Message from Executive Director

Susan Martin

Dear Bower Family & Friends,

     Welcome to April at Bower Center for the Arts!  We are very excited to shower you with a variety of opportunities to experience and enjoy the arts. Kick off the month by joining us on Friday, April 8 for our 2nd Friday Exhibit Reception & Gallery Talk from 5 - 7pm.

     Grow your creativity and connect with others by participating in one of our spring classes or workshops.  Check out all the opportunities for youth and adults HERE!  Create a mosaic gazing ball, color your world by creating ceramic flowers and garden markers, learn to throw some clay, play the guitar, or youth can expand their techniques in acrylic & watercolor painting or enjoy learning to dance to their Disney favorites!

     April showers bring May flowers and FREE concerts and performances at the Bower Center.  Check out our calendar HERE for three different opportunities this month for families to enjoy live performances with Opera on the James and the Southwest Virginia Songwriters Association. 

     We hope you'll join us for one or more of the many opportunities to grow your creative story!  We look forward to seeing you soon.

Sincerely,

Susan 

CREATE. INSPIRE. CONNECT. GROW.

Up Next

Artist Spotlight

    Join us Friday, April 8, 5-7pm, for our 2nd Friday Exhibit reception and special presentation.  At 6pm in the Terrace Gallery, where Robert Hunter’s artworks depicting flying saucers are installed, Barry M. Koplen, a writer as well as a photographer, will talk about a UFO sighting he and three others experienced, and which he detailed in his book, Close Encounter at Smith Mountain Lake, Virginia.

   The talk accompanies Robert Hunter’s exhibit, Saucer Dreams, that explores the subject “Flying Saucers” in both a Pop Art and in a Neo Surreal context.

   New data is constantly being discovered regarding UFO sightings, therefore my presentations over the years since this encounter have offered more information and invited different questions.

    “What the four of us saw that night while on the balcony of a summer cottage at Smith Mountain Lake, less than forty miles from Roanoke VA, raised so many questions about beliefs, even beliefs in deities, that I had to describe my thoughts and my feelings in hopes of better understanding them.” From: Close Encounter at Smith Mountain Lake, Virginia by Barry Koplen

Dawn Richerson

2022 Suzie Viemeister Emerging Artist

     Dawn is an artist who is inspired by the soul of place and the natural world. On long walks in the woods, she often documents what she sees and experiences with photography and writing. Later, she takes these field notes and explores her subject matter further, primarily through painting.

     Her paintings are both an interpretation of and an invitation to the story of life unfolding around us and within us. During her residency, she hopes to explore the natural beauty of Virginia through painting and photography. Dawn has always wanted to live in a rural area and has recently relocated to Bedford County.

     "It is the experience of life that is at the heart of who I am and what I do," she says. "I think it is the desire to reconnect with life and all that is alive in me that is at the core of all my expression. I hope my paintings connect those who encounter them with that sense of wonder—and even mystery."

     Meet Dawn on Friday, April 8 at our 2nd Friday Exhibit Reception.  A formal introduction will take place at 5:30pm.

Upcoming Performances

Looking Back

March 2022

Bower Center For The Arts

305 N. Bridge Street

Bedford, VA

540.586.4235