York, in 1996 instead. There, he met his wife, Gloria, and they started their own business: Raven’s Custom Creations. As Raven used his artistic skills to create custom-painted and decorative furniture, his passion for art was invigorated.

In addition to thriving artistically, Raven was spiritually and personally fulfilled. He and Gloria had three children, and he opened his own gallery in Elmira in 2007. Then the 2008 financial crisis occurred.

Forced to close the gallery, Raven and his family moved back to Spain for a year and a half. Ultimately, they moved back to Elmira and Raven opened a new gallery.

After entertaining the idea of RVing out west, Raven and Gloria decided to move to Lynchburg, where all three of their children still study at Liberty University. Raven knew that he wanted to open a gallery here; the challenge was finding the right spot for it. Julian Raven Artist, LLC, found a home at 2121 Wards Road and officially opened on March 25.

“I could have gotten a warehouse and been off the beaten path,” he said. “I looked at those options but decided that if I wanted to get up and running, I needed to be in an area with more movement. It’s sort of an unlikely setting for an art studio because I’m stuck between a Wendy’s and a McDonald’s, but it’s also sort of fitting because I’m a contrarian by nature. It just had what I saw as the bones to be something great.”

Raven and his son spent six weeks completely renovating the building, which houses not only Raven’s work, but also what he calls his “Renaissance Creative Palette” of services: painting parties, art classes, portrait painting and photography, and more. There is a screen-printing room downstairs and a brand-new photo studio, for which a ribbon cutting ceremony was held on June 15.

Raven says that his painting parties are a “real way to connect with people,” and adds that “seeing people who have never painted before create works of art is remarkable.” According to Raven, one gentleman came in a couple of times to paint, and after Raven shared the man’s second painting on Instagram, it sold for $100.

When it comes to Raven’s own work, he is a multimedia artist and photographer.

“I have a lot of very broad experience because my artistic hunger has made me curious to discover and try new things,” he noted. “I like to be constantly challenged. I always seem to find difficult things to do!”

That said, Raven specializes in abstract expressionism, which he says allows him “to share his inner-world experience and joy.” He recalls that an attendee of one of his shows referred to him as a “happy Pollock,” a moniker that he happily embraced.

There is no telling where Raven’s journey will take him next, but one thing is certain: he will continue to see the beauty in all things and to share his interpretations of that beauty with others.

“Beauty, for me, is so arresting,” he stated. “When I see true beauty—nature, people—I want
to capture it and share it with others. We live in some pretty serious times right now. I want people to feel lighter after leaving my gallery.”  

To learn more about Julian Raven, his gallery and studio, and his art, check out his website (julianraven.com) and Facebook page.

The Seven Hills Chamber Music Festival to Return to Lynchburg in August

Photos courtesy of Seven Hills Chamber Music

Like many forms of classical music, chamber music is evocative of the past. Established in the late 1700s, it is deeply rooted in tradition and frequently associated with the great composers of that time: Beethoven, Bach, Mozart, Vivaldi, Handel, and so on. That said, chamber music most certainly does not belong to or in the past; rather, it is an ever-evolving art form that continues to enchant audiences around the world thanks to the contributions of innovative and talented composers and musicians. Luckily for Lynchburg, one such group of musicians has made it their mission to share their art with local audiences for free every summer: Seven Hills Chamber Music.

Seven Hills Chamber Music was founded by Dudley Raine IV, a freelance violist currently based in New York City. Raine established a piano quartet in 2017, but the COVID-19 pandemic forced the group to cease performing; ultimately, though, the pandemic also inspired Raine to think bigger—and closer to his hometown. After networking with musicians he had worked with in New York City, met at festivals, and met through school (Manhattan School of Music), Raine established Seven Hills Chamber Music.

“As we were coming out of the pandemic, I was looking to do something for my hometown of Lynchburg, Virginia,” Raine said. “We had 13 artists come together for three concerts, and we were
all really excited to play live music again. After that, the momentum kind of kept picking up!”

Those three concerts comprised the first Seven Hills Chamber Music Festival in August 2021. Following the success of the inaugural festival—which reached about 1,000 people—the group hosted its second annual festival with 23 performers last year and will present its third festival with 31 performers this August. The group has also added standalone concerts to its repertoire.

A chamber music concert is markedly more intimate than an orchestra concert in that each musician who is performing is usually the only person playing that particular part. Additionally, unlike orchestra ensembles, chamber ensembles do not have conductors.

“In an orchestra, there might be ten violinists playing the same notes, but with chamber music, it’s typically one person—or maybe two people—per part,” noted Raine. “Chamber music is also generally unconducted, which means that the musicians are the ones who have to keep time and breathe together. We have to know each other’s parts because there are a lot of things that go on across the ensemble during a performance.”

