North Carolina was recently home to an exhibition of more than 80 works of art by Chinese watercolor artist Guan Weixing. Guan’s work has been described as “inconceivable” and “watercolor magic.” His work has won several international awards and a book of his paintings, “Memories of Peking: South Side Stories,” has won several international illustration awards.
Where did this exhibition by one of the world’s foremost watercolor artists take place? The North Carolina Museum of Art? A prestigious private museum? Actually, Guan’s first major exposure to a U.S. audience took place at Ambleside Gallery, which recently set up shop in Greensboro’s ever-evolving arts district.
Ambleside is co-owned by Jackson Mayshark and Jan Tucker, longtime friends who opened the 2,800-square-foot gallery in June 2004 with complete confidence in the market for fine art in Greensboro. They had been dealing art for years out of Tucker’s condominium, with Mayshark hauling vanloads of paintings from his home base in Grosse Pointe, Mich. Sales and consultations were going well, so the two friends took the next step and opened a gallery.
Tucker spent years as an executive assistant with a Greensboro-based yarn maker. An artist and performer in her own right, she and her husband, the singer Jimmy Tucker, made an album as a duo several years ago.
Mayshark is a world traveler who has lived in India and London for extended periods of time. His connections allow him to source art from all over the world. Other artists on display in Ambleside include Matthew Hilliard, who specializes in brilliant African landscapes, and Rich Nelson, whose oil paintings capture his fascination with the true essence of people.
So what made these two businesspeople decide there was a strong market for fine art in Greensboro?
“We were attracted to the openness,” Mayshark said. “I thought the environment would lend itself well to a really high-quality gallery. The clientele is very receptive. There are a lot of pluses. I see a lot of positive things going on in this town, and we’re happy to be a part of it.”
An interesting answer, considering the fact that Greensboro is continually struggling with an image that would not identify the city as a hotbed of fine art. In the eyes of the mainstream media, Greensboro doesn’t look like much. A recent article in the Washington Post recounting the tragic 2003 Campus Walk apartment fire near the UNCG campus described Greensboro in less-than flattering terms.
“In a state admired for the lyric beauty of its coastline on one side and its mountains on the other, Greensboro is sandwiched in the unremarkable middle, a college town where plenty of students cling to the campus neighborhoods after graduation day,” the reporter wrote.
More than 25 years later, the city is still dealing with the 1979 Klan-Nazi shootout that left five people dead. The City Council’s refusal to endorse the Truth & Reconciliation Project once again has exposed Greensboro’s image as a backward Southern city. The News & Record of Greensboro has remained fairly neutral on the subject, but a web search on the commission turns up several national articles where Greensboro is described basically as a dark city trying to see the light.
In addition, local alternative weeklies and bloggers see the council’s action, or lack thereof, as evidence that the city is still controlled by a few rich white guys.
One local blogger, after going on such a tirade, finished up with a shot at the city’s newest symbol of its downtown renaissance, First Horizon Park. While the News & Record has acted as a cheerleader for the new stadium, others still see it as a misguided venture.
Indeed, a buzz this spring surrounded the opening of First Horizon Park on the north side of downtown. Greensboro residents are also excited about the development of the old North State Chevrolet site across the street from the stadium, where developers Steve and Jim Jones have plans for a mixed-use development.
First Horizon’s existence has benefited another Greensboro gallery, The Marshall Gallery, which sits across the street from the stadium. The gallery is in the process of framing 52 prints, taken by its house photographer, of Greensboro Grasshoppers players, which will hang in the stadium’s skyboxes.
Co-owner Tracey Marshall’s confidence in the market for fine art dates to 2000, when she chose the downtown location long before First Horizon was on the drawing board. She said the market for fine art in Greensboro has always been strong and keeps getting stronger.
She cited the organizational support of Greensboro’s United Arts Council, which promotes private galleries in addition to helping financially support public galleries.
“We’re building an image here,” she said. “People know you don’t have to go to New York to get a good piece of art.”
The Southern arts district is expected to keep thriving. Soon, Smothers Place condominiums will open next to Blumenthal’s, a Greensboro apparel tradition for years.
One major criticism of the Greensboro downtown renaissance is it hasn’t been getting people to live downtown, instead of just visiting. But many view the completion of Smothers Place as a big step toward solving that problem.
Mayshark certainly is pleased.
“Our timing as far as the growth and development of Greensboro, in particular downtown, was very good,” Mayshark said. “It creates more and more of a sense of community as more people are living downtown.”
Perhaps the biggest cheerleader for downtown development is Mayor Keith Holliday, who has publicly voiced his fear that the work of the Truth and Reconciliation commissions will harm Greensboro’s image. Holliday is also a frequent visitor to Ambleside.
Holliday was asked what it said about Greensboro to have a gallery bringing in fine art.
“One word: progressive,” he said.
Sam Hieb is a contributing editor of Carolina Journal.