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THURSDAY, AUGUST 3, 2000
P91B
Conversations with Gulf Coast Artists
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a child in New Orleans, I used to attend art classes in the summer with a Mrs. Ellison. She had a studio in an enormous old garden district home. Four or five other pre-teens were in the class and every week she?d herd us all onto the streetcar, laden with our paintboxes and easels. We'd ride down to the French Quarter and spend the day being sidewalk artists. That was a marvelous introduction to painting."
McLemore continued with her art classes at Newman and later at Newcomb College, where she majored in French. After graduation, she was offered a job with the state social services department, and became so enthralled with the job that she remained there for most of her working career.
"I really enjoyed the work. It was always interesting and I was surrounded by wonderful, fascinating people , from all walks of life. It was real people, real life."
This fascination for real life and her love for fine art, led Dorothy and her first husband to take an apartment in the French Quarter.
?It was a slightly scandalous place to live at the time,? she says. ?My grandmother, who lived uptown, asked an elderly schoolteacher friend to drive her to the Quarter just to inspect our house. She didn't make a fuss but she never did quite approve."
McLemore didn't let her grandmother influence her. She remained in the French Quarter for most of her adult life.
After that pivotal European tour with her sister, the artist met and married her second husband, Geren, in 1967. Together, they bought a house in a quiet, residential section of the Vieux Carre.
For the next twenty-odd years, they became fixtures in the art community there, befriending both artists and gallery owners.
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Photo by Ellis Anderson
Gulf Coast artist Dorothy McLemore, originally from New Orleans and now a Bay St. Louis resident, experiments with form and color in one of her works at her home.
?It was a tremendously exciting time to be in the French Quarter. It was the real hub of the New Orleans art world then. All the important galleries were located within walking distance of our house and many nationally known artists were our neighbors.?
The McLemores both took early retirement in 1987. Dorothy wanted some time to make art as well as collect it and she returned to classes at the New Orleans Academy of Art.
Her husband meanwhile developed a love for Bonsai trees and suddenly found that there was a shortage of outdoor space at their Quarter house. When they began searching for a home out of the city, the Gulf
Coast seemed a natural place to look.
'!My family had owned a damp on Bayou Portage when I was a child," says McLemore. "We'd spend part of the summers there, while my grandfather and father would catch the train in to work every day. I always loved the natural beauty of the Coast, but what surprised me after we moved here in 1989 was the discovery that the area was literally bristling with artists, many of them from New Orleans!?
One of these New Orleans refugees, Jerry Dixon, had opened Serenity Gallery in Old Town Bay Saint Louis. He began showing McLemore's vibrant oil paintings and she entered several regional art
shows. Within a short time, her distinctive style had developed a following of its own. The art collector's own work was becoming collectible. She laughs off the suggestion that she's become a well-known figure in the local art scene, but admits her newest series has been very popular.
"The work is about reflections. They're landscapes, and to me they're about shapes and colors. I paint the landscape itself in a rather impressionistic way and then paint the reflections in the water as abstracts."
Most of the paintings seem to depict a world that's a slight dimension away from the reality we see every day. The colors are a bit more vivid, the shapes are more pronounced and the shad-
ows have more depth. The overall effect brings the eye back to the paintings-again and again, delighting all the viewer's senses.
As McLemore discusses the joy she's found in painting, her eyes spark with enthusiasm. With true Audrey Hepburn elegance, she gestures dramatically to include her entire house.
"I couldn't possibly live without being surrounded by art. To wake up, to see paintings that you're emotionally attached to, that's what counts! If I lived in a one-room hovel and it contained a few good creations, I'd be completely happy,? she sa}^, and there is no doubt that she has spoken the absolute truth. ?The art is what's important. It's the essential spirit of life!"