As such, the group has developed a close camaraderie that imbues their already dynamic performances with a palpable, effortless, and knowing energy. Listening to them play could easily be compared to listening to a conversation among old friends—a conversation built on familiarity and trust and full of seamless transitions as a wide variety of thoughts and feelings are discussed.

In addition to figuratively telling stories with their music, Seven Hills Chamber Music utilizes literal storytelling to help audience members, many of whom may not be familiar with chamber music, connect with the compositions.

“Before we play a piece, we have one of the artists talk about the piece,” Raine stated. “This artist may give little examples of what people will hear, point out what to listen for, tell a story about the piece, and so on. This makes the experience more relatable for those who may not know much about classical music.”

Showcasing new works by living composers and works by lesser-known composers also enables the ensemble to make chamber music more relatable for modern audiences.

“Everyone likes to hear Beethoven and Mozart, but we bring a lot of new music as well,” Raine said. “My co-director, Nicole Brancato, does a lot of the programming. She is an expert in the field of new music and knows a lot of great composers, and I also have my share of experience with new music. We try to program many different styles of music by all sorts of composers.”

In fact, this year’s festival will open with a celebration of female composers, past and present, on August 16.

“Our opening night concert in Lynchburg this summer will be music exclusively composed by women—both women of the past, such as Fanny Mendelssohn and Clara Schumann, and living composers like Missy Mazzoli,” remarked Raine.

The group will also be joined by two composers-in-residence, one of whom is on the faculty at Juilliard Pre-College in New York City, and the other of whom is based in San Francisco and often composes music for movies.

After operating out of Raine’s old 501(c)(3) for his piano quartet for about a year, Seven Hills Chamber Music officially became a 501(c)(3) organization last summer. The group has been awarded two grants thus far—one from the Schewel Charitable Foundation and one from the James River Arts & Cultural District program—and has received a great deal of support from the community at large. 

Although the group is currently working on producing a concert for New York City and ultimately hopes to tour throughout the year, Raine stated that “our home base will always be the Lynchburg festival.” He added that he envisions collaborations with other organizations, such as dance companies and chorus groups, and the incorporation of visual arts aspects.

No matter what the future holds, Seven Hills Chamber Music will undoubtedly continue to delight audiences while proving that chamber music is anything but a relic of the past. 

“It’s incredible to be able to share our music with people for free!” Raine exclaimed. “We are passionate about what we do and about sharing that passion with others.”  

For more information about Seven Hills Chamber Music, including the schedule for their summer festival, please visit sevenhillscmf.org.

Amelia Perry Pride’s Steadfast Quest for Equity in—and Beyond—Home Economics

By: Emily Mook  |  Photos by Ashlee Glen

“I would rather wear out working among all classes of my race than to rust out seeing so much to be done.” – Amelia Perry Pride (in a letter to Orra Langhorne, 1899)

Although she was one of Lynchburg’s most groundbreaking, altruistic, and inspiring citizens, Amelia Perry Pride is not as well-known as she should be.

“During her time, everybody knew her, and yet today, I feel like nobody knows her,” said Ted Delaney, Director of the Lynchburg Museum System.

Perhaps this is partially the case because Pride, a free biracial woman born in Lynchburg in 1857, did not seem to be concerned with her own prominence. A monumentally generous and seemingly tireless philanthropist, Pride focused her energies on bettering the lives of others—particularly people of color who were less fortunate than she—rather than on widely broadcasting her own name and achievements. Additionally, Pride was more concerned with practical matters of equity and equality than with outright innovation. It also cannot go without saying that the accomplishments of people of color are routinely and unjustly undervalued.

Whatever the reasons may be for Pride’s relative lack of present-day recognition, her story is unquestionably worth knowing and celebrating. Among her most remarkable endeavors are her founding and running of the Theresa Pierce Cooking School, which ultimately became the basis for the public home economics curriculum for Lynchburg City Schools.

Born to biracial parents and orphaned by the age of 16, Pride demonstrated early abilities to take care of, motivate, and challenge herself. After attending local schools as a child, she continued her education at the highly esteemed Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute (known today as Hampton University) and graduated in 1879 from the teachers’ education program. Upon her graduation, Hampton immediately hired Pride to teach a group of Native American girls through its missionary program. Over the next decade, she taught at various Lynchburg public schools, including Polk Street Colored School, Old Payne School, and Jackson Street School, and she went on to serve as the principal of Polk Street School from 1890 to 1911. She was one of the first Black women employed by the Lynchburg School system. Pride also established The Dorchester Home (a retirement home for elderly Black women) in 1897, the McKenzie Sewing School (a free sewing school for Black children) in 1898, and the Theresa Pierce Cooking School (a free cooking school for Black girls) in 1903. 

