Diverse group of artists featured in Laptop Lounge

Nov. 26—With multiple local art galleries, an increasing number of colorful murals downtown, and after hosting the inaugural Hunt County Festival of the Arts in May, Greenville continues to establish itself as a community that encourages the arts.

Recently, another showcase of original work by area artists opened when the Uptown Forum unveiled its upstairs "Laptop Lounge," which currently features the work of four artists: Cathy Smithey, David Zvanut, Jerry Dodd and Greg Sims.

The lounge is intended to be a spot where people can work or relax alone or in small groups.

"When working on this, we thought of a college campus type of a concept, where people can sit down with their laptops and their coffee and work or chit chat with each other," Sims said.

In terms of artwork, the centerpiece of the lounge is a mural by Smithey originally displayed at the Blue Armadillo Winery, a winery that had been owned by Friendlee Buffington and his wife, Teresa, which was open from 2008 to 2013.

"My wife had the idea of having a mural showing an armadillo climbing out of a vineyard," Buffington said. "We approached Cathy about doing it, and from her imagination, she expanded on that idea into this beautiful painting."

Although the Blue Armadillo mural is her only piece at the Laptop Lounge, Smithey stays busy with a variety of art projects.

Probably her most visible work locally is her mural on the side of the Armstrong Appliance building, titled "Spectrum." Completed in 2013, the abstract, eclectic work features large metallic circles attached to the side of the building to give a 3D effect against a background of colorful stripes.

"Spectrum" also includes a large picture frame as a "modular element" so that different paintings can be placed in it. Another 3D component of the mural is a cutout portrait of Gussie Nell Davis, the founder of Greenville High School's Flaming Flashes, which was the country's first high school drill team.

"I have always enjoyed making art with a 3D element ever since my first-grade teacher had me go to all the classrooms and show my poster with a protruding bird nest," Smithey said in her artist's statement. "Also when I was 17, my 3D Picasso rendering won a first place ribbon at an art show at NorthPark Mall, so I was excited when the owner of the Armstrong Appliance Building, Jeff Holland, suggested incorporating a 3D element into the mural as well."

A more recent large scale project of Smithey's was a renovation of the chapel at Mother Frances Hospital in Tyler, in which she re-painted the domed ceiling and the chapel's statuary.

On the renovation project, she worked alongside David Zvanut, another Hunt County artist featured in the Uptown Forum's Laptop Lounge.

On either side of Smithey's "Blue Armadillo" mural are abstract watercolors that Zvanut painted when he was a graduate student at East Texas State University (now-Texas A&M University-Commerce) in the 1980s. Other works of his in the lounge are mixed media acrylics with politically suggestive themes.

"I've been putting art up in the Uptown Forum for about 10 years now because it's been a good place to show some of my larger works instead of just keeping them in storage," Zvanut said. "While I did abstract stuff like these watercolors when I was a student, now I mostly use a more realistic style, often with a sarcastic tone or are a little political.

"I also like to incorporate objects into my work, like this barbed wire," he said in regard to his painting, "Border Fence," which depicts a Texas flag, with blood-like red paint running down the fabric and a wreath of barbed wire circling the "star" (substituted by five jalapeño peppers) on the flag.

Another work of Zvanut's that's prominently featured in the lounge is a large abstract mural titled "Music on Parade." It is a copy of a mural he originally made for the AT&T Performing Arts Center in Dallas. Another copy is displayed in the music building at A&M-Commerce.

In addition to painting, Zvanut also works extensively with glass. In 2018, he completed a fused glass window in the Commerce Public Library that depicts a bois d'arc tree. Also, in the renovation project at Mother Francis Hospital in Tyler, in which he worked with Smithey, Zvanut restored the chapel's more than 100-year-old stained glass windows.

Along with Zvanut's and Smithey's work, the lounge also includes a metal sculpture by Commerce-based artist Jerry Dodd.

"I try to create a whimsical use of steel," Dodd said of his sculpture at the Laptop Lounge, a colorful, abstract piece that somewhat suggests a globe or compass. "The top of it actually rotates."

Despite his humility, Dodd is a nationally-acclaimed sculptor who taught art at the university level in New York before teaching at A&M-Commerce from 1977 through 2006.

In addition to installing his sculptures at venues including the Art Centre in Haggard Park in Plano and the Irving Art Center, local art lover Byron Taylor owns several of Dodd's pieces in his personal collection.

"Jerry's sculptures are so colorfully inspiring to me," Taylor said. "I really like both metal and colorful art, and Jerry's work is both."

Finally, the laptop lounge also features a piece by Greg Sims, who's better known locally for heading up Greenville's Board of Economic Development.

Sims' entry in the gallery is a piece of digital art depicting one of his favorite recording artists, Elvis Presley.

"I love art, even though I'm a dabbler really, because as anyone who does art can tell you, it's relaxing," Sims said. "For this picture of Elvis, I started with a black and white photo from his movie, 'Kissin' Cousins,' and painted over it with a Stylus pen on the computer and made it really colorful."