After 5: Artists interpret environmental terms at Waverly House show

It doesn't take much to get people thinking green these days. But leave it to a group of artists to turn a "think-green" challenge into an explosion of creative works.

Eunice Wallar's call for entries a few months ago to her Waverly House Gifts and Gallery returned 108 pieces - a record number for the gallery owner. Her simple criteria: The art must feature the color green, nature, environmental aspects or recycled materials.

"They really ran wild," Wallar says walking through her gallery, where 52 juried works of art were chosen for the Think Green show that runs through May at 2031 S. Waverly Ave.

Wallar engaged Kat Allie of Ozarks Technical Community College, Jim Beasley, former Springfield Art Museum curator, and Kara DeBacker, an art collector, to jury the show. Forty-two artists, including a few from the Branson area, made the cut.

"A lot of the artists, I've never had in here," Wallar says.

In tight space on Waverly House's second floor, the neatly organized works show off southwest Missourians' creative minds and penchant for nature. Outside of the typical nature painting or photograph, artists submitted a handmade book, a recycled silver plate, a knitted purse and pine-needle figures. Perhaps the most unique are Lettie Blackburn's mixed media "Security Envelope Trees" and S.J. Witte's "Dandelion #1."

Blackburn snipped the insides of security envelopes to develop a nature scene of evergreen trees, rolling hills, a running creek, rocks, tall pines and a cloudy sky.

"She said she realized how pretty the designs of security envelopes were (with) such beautiful patterns," Wallace says of Blackburn's piece, which earned the show's Theme Award. "That's an artist for you."

In her Best of Show work, Witte applied watch parts to create the wispy round top of a dandelion.

"I told them to have freedom to interpret the theme," Wallar adds. "You can see that in the art here."[[In-content Ad]]