Love of painting
Gallup artist celebrates Lent with ‘Ash Wednesday’ art show

Mary Boyd Ellis opens her art show, "Ash Wednesday" this Saturday, February 9, 2008 at the Gallup Performing Arts Center Gallery. The gallery is at 1500 South Second Stret in Gallup, N.M. and will be up until March 23, 2008. Ellis took three years to complete the series based ont the T.S. Eliot poem "Ash Wednesday." While speaking about her work, Eliot said, "I don't care if I have alot of money...I love to paint." [Photo by Daniel Zollinger/Independent]

By Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola
Staff writer

One of Boyd-Ellis "Ash Wednesday" paintings.

GALLUP — One of the founding members of Gallup’s fine arts community will open a new art show during Saturday evening’s February Arts Crawl.

Painter Mary Boyd-Ellis, who served as the first director of the now defunct Red Mesa Arts Center, will have a reception for her show, “Ash Wednesday,” from 7 to 9 p.m. on Saturday at the Gallup Performing Arts Center, 1500 S. Second St.

The exhibit features a series of 29 paintings and drawings that were inspired by Boyd-Ellis’ interpretation of T.S. Eliot’s poem “Ash Wednesday.” Written after Eliot’s conversion to the Anglican faith, the poem was published in 1930, the year Boyd-Ellis was born. Stanzas of the poem accompany each piece of Boyd-Ellis’ artwork, inviting viewers to contemplate both the poem and the paintings as they walk through the exhibit.

In keeping with the Ash Wednesday theme, the show will be on exhibit through the Lenten Season and will close on Easter Sunday, March 23.

Boyd-Ellis, a painter for 40 years, said poetry and literature have always been important to her and her artwork. A grandfather and an uncle read poetry to her as she was growing up, she said, and she believes writing a poem shares “some similarities to the thoughts that go into a painting.”

According to Boyd-Ellis, she always paints in a series, with the series centered on a particular theme. After the loss of her daughter Megan, who was bipolar and who committed suicide four years ago, Boyd-Ellis painted a series around the theme of “doors.” Some of those paintings are currently on exhibit at the New Mexico Cancer Center-Gallup, 2240 College Dr.

Her next series, Boyd-Ellis said, will be centered on the theme of “skies.” Boyd-Ellis lives on a mesa west of Gallup that offers great views, she said, including a spectacular eastern view of Pyramid Rock. “Sometimes there’s just miraculous light,” she added.

“Ash Wednesday” is Boyd-Ellis’ first major show in the region since 2003, although she does exhibit her work at the Double Six Gallery in Grants. She expressed mixed memories about the Red Mesa Art Center.

“I had some wonderful shows in that gallery,” she said, adding that those shows sold a lot of artwork for regional artists. “That’s how I met all the artists here.”

Being the center’s director, however, was another story. Calling the experience the “two most miserable years” of her life, Boyd-Ellis said she is saddened by Gallup’s lack of support for its fine arts community. And like many Gallup artists, Boyd-Ellis said she was deeply disappointed when Gallery 211 on Coal Avenue folded.

With dozens of Indian traders and Indian jewelry businesses in town, she said, Gallup represents Indian art very well. However, she said, artists who create contemporary fine art don’t find the same support.

She is particularly frustrated by some of the landlords who own downtown property on Coal Avenue. Boyd-Ellis said she had to close her art studio in San Francisco years ago because of escalating rent, and she believes some Gallup property owners also set their rents so high that local art galleries can’t afford to stay in business on Coal Avenue. Some of those property owners don’t maintain their property well, she added, even with their high rents.

“It breaks my heart to see that street,” she said.

Since leaving the Red Mesa Art Center in 1990, Boyd-Ellis has spent her time in her home studio, enjoying the solitude, instructing adult art students, and working on her own paintings.

“I love doing it,” she said of the opportunity to focus on painting. “I just love to paint.”

The Gallup Performing Arts Center Gallery is open Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and by appointment.

Information: GPAC: (505) 722-2258 Mary Boyd-Ellis: (505) 722-3451