The Theresa Pierce Cooking School was held in a house owned by Pride and her husband, Claiborne Gladman Pride, and located on Madison Street across from the couple’s home. Its name evinces a common practice of that time period.

“[A white couple named] Wallace and Stella Pierce donated money to Amelia Pride to start the school in memory of their deceased daughter, Theresa,” Delaney noted. “At Hampton Institute, each student was sponsored by someone, and students were expected to write their sponsors letters. Sponsors were typically white people in the North trying to help Black people in the South. Amelia Pride herself was expected to write letters to her sponsors to update them on what she was working on. She had this model of how you were supposed to do things: Get sponsors to underwrite your projects and keep in touch with them. It was very natural and normal for her to make contact with Wallace Pierce, get him to underwrite the school, and name the school after his daughter.”

In fact, Pride was generally extremely adept and resourceful when it came to using her identity as an affluent biracial individual to enact positive change.

“Another thing she was very skilled at was, through her connections to the white community, getting white people to donate to her causes and being able to walk that line,” stated Delaney. “She was in a socioeconomic class where she could socialize with white people and gain their support while at the same time—because she was considered ‘colored’ or ‘Negro’ by the society of that time—she had full reign to work, lead, and start initiatives in Black communities. She used her position—which was very much on the line of race—to navigate both worlds.”

Although there are no rosters or other data sources indicating the number or ages of students who attended the cooking school, Delaney believes that students likely ranged in age from about eight years old (old enough to follow a basic recipe) to 15-20 years old (old enough to get work on their own). That said, he also thinks that Pride would have been unlikely to turn adults in need of basic cooking instruction away.

“It wouldn’t surprise me at all if she had some adults in the classes,” he said. “She was so equal opportunity. Whoever was in need, she was going to help.”

According to Delaney, Pride’s granddaughter Miriam Pride Kyle said her grandmother was committed to helping families learn how to grow and prepare nutritious foods. An avid gardener herself, Pride insisted on adding a garden to the grounds of Polk Street School to facilitate this learning and took matters into her own hands when her request was initially denied. 

“The school board denied her request to plow a plot of land behind Polk Street School,” Kyle recalled in 1981. “She got a horse and plow and proceeded to do it herself. It was reported immediately and a man was sent out to do it. She taught gardening to pupils and canning to their parents.”

Pride’s focus on imparting essential skills also applied to her curriculum for the Theresa Pierce Cooking School.

“As far as I’m aware, there was nothing particularly revolutionary about her cooking and she didn’t have a signature dish,” said Delaney. “At that time, she was really worried that there were young people—and even older people—who maybe had been enslaved, were now on their own, and had never been taught things as basic as boiling water. She really focused on the core principles of cooking and being able to feed yourself. Reading her letters and articles that she sent to [Hampton Institute periodical] The Southern Workman, I think that in everything—cooking, sewing,
The Dorchester Home—she was really about imparting those fundamental life skills that many of us take for granted and assume that everyone knows or has the opportunity to learn at home with family.”

The Theresa Pierce Cooking School was transferred to Virginia Theological Seminary and College (known today as the Virginia University of Lynchburg) during the 1916-1917 school year. An excerpt from the College’s 1920-1921 catalog (seen to the left) outlines Pierce’s (likely somewhat modified) curriculum.

In 1949, 17 years after Pride’s death, Lynchburg City Schools created a new home economics building at Dunbar High School and named it the Amelia Pride Center in Pride’s honor.

“The oral history is that her cooking school and curriculum were generally integrated into the public schools here for Black students,” Delaney noted.

Today, the Amelia Pride Center is part of the Paul Laurence Dunbar Middle School for Innovation campus, and it houses continuing education and alternative secondary education programs. Pride’s steadfast legacy lives on, and her name is one we should all feel proud to know.

“She was in command at all times!” Kyle said of Pride in 1981. “It was often said of her: ‘When Mrs. Amelia Perry Pride walks down the street, the street has been walked down.’ I’m sure she could have persuaded the rattles off a snake if she had to in order to help someone.”

“She strikes me as one of the hardest-working, most productive people who lived in Lynchburg,” stated Delaney. “Starting schools, starting an old folks’ home, and taking on the many other initiatives that she took on were not easy tasks by any means. These are major accomplishments, and they require not only your own hard work and investment, but also the ability to mobilize other people and to get other people to follow your vision and support you. It’s really amazing to see how much she accomplished and to think about the forces she was able to marshal to support her work. She was an incredible woman in this community.”  

