A Place To Rest

Humans seek a home. It's in our DNA. Shelter is a fundamental need, a requirement for life as important as food and water. We seek a place to rest, to retreat. It's natural, a common link in all animals. It's also the subject of Nancy Farrell's works.

"Wherever I have lived in the South, I am always inspired by the scenery," the artist says. "The beauty of the South has always appealed to me, but I suppose you are always inspired by these areas, the places that you live."

Farrell, a resident of Ozark, has been painting the southern scenery throughout her adult life and recently earned a place within the Permanent Collection at the Fort Smith Regional Art Museum. Her 2006 oil painting, "My Louisiana Retreat," was selected by a committee to become part of the permanent collection and will be showcased during the museum's exhibit "Features From the Permanent Collection," starting today.

"They were really fine judges," she says of the committee. "I really have to commend FSRAM for finding such wonderful and knowledgeable judges from all over the area. They encourage and recognize local artists who otherwise may have no opportunity to exhibit and enter a competition like this."

Farrell's painting joins other new acquisitions in the museum's permanent collection. These new pieces are works by regional artists including watercolorist William Mayes Flanagan, weaver Louise Halsey, painter Jimmy Leach, potter Jane Osti and painter Peggi Kroll-Roberts.

"My Louisiana Retreat" was recently purchased by the museum and represents the peace Farrell experienced during the days she painted it.

"It was just such a lovely place, really," she says. "It's like many of my oils; they represent what is around me. This painting was done from my backyard in St. Charles, La. There were palm trees and Calla lilies. It was just a pleasant place to sit."

The retired college art professor is not new to museums. As a small child, Farrell's mother took her to art museums throughout the country. Raised in Tampa, Fla., the young girl's love of studying art turned from passion to profession, she says. She attended the University of Southern Mississippi for a bachelor's degree in art followed by her master's at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She taught at the college level for more than 25 years, locally at the University of the Ozarks in Clarksville and Arkansas Tech in Russellville and Ozark and throughout the South, including in Louisiana and Kentucky. Her passion for art has allowed her work with students, which she says has brought her a great deal of joy.

"I enjoy the opportunity to inspire students," she says. "And I hope that my works can do that. Art -- it's always been a part of my life. It's why I studied and majored in art."

The painter, who has also been painting watercolors of local historic locations, has made her home in the Ozarks, stating that the mountains, valleys and vegetation of Arkansas draw her to paint as much as the tropical scenes of her hometown did.

"It is just picturesque here," she says. "It's something about the mountains that draws me in. Both the tropical scenes and the mountain scenes really inspire me. Sometimes, I think when a person lives in one place for too long, they just become complacent, they don't see the beauty anymore. Maybe the painting can help remind them of the natural beauty around them.

"My hope is that my painting will remind a viewer of some place they have been before or a place they want to go to," she continues. "Maybe it is a pleasant place they can be. Maybe it's my patio."