CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – Through October 30, the Planters Bank Peg Harvill Gallery of the Customs House Museum features light-hearted paintings by Nashville artist Aaron Grayum.
Large works featuring circus characters within powdery blue and yellow background dance throughout the gallery walls, lacing a sense of nostalgia into the contemporary paintings. In OK, Grayum sprinkles bits of prose within the patterns of colors. The young boy, reminiscent of The Little Prince, stands atop written thoughts as if he has overcome life’s challenges.
Aaron Grayum is an artist and a writer. He often combines the two, incorporating thoughts and words onto canvases filled with elephants, jellybean trees and red umbrellas. He has a fascination with street magic, old buildings, and Bigfoot, which comes out in his acrylics, cut paper, charcoal, and other mixed media paintings. The artist says of his work “Every piece of art, in some way, is a self portrait. The work in this show is no exception. They show who I am, who I’ve been, and how I see the world. When I was a kid, I would draw all kinds of things with all sorts of materials. As a 5-year old, my artistic expertise and understanding of life only went so far. So several dozen trips around the sun later, and with a few more skills in my paintbox, I decided to give a new voice to my childhood self.”
The Customs House has brought out items from the permanent collection that celebrate Halloween. Images of vintage postcards highlight costumes and dolls. A “cat” dress from the early 1920’s features Halloween designs cut from crepe paper, and the horse drawn hearse (c. 1890-1899) is back on display. Other exhibits at the museum this month include Women Painting Women. This year’s artists represent Texas, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, as well as Tennessee. Olen Bryant: Tennessee Treasure celebrates the region’s favorite artists with an exhibition of thirty-one works. Coming from private collectors as well as the Customs House’s own permanent collection, the show features delicate women from the 1950’s to a large ironing board figure created in 2004. This exhibit runs through October 16 and is sponsored in part by Planters Bank.
Located at the corner of Second and Commerce Streets, the Customs House Museum is the second largest general museum in Tennessee. For more information on above event contact Terri Jordan, Exhibits Curator, at 931-648-5780 or terri@customshousemuseum.org.