What the Revitalization of the Tutelo Language Will Mean for the Monacan Indian Nation

“A language is not just words. It’s a culture, a tradition, a unification of a community, a whole history that creates what a community is. It’s all embodied in a language.”
– Noam Chomsky

Throughout its history, the Monacan Indian Nation has demonstrated astounding resilience in the face of obstacles orchestrated by those who wish to eradicate its identity. The Monacan community has not only overcome these obstacles, but has also utilized them as opportunities to reclaim and strengthen its identity time and again. To say the least, the journey has been arduous and the victories hard-won, but the Monacan people have continued to reclaim and revitalize the aspects of their identity that have been taken from them. 

One such aspect is the Monacan language, Tutelo, which is in the process of being recreated, restored, and cataloged. The importance of language to a community’s identity cannot be overstated; when a community’s language dies, that community must then use the words—which, as Chomsky said, are never just words—of others to refer to itself. The Monacans’ reclamation of Tutelo is monumental, a fact made even clearer as one learns about the journey that led to this reclamation.

The Monacan Indian Nation is headquartered on Bear Mountain in Amherst County, and its citizens are descended from Eastern Siouan groups from Virginia and North Carolina. The Nation’s efforts to attain state and federal recognition—which it did in 1989 and 2018, respectively—demonstrate the Monacans’ longstanding strength and ability to turn obstacles into opportunities. 

In fact, the earliest documentation of Monacan presence in Virginia—documentation that was ultimately integral in the Nation’s achievement of federal recognition—details the capture of a Monacan man.

“The history of our people dates back to 1608 as far as physical, handwritten proof of us being here in the state of Virginia goes,” said Lou Branham, Director of the Monacan Indian Nation Ancestral Museum. “It goes back to a personal journal kept by Captain John Smith. He ran across a Monacan named Amoroleck, took him captive, and questioned him about the Powhatan Confederacy. This document was very important when it came to the Bureau of Indian Affairs and us getting federal recognition.”

In the 1920s, Dr. Walter Plecker enacted what Branham calls a “paper genocide” of Virginia-based Native Americans by eliminating the option to identify oneself as an indigenous person when responding to the census. Plecker, along with the Anglo-Saxon Clubs of America, persuaded the Virginia General Assembly to pass the Racial Integrity Act of 1924, which stated that it was illegal for whites and non-whites to marry, and which recognized only two racial classifications: “white” and “colored.”

“Plecker was in a position of power—he was the head of Vital Records and Statistics for 32 years—and he believed in eugenics,” Branham noted. “He thought that you were either white or you were colored; to him, no Native Americans existed.”

As a result, Monacan people who moved away—often to marry whom they wanted and to generally escape the rampant racism in the area—would frequently be unable to locate family members upon their return.

The United States Supreme Court overturned the Racial Integrity Act in 1967, thus allowing Native Americans in Virginia to marry whom they chose and to change their birth certificates—for a fee, until 1997—to accurately convey their identities.

“When we went for state recognition, we had to mail off our birth certificates,” recalled Branham.
“If we hadn’t gone for state recognition, we never would have known that that documentation had been changed.”

Branham chooses to see Plecker’s contemptible actions as a catalyst in the Monacan Nation’s journey to fully reclaim its identity.

“I’m a firm believer that in our walk in life, we have ups and downs and many side roads that are taken,” she stated. “Plecker was just a part of the plan that happened to happen to the Monacan people.”

Branham’s father, Ronnie, started the Monacan tribe as an entity along with his first cousin and founder of the Monacan Indian Nation Ancestral Museum, Phyllis Hicks. Ronnie Branham was the first elected chief of the Nation, and Hicks was an ordained minister who pastored the church that resides on the Monacans’ seven-and-a-half acres of land alongside the tribal schoolhouse (once used as both a school and a community meeting space) and the museum.

“This land is the heart and soul of our community,” said Branham. “If you take this away, it’s almost like ripping a heart away from a body. The history of generations and generations of our family—of kids playing in the creeks and running through the woods, of people going to the church and the school and attending functions—is here. Here I promote no negative energy. Everything here is positive for me because this has always been a positive and peaceful place in my life.”

As the Monacan Nation’s recent federal recognition continues to open doors to various government programs—including a community health services program that will be open to Native Americans from any tribe and to community members who are Medicaid and Medicare recipients—the restoration of the Tutelo language has come to the forefront.

The process was initiated by the late George Whitewolf, who was a Monacan medicine man, in 2000. According to Branham, Whitewolf spent a great deal of time with the Lakota tribe and shared their language, Lakhota, with the Monacan tribe upon his return. These interactions prompted further research of Lakhota and other Siouan languages, and the Monacan people ultimately discovered that they spoke Tutelo.

