THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 1, 1996 TAG: 9607300124
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 15 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JOAN C. STANUS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 102 lines
When Norfolk artist Helen Pine first walked into the d'Art Center 10 years ago, the freshly painted walls were not unlike an empty canvas, beckoning her to splash a touch of bright colors upon the stark white plaster.
She dashed home and told her daughter, ``You have to see this place.''
A painter like her mother, Pamela Pine Winslow also was drawn immediately to the fresh space in downtown Norfolk's newly completed enclave of studios for working artists.
``The energy was just palpable,'' Winslow recalled. ``I turned to Mother and said, `We need to be here.' ''
They've been there, working their creative magic together, ever since.
This year, as the d'Art Center celebrates its 10th anniversary, Winslow and Pine remain as two of only a handful of the original 22 artists who opened the center in 1986. For differing reasons over the years, dozens of artists working in all sorts of media have come and gone from the center, a combination of working studios and public art galleries. But for the last decade, these two very different painters have worked harmoniously in a shared studio, side by side, in full view of the public.
For both, the experience has been an inspiration.
``It's not for everybody,'' said Winslow, 46. ``But we're suited for it. It could get on your nerves if you like to work privately. We feel the whole experience, including dealing with the public, is stimulating.''
``At my age, I'm so fortunate to be here with all these younger artists,'' echoed her 74-year-old mother. ``I love listening, talking and seeing what the younger artists are doing. It sounds corny, but we're a big family here. There's no jealousies or anything like that. The energy bounces off each other.''
And often across the room.
An impressionistic colorist, Pine is partial to brightly colored renderings of Southwestern landscapes. Her daughter, on the other hand, creates two-dimensional fiber assemblages of various textures and colors.
Although their work is entirely different, they are ``unconsciously inspired'' by each other.
``What Pamela does is so different from my work,'' Pine said. ``She goes a step further than I do. I look over there and say, `Wow. How did she get that texture with fabric?' I can't even sew on a button.''
Winslow added:
``We're each other's biggest help. I admire Mother's strokes and the textures she gets from them. Her color sense sloshes over to my work.''
But working so closely, within just a few feet of each other for hours on end, day after day, can have its moments.
``We've had our growing pains,'' Winslow said. ``We do snipe and bicker at each other sometimes. But yet there's this momentum. We're so driven when we're working we don't even talk to each other for hours. And then we'll stop and say, `Can you look at this?' In fact, we get along better here than we do at home.''
``We're really not mother and daughter here,'' Pine said. ``We're inspired and focused and doing what we're supposed to do.''
The unusual painting partnership was never a planned one for them. Both found their way to the d'Art Center almost serendipitously.
A native of Canada, Pine and her husband moved their six children to a large sprawling home in Edgewater in the late '50s. Amid diapering, laundry and tackling a plethora of homework assignments, painting became the busy mother's ``salvation.'' When she wasn't doing her own work, she was conducting art classes for the neighborhood children.
``I was driven,'' says Pine, who studied at Montreal's Museum of Fine Arts. ``Every time I had a few spare minutes, I'd work. In the early '60s, I joined the Tidewater Artist Association and that encouraged me to really pick it up.''
An ``obviously creative child'' with a flair for the dramatic, Winslow initially followed in her father's professional footsteps by tackling a career as an actor after leaving high school. Before long, she realized she was becoming distracted by the colorful set designs and costumes. By a fluke, she fell into a job designing costumes, and embarked on a career designing sets and costumes for touring companies, TV shows and other theatrical venues.
But her life came to a ``screeching halt'' when she became seriously ill one Christmas while home visiting her parents. During her yearlong recovery, she struck up a romance with her parents' next-door neighbor, and the two eventually married.
After marriage, she continued as a free-lance designer but also ``ping-ponged around'' at various other jobs, such as producing radio shows and handling public relations for the American Cancer Society.
The opening of the d'Art Center came at a fortuitous time for both women. Winslow was between jobs, and Pine was entering a new phase of life, one without children at home.
``When the last chick flew the nest, it coincided with the opening of the center,'' she said. ``It was the right time for me to do this.''
Neither has regretted the decision. And through the years, they've both become strong advocates of the center's mission.
``I think it's so important what the d'Art Center is doing ... especially the tours of schoolchildren coming through here,'' Pine said. ``Some of them have never even looked at a painting before. If you can inspire them to just go home and pick up a crayon and some paper, that's really something.''
Winslow added:
``My gospel is that it's the process that I go through in creating my work that is important. I don't care if I sell anything or at what prices. I focus on the work. The reason we've lasted here so long is that we don't expect anything ... or have any grand illusions. But what we've found is there has been a lot of wonderful surprises being here.
``I told Mother we needed to be here ... and I was right.'' ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by BETH BERGMAN
Helen Pine and her daughter Pamela Pine Winslow both create art in
the d'Art Center. They moved into the center 10 years ago. by CNB