ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, October 21, 1996 TAG: 9610230005
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: ABINGDON
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
The little waterfall fascinated Whitetop artist John Sauers from the first time he saw it.
On different days, depending on the amount of recent rains, it would flow out of Chestnut Mountain in Washington County in different patterns, providing a never-ending series of changes for Sauers to re-create as he stood at its base with his paints and palette.
"From out of the depths of this hollow comes this source of life in an almost primeval consideration," he said, describing his reaction to the scene when he first happened onto it. He was intrigued by the symbolism of water, anyway, and the fact that this relative trickle eventually links itself to something much bigger and far away.
Ultimately, he said, "this is going to be the Mississippi River."
But it was not only the waterfall which drew him back. It was how this little niche in the mountainside contrasted so darkly with its surroundings. Even at high noon, when everything else seemed startlingly bright, the muted greens and subdued light of this little enclave seemed a glimpse into some other world.
"People driving through there will call it spooky," he said.
Sauers has been back again and again, reinterpreting the scene with his paints and charcoals, over the past several months.
"I've done a total of 14 pieces on this," he said. "That's not bad for a summer's work, considering what else I've been doing." The Whitetop resident has a studio in the William King Regional Arts Center in Abingdon, where he meets visitors and teaches weekly classes.
And he plans to continue renderings of the waterfall and its surroundings until winter snows keep him away.
"Interpreting this environment up here, I like it," he said. "I'm going to be back as long as I can get through this road."
Sauers grew up outside of Bel Air, Md., next to a large stand of woodland. "And where I live now - that's a helluva woods," he said.
He always had ties to Southwest Virginia, making frequent visits to relatives. "I started going to Whitetop when I was 5 years old," he said. "As a child going there, even then, I found something stirring about it."
He and his wife, who was raised at Groseclose in nearby Smyth County, built a home at Whitetop in 1981. "I knew we were going to be moving here."
He worked as a graphic artist with the Baltimore Gas & Electric Co. for 35 years, after graduating from the Maryland Institute of Art in 1955. When he was told he would have to start learning computer graphing in mid-1990, he decided to take early retirement. "And we came right down here and moved in," he said.
His wife and frequent model soon landed a job as Whitetop site manager for the District 3 Cooperative, which provides hot meals and social programs for senior citizens. Sauers continued to pursue his art.
He had always done that over the years, even at work. "I went sketching on my lunch hour virtually every time," he said. "It taught me the value of quick sketching. ... The beauty of it is you learn self-discipline and you make the most of your hours."
He has sketched street people and painted outdoor by moonlight, but not all his works are finished so quickly. He has one painting in his studio of a woman in a field which he started in 1979 and is only now close to finishing, and another of Natural Bridge on which he has worked for 25 years.
After moving to Whitetop, he became an associate artist with Abingdon's Arts Depot and in April accepted resident artist status at William King. He said he was treated well at the Depot but could not afford to pass up the additional exposure he would get in a bigger studio.
His art has brought him many awards, including Best in Show in the 1991 Roanoke Elmwood Park Outdoor Exhibit, Best in Show in the Dimensions 1989 National Competition in Winston-Salem, N.C., and the Blair Wiley Fishwick Award at this year's Sidewalk Art Show in Roanoke. He has had paintings exhibited at the Chrysler Museum in Norfolk and a watercolor accepted in the Juried Exhibition 1996 at the Peninsula Fine Arts Center in Newport News.
But few subjects have have drawn him to them like the waterfall.
"I guess the bottom line is the probing into the spirituality of the scene, that which reaches above the literal and the picturesque," he said. "That's the only thing I know to say."
LENGTH: Medium: 86 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Paul Dellinger. 1. A waterfall's - and an artist's -by CNBmany moods: John Sauers (right), who has a studio in the William
King Regional Arts Center in Abingdon, surrounds himself with
renditions of his waterfall. 2. Ultimately "this is going to be the
Mississippi River": The Whitetop artist puts brush to palette to
paint his latest rendering of a waterfall on Chestnut Mountain in
Washington County. color.