The near-extinction of Tutelo resulted largely from colonization. Additionally, the last native speaker passed away around the year 2000.

“A lot of it had to do with colonization and eugenics,” Branham noted. “The United States’ political ideology of things is that they wanted to colonize Native Americans and make them conform to non-Native ways.”

A group of historians and linguists, led by indigenous historian and language activist Dr. Marvin Richardson of the Haliwa-Saponi Tribe, is working with Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages to create a Tutelo-Saponi Monacan Living Dictionary. This online dictionary is accessible to the general public and continues to grow at a steady pace.

“We’ve got to recreate words and grammar,” stated Branham. “We’re currently working on creating words and phrases, but it’s hard to do the verbs right now. We actually have about 700 entry words so far, but by the end of 2023, we hope to have 3,000.”

For Branham, the revitalization of Tutelo is important on both a personal and a wide-scale level.

“When I was little, I remember my grandmother using certain words and phrases, and my father would say, ‘You can’t teach her that,’” she recalled. “My great-grandmother said, ‘If we spoke our language, we could risk having our homes burnt down.’ I think it’s a shame that you have to live in fear just because you have different cultural beliefs and speak a different language.”

As Branham continues to build bridges with community organizations to raise awareness of and garner support for the Monacan Indian Nation, she is excited to see the bridge between the Nation’s past and future become fortified by Tutelo’s return.

“It’s going to open up a new world from the old world,” she said. “It’s our old, traditional language, but to so many it’s going to be something that’s brand new.”  

How Robert “DJ Mad Lad” Goins Shaped Lynchburg’s Culture

Local DJ and all-around renaissance man Robert “DJ Mad Lad” Goins’ influence on Lynchburg’s rich and complex cultural and musical identities simply cannot be overstated. At the tender age of 15, he saw that Lynchburg’s African American population lacked representation on the radio and set out with tenacity, curiosity, and ingenuity to address the problem. Goins’ fateful tale of the summer of 1966 is a testament to an individual’s capacity to enact positive change and transform a community.

In the early 1960s, Lynchburg’s radio station offerings did not come close to reflecting the vibrant diversity of the music being made or the artists making that music. In particular, soul music by Black artists had no avenue for reaching a broad local audience; access was limited to those who could afford to buy soul records.

“Growing up in Lynchburg in the ’60s, there was no soul station,” Goins recalled. “I didn’t know the difference between the different genres of music. Songs like Whole Lot of Shakin’ Going On; Ahab,
the Arab; Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavour; and Peggy Sue were all that I knew about in the first, second, and third grades. I didn’t know anything about Black artists because the stations
weren’t really playing those artists. Nobody played any soul music during the day. You might occasionally hear The Supremes or Chubby Checker, but those occurrences were few and far between.”

Little did Goins know that a trip to Chicago in the summer of 1966 would open up a new world of music not only for him, but also for the Lynchburg community at large.

“I didn’t know that there was such a thing as a Black radio station until 1966, when I spent the summer with my cousin in Chicago,” he said. “I heard this Black radio station and I said, ‘Wow, this is slick! I wish I could have some kind of way to get this kind of music out to everybody!’”

It didn’t take long for Goins—who was only 15 at the time—to begin turning that wish into reality. His first step was learning how to build a transmitter.

“I came across this popular electronics book called Radio-TV Experimenter, and they had this circuit board transmitter—a short-wave code transmitter—and I just started building it,” he noted. “All it did was make Morse Code noise on the air on the short-wave band. I just kept on messing with it and adjusting it and making it fall on a band where people could listen to it.” 

The next step in the process was figuring out how to get music onto the radio.

“After some trial and error and a couple of blown circuit boards, I found a way to put music on the radio,” said Goins. “It was a daily experiment until I got something that worked, and it took me the summer of 1966 to figure it out. I finally got a circuit, hooked my record player and microphone up to it, and I was on the air! I could get a couple of blocks with it.”

Along the way, Goins—who did not yet realize that he was creating an illegal radio station—consulted with two of his teachers, neither of whom were aware of their student’s project.

“I had a couple of teachers—my electronics shop teacher and my physics teacher—who told me about crystals, which are the things that put the radio waves on the air,” he stated. “They didn’t know what they were helping me do! They thought I was just really interested in the topic.”

Once Goins figured out how to get music on the air, he realized that he needed access to additional music if he wanted to start his own station. Fortunately, he had plenty of friends who were happy to share their records in exchange for guest spots on Goins’ new station, which he named WKKD (KKD stood for Krispy Kreme Donuts).

