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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE (RIDGELY, MD—December 7, 2007)

Chestertown Artist Shirley Hampton Hunt Exhibits at Adkins Arboretum

Adkins Arboretum presents “Landscapes of the Eastern Shore,” an exhibit by Chestertown photographer Shirley Hunt. With the region’s landscape changing so rapidly, Hunt’s photographs provide a bittersweet record of their beauty and a sobering look at the loss of historic places. Her work is on view through January 30, 2008. The public is invited to a reception to meet the artist Friday, December 14 from 5 to 7 p.m.

Hunt photographs our familiar Eastern Shore landscapes in a way that draws attention to the beauty and fragility of our surroundings both in nature and in traditional architecture abandoned to decay. From historic homes and old wooden barns to wooded creeks and quiet wetlands, Hunt explores elements of the landscape that have defined life on the Eastern Shore for generations.

Hunt exhibits in Washington and Baltimore as well as on the Eastern Shore and is a partner in The Artists’ Gallery in Chestertown. She is well known across the region for her large black and white photographs of once beautiful houses now fallen into decay. Her elegant, large-format book titled “The Vanishing Landscape: Documenting a Changing Way of Life” is a record of regional architecture being lost to neglect and change.

Several of the book’s houses are included in this show, including a photo of a simple two-story farmhouse called Hopewell that was built in 1730. Centuries of memories and stories must have surrounded it, but now, choked with vines, this modest wooden home is a brittle, delicate shell obviously on its way to becoming part of the weedy landscape that surrounds it. Hunt captured its poignant gaping windows and the interwoven textures of shingles and vines not long before it was demolished in 2002.

More than half the photographs in the show are black and white images full of lush texture and nuanced tones of gray. The rest are studies in delicate, understated color. “Tanglewood, Shad Landing” shows muted colors reflected in still water below a snowy snarl of vines, while the gray-browns of an icy stream in “Berries and Ice” are sharply punctuated by bright red berries growing on tangled shrubs.

Born in Georgia, Hunt studied art and photography at Stephens College in Columbia, Missouri, before moving first to the Washington area, then to Baltimore. There, she furthered her studies in studio art at Maryland Institute College of Art. After relocating to the Eastern Shore in 1991, Hunt began to notice the deserted homes scattered around the countryside. Seven years ago, she decided to document them in photographs along with the forests, winding streams and wetlands so characteristic of the Eastern Shore.

All of Hunt’s photographs have a sensitive beauty, but their strength lies in the way architecture and landscape are so closely equated. The decay so evident in her houses and barns seems (and is) as natural as in the fallen trees beside streams or in tangles of vines. Both buildings and forests are in the process of returning to earth, blending entirely into the landscape.

This show is part of Adkins Arboretum’s ongoing exhibition series of work on natural themes by regional artists. It is on view through January 30 at the Arboretum Visitor’s Center, located at 12610 Eveland Road adjacent to Tuckahoe State Park. Visitor’s Center hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily, except holidays.

Directions: From Route 50 south, take 404 east to Hillsboro (west of Denton). Turn northeast onto 480 and immediately turn left onto Eveland Road. The Arboretum is two miles ahead, on the left.

Adkins Arboretum is a 400-acre native garden and preserve at the headwaters of the Tuckahoe Creek in Caroline County. Open year round, the Arboretum offers educational programs for all ages about nature and gardening. For additional information about Arboretum programs, visit www.adkinsarboretum.org or call 410-634-2847, ext. 0.

Assateague is among the works of Chestertown artist Shirley Hampton Hunt on view at Adkins Arboretum, Ridgely. Right-click on the following link to save full sized image: hunt_show.jpg 679k