For more than a month now, paintings depicting religious scenes, patriotic images and recognizable characters from both history and fiction have been on display throughout the yellow house at the corner of East Race Avenue and North Locust Street in Searcy.
The paintings — covering canvas, cardboard, newspaper and other materials — are the works of Angela Renee Turney. The yellow house is the home of the Searcy Art Gallery, and the current exhibit, titled Shades of ART, shows off Turney’s work.
In one room of the house, a cluster of faceless cartoon characters hangs on a wall across from images of soldiers and flags painted on newspaper. After walking through a hallway of paintings depicting religious scenes such as the Last Supper, the next room shows paintings of celebrities like Albert Einstein and Abraham Lincoln, along with work inspired by Turney’s daughter.
The current exhibit at the Searcy Art Gallery is Turney’s first solo show, but she has been making art since she was young. Turney grew up in central Arkansas — Jacksonville, Sherwood and Gravel Ridge — and her father, Bob Geal, introduced her to art at a young age.
“He would draw with me. I actually still have some of those drawings, and I actually showed him some recently,” she said. “It started out as him trying to keep me busy, and I don’t think he realized until I got to high school and got my first award that I was serious about what I was doing. It wasn’t just a hobby. It was a passion.”
In high school, Turney’s art teacher, Diane Jones, pushed the young artist to continue pursuing art, and when Turney was 16, she won first place overall in the Arkansas Young Artist competition through the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.
Turney sold several pieces when she was in high school — her first one bought by Jones — and after high school, art continued to be a big part of her life. Jones had taught her to improve her technique while she was in high school, and because of that, Turney said she did not see a need to seek out more training.
“My art teacher told me in high school that as long as I keep my technique, I’ll be good,” she said. “I believe that if I have someone else teach me, I would go crazy paying someone else to teach me their style. I believe if it’s your passion, you will grow.”
Eventually, people began to seek Turney out for commissioned work. One piece of work that sticks out in Turney’s mind is a painting she did for a man whose child had cancer.
“When my husband at the time came home and told me about them, I instantly felt like I had to paint her,” she said. “The fact that I could touch somebody with my art, that’s when I knew that I wanted to do it not just for the money but for the emotional therapy.”
Of course, Turney said, painting has never really been about the money anyway. She also works as a housekeeper to support her family, but she craves the comfort and expression her art allows her. There have been times when people who are clients of her housekeeping business look at her art and ask what she’s doing cleaning houses, but Turney said the art world is one in which you have to work your way up.
One of the pieces hanging at the Searcy Art Gallery is called Keys to Happiness. The figure in the painting is nondescript and is playing the piano.
Turney said that painting is telling the viewer that she, as the artist, has found her happiness.
“That’s just how I felt,” she said. “I love to listen to music when I paint, and I was just jamming when I painted it. A lot of times I don’t even know what I’m going to paint when I sit down. I just go for it.”
Turney said her faith shows through in a lot of her pieces. She grew up Catholic, and because of that influence, she said, she often paints images of Jesus Christ, biblical stories and angels.
“I definitely believe there is ‘the other side,’” she said. “No matter what faith you’ve come from, everyone has to have something to rely on, even if you don’t believe in God. My faith is what I depend on when I’m falling apart. When I’m upset about something, if I’m not painting dark, I’m painting angels or Jesus. That’s just who I am.”
Turney’s work can be found on her professional Facebook page, ARTurney. Her style, she said, often shows what she is feeling at the time the art is made, and she enjoys being able to step out of her routine in order to create something new.
“People say I’m crazy and I’m weird, but that’s just who I am,” she said. “I’m ever-changing. It bores me to do the same thing all the time. In a life where we all go to work, where we all take the kids to school and this and that, I rely on my art to be that change.”
Staff writer Angela Spencer can be reached at (501) 244-4307 or aspencer@arkansasonline.com.