“I didn’t have too much music at the time,” Goins recalled. “Records were 76¢ back then, and that was most of my lunch money. And that was only for a two-and-a-half-minute song, so what do you do for the rest of the time? I kind of depended on my friends who bought records all \the time. If you had a record collection, you could come be on the air!”

Still unaware that his station was illegal, Goins advertised with gusto.

“I put it out there that I was putting a soul radio station on the air and nobody believed it because the only time we heard soul music was when WLAC out in Nashville came through Lynchburg around 10:00 at night,” he said. “That was my bedtime! I put up posters and flyers all over the school telling people to tune in to 630 on their radio dials to hear all kinds of soul music starting at 3:00 p.m.”

Despite any initial skepticism, WKKD quickly gained a lot of traffic—literally and figuratively. A myriad of listeners consistently drove downtown and lined the streets within WKKD’s limited range
to listen to artists like James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, Etta James, Otis Redding, and many more.

“Everyone seemed to like what I was doing,” Goins stated. “They would drive in range of the station, and that range was very, very limited. I lived at 1502 Pierce Street. On a good day, when it was nice and sunny, I might reach all the way past 5th Street and the Rivermont Bridge—that’s all the range it had. At 3:00, there was a huge migration of cars that parked on the side of the road so they could hear some music. Cars would line up on 12th Street and Pierce Street so they could get in range of the station. People would even dance on the side of the road!”

As WKKD’s popularity continued to skyrocket, one of Goins’ friends—who worked at a legitimate radio station—warned him that he could get into hot water.

“I didn’t know anything about radio regulations, FCC licenses, or any of that stuff,” noted Goins. “I just kept hearing from a friend of mine, ‘Yo man, you’re going to get into trouble! You might go to jail!’ And I said, ‘Go to jail for what? I’m just playing around with the radio here!’”

Ultimately, Goins did not get into legal trouble, but he was forced to shut WKKD down after about a year and a half on the air. By this point, however, Goins had already established himself as a central figure in the Lynchburg music scene and quickly embarked on the next chapter of his ongoing illustrious career—all before graduating from high school.

“There was a radio station called WDMS that played easy listening music on AM and FM all day, and they weren’t able to get advertisers,” Goins recalled. “Sponsors were calling them wanting to know where my station was so they could advertise on it. That did it. The guy [at WDMS] said, ‘We’ve got to do something about this,’ and they gave the FM—which became WJJS—to us. I didn’t know it was going to become as popular as it did—if I had known, I would have bought it! I was in eleventh grade at the time.” 

WJJS went on to become the number one radio station in Lynchburg.

These days, Goins continues to DJ a wide variety of events in and around Lynchburg and can be heard on “The Groove” WGVY, an Oldies station on 102.3 FM, weekdays at 3 p.m. With his gregarious nature, boundless curiosity, and respect for all genres of music, he also continues to lead the charge in fostering connection and innovation through music.

“I play all different genres of music with the same level of enthusiasm,” he said.
“I’m also the kind of person where, after about 15 to 20 minutes, you’re my best friend and I’m your best friend! That’s just the way I am.”  

Renowned Artist Residency Program Virginia Center for the Creative Arts Continues to Innovate after 50 Years of Success

Art, in its many forms, tends to be perceived as a product rather than a process. When you see a painting in a gallery or a book on a shelf, you are presented with a polished result of a great deal of time and effort expended by that particular creator. At Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, however, the creative process—in all its unrefined and hard-won glory—is given the spotlight. For just over 50 years, VCCA has provided artists of multiple disciplines with the time, space, and amenities to fully immerse themselves in their work without specific expectations. Considering the organization’s recent and upcoming developments, its next 50 years are sure to be even more remarkable.

VCCA’s story began in the late 1960s when two Virginia-based authors, Elizabeth Coles Langhorne and Nancy Hale, agreed that Virginia should have its own artist residency program. The program started as a couple of homes and a farm in Charlottesville, and the first artists were welcomed in 1971. In 1978, the program moved to Amherst thanks largely to the efforts of William Smart, an English professor at Sweet Briar College. To this day, VCCA resides on the picturesque 410-acre Mt. San Angelo estate across the highway from Sweet Briar.

VCCA, whose alumni include Beth Macy—author of Dopesick, which has now been turned into a Hulu miniseries—and Charlottesville-based author Jocelyn Nicole Johnson, offers fellowships for writers, visual artists, and composers at all stages in their artistic careers. Applications are accepted three times per year and are peer-reviewed by other artists within the same discipline.

“The most important part of the application is a work sample,” said Kim Doty, VCCA’s Director of Communications. “The panel carefully considers the quality and promise of the work before making their recommendations, and we try to schedule as many people as we can. We have three four-month residency seasons: winter, summer, and fall. Historically, summer tends to be a little more competitive due to many people being on an academic schedule. Within each scheduling period, people come for various lengths of time. We really want to make sure that people can come for a length of time that works with their lives.”

Since its inception, VCCA has remained committed to providing fellows with a balanced environment that allows them to focus on their work while also forging meaningful connections.

“We’re trying to make sure that we’re cultivating a welcoming, supportive, and nurturing atmosphere where artists of all kinds can come and be themselves and get the support they need to move their work forward,” Doty noted. “Our missions of time, space, and a sense of community have been very constant.”

On a basic level, that sense of community derives from artists’ shared awareness of daily life’s abiding ability to thwart the creative process.

“Few people acknowledge the amount of effort and time that goes into creating art,” Doty remarked. “Our day-to-day lives don’t make it easy to carve out that time and space. VCCA and other art residency programs are places where you can be among other artists—the people who understand the struggle personally.”

Opportunities for deeper connections are also plentiful at VCCA. For instance, after residents enjoy dinner together, writers in the group will often host optional and informal readings of their work around the fireplace.

“There are these chances for people to come together and start a collaboration, form a friendship, or simply gain new understandings about how to solve a creative problem,” said Doty. “A writer can have a conversation with a painter and, even though their work may seem to involve totally disparate processes, there’s just something about a different creative approach that can change the way you think about something.”

Of course, solitude is also an essential part of the creative process. Each resident enjoys a private bedroom and bathroom, and plentiful studio spaces are available for use.

Fellows also receive three meals per day provided by renowned catering service Meriwether Godsey.

“We used to try to manage an in-house kitchen staff, but that was sort of an ongoing struggle,” Doty noted. “Then we partnered with Meriwether Godsey, and they are just fantastic. The residents rave about the food and feel like they’re getting healthy, nourishing, and delicious meals every day. Food that is good and lovingly prepared really makes a difference.”

In addition to improved dining services, several updates and serendipitous occurrences have helped VCCA become the celebrated residency program it is today.

In 2004, a foundation in Denver, Colorado, sent out a flyer indicating that it was looking to give away a lovely property called Le Moulin à Nef in the village of Auvillar, France. As luck would have it, Sheila Gulley Pleasants, VCCA’s Director of Artist Services, is fluent in French. VCCA acquired the property and started a residency program in France. Once artists have had a residency in Virginia, they are eligible to apply to the program in France, which hosts four artists at a time. Additional international programs have since been established in Germany and Austria.

In 2020, a once-in-a-lifetime gift helped VCCA realize its long-standing dream of purchasing the Mt. San Angelo estate.

“When we learned that Sweet Briar would be willing to entertain our offer to buy the property, a longtime board member of ours [Cynthia Tremblay] was ready to help,” Doty recalled. “She owned this Georgia O’Keeffe painting, entitled Blue Sand, and when she learned that there was a buyer interested in purchasing it, she very generously donated the painting to VCCA so that we could sell it and use the money to help purchase the property. It feels very poetic that the gift of this painting will ensure that we have this home for artists.”

Although VCCA was saddened to halt the program for 15 months due to the pandemic, the organization completed several significant renovations during that time: the Studio Barn and other public rooms were upgraded and refurnished, each bedroom received its own private bath, all bedrooms and studios received independently controlled HVAC units, and the 1930s pool that had fallen into disrepair was restored. The organization also hopes to improve ADA accessibility in the near future.

Additionally, and even more importantly, VCCA recently hired its first outreach manager and established its 50th Anniversary Fund, which is specifically designated to give 50 artists of color who are new to VCCA a free two-week residency.

“We’ve always had diversity in terms of artistic disciplines, ages, and phases of people’s careers,” remarked Doty. “Now, we’re working hard to make sure that the demographics of the artists who are coming more closely reflect those of the U.S. population.”

VCCA currently has a pay-as-you-can model in which the organization’s Annual Fund covers at least 50% of the cost of all artist residences and an endowment provides more than $150,000 annually in financial aid. A variety of fully funded fellowships, which are endowed by individual donors or sponsored by grants or foundations, are also available. Ultimately, VCCA hopes to eliminate all fees for artists.

As VCCA continues to innovate and improve its residency program, its primary mission of facilitating and honoring the creative process without agenda will undoubtedly remain unchanged.

“It’s a very unpretentious and welcoming place, and there are no expectations or obligations,” Doty said. “We want people to be able to come and just pursue what they want to pursue. We’re trusting them to come and hopefully take their work to unexpected places.”

Be Kind Gallery 101 Cultivates a Caring and Inclusive Community for Creatives

Viewed from different lenses, a single work of art can tell innumerable stories.

Art possesses a singular ability to speak to different people in different ways, and that is part of its power. That being said, there is also great power in an artist’s intent, in the often deeply personal message they seek to share. At Be Kind Gallery 101, both interpretation and intent are given space, thus creating an atmosphere where creativity, conversations, and connections thrive.

Be Kind Gallery 101 was founded by Stability X, an artist and veteran who sustained traumatic brain injuries after jumping out of airplanes during her service in the 82nd Airborne Division in North Carolina. When she decided to leave the military so she could better care for her daughter, X was met with little support.

“I sustained multiple traumatic brain injuries doing those jumps and decided, as a single mother, that I needed to stop so that I could have some cognitive abilities to take care of my daughter,” X said.

“She is, overall, top mission. I needed to do what was best at that time for my health and for my daughter’s safety. I did not get a positive reaction from my leadership when I made that decision. I could no longer perform human resources work, which had been my job for nine years, to the best of my abilities because traumatic brain injuries affect your executive functioning skills. I ended up getting disability compensation, but it wasn’t enough to take care of my daughter and me.”

X started a stationery notebook company to bring in some more income but discovered that the burnout resulting from being an entrepreneur with brain trauma made the situation untenable.

In addition to dealing with financial struggles due to lack of support, X was also dealing with isolation.

“When you’re in the military, you’re part of a team of soldiers,” she remarked.

“You are rarely isolated. When you’re a veteran out in the community, if you’re not with a company that has six or seven other employees in your immediate vicinity, you can feel immediately isolated… What I want people to understand about veterans, especially those recovering from injuries, is that it’s important
to reach out. Talk to them, ask them about their journeys, and see how you can help introduce them to different resources and organizations.”

These experiences, paired with X’s long-standing love of and talent for art, led her to open Be Kind Gallery 101 in March. She currently invests her disability compensation into the gallery, and her ultimate goal is to attain 501(c)(3) status.

“I wanted people to know that I was trying,” she said of her decision to open the gallery. “I wanted to say, ‘This is how I’m trying. Come in and ask me questions, and let’s talk about it.

See how I’m still working.’ Veterans who are injured don’t get enough compensation nine times out of ten, and they still have to work. This is how I choose to work.”

X and her partner, John Rose, are both artists with unique styles. Rose likes to incorporate found objects that are often perceived as trash, such as empty beer cans, into his art, thus giving them new life. “I feel like I’m still discovering myself as an artist, and I feel like you always need to be open to evolving as an artist,” he noted. “It’s an ongoing process.”

X is a mixed-media artist. “Including pictures that are already made can give more of a story to a piece and inspire more conversation about a piece,” she said. “I enjoy doing the ‘unordinary’ when it comes to art. Often when you go into galleries—to this day—you’re just seeing paintings. I want the mixed-media niche to expand.”

In addition to showcasing a wide array of styles and mediums, Be Kind Gallery 101 invites artists of all skill levels to share and sell their work as space allows. “I want to bring awareness that this is a space that’s not going to say, ‘We’ll consider your work when we do another exhibition,’” X noted. “Bring in your work, and as long as we have the wall space, we will hang it up.”

Providing a safe and welcoming space for artists to share their stories through their work and for visitors to browse, talk, and shop is the gallery’s primary mission. Rose says that he “would like to help people find confidence in who they are as artists and as people,” and X hopes that coming to the gallery will provide people with a sense of refuge.

“Coming into this space is a break from what’s going on out there,” she remarked. “There is so much consumption and consumerism. You don’t have to buy anything when you come in here. You can just look and explore. I think we need more spaces like this where you don’t feel pressured. Giving that refuge is so rewarding to me, as is having people ask questions about the art.”

X can personally attest to the triple-fold power of creating, sharing, and talking to others about one’s own art. One of her pieces took 18 hours to create. “Every hour that I spent making it, I knew that it was helping me to get it all out and not keep it bottled up,” she said. “I want my art to get me in good trouble.”
With its intentional and inclusive approach, Be Kind Gallery 101 is undoubtedly fostering invaluable connection and bringing much-needed awareness to talented local artists.

“I want people to know more artists the way that we know Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, and Justin Bieber,” said X. “We need to know painters and sculptors. Our experiences need to be shared and spoken about.”

Whether you choose to enter the gallery as a storyteller or an interpreter, you will likely empower others to share their stories. Together, our stories paint a beautiful picture—or perhaps, more accurately, create a dynamic and powerful mixed-media piece.