Where Art and Writing Collide

Write or paint?

"Will There Be Peace Anywhere?" copyright MMSikes

That's always a big question for me.

Which do you like best?

I don't know.

Writing is hard, but it's useful. I need the skill to promote my paintings.

Painting is hard, but it's fun. I can lose myself in the process. I love the joy of working in experimental water media. And I've discovered encaustic painting. I had no idea the excitement I would find in moving paint and wax around using a heat gun.

But wait. I can get lost as I develop the characters in a book and then become part of the story myself. That's fun, too.

And sometimes my art and photography illustrate my articles and my books. That's useful. I love combining the two.

I'm very excited that my painting "Will There Be Peace Anywhere?" was selected for the 2012 National Juried All-Media Exhibition  at the Petersburg Regeional Arts Center. The show has 65 artists from all over the country featured.

Romance. Happy endings. Exciting paintings. Meaningful art. These are all wonderful to have in your life--even though sometimes art and writing collide, and it makes you a little crazy.

Mary Montague Sikes

Authors' Book Fair Features Civil War Theme

At West Point Authors' Book Fair 2012

This year's West Point Authors' Book Fair featured a Civil War theme, probably because several of the featured writers have books set during that tragic point in time. I don't. However, I do have two books that relate to the Civil War era. During the authors' presentation talks, I spoke briefly about those books.

A Rainbow for Christmas is set in 1869 on a wagon train heading west. Cade Russell, the wagon master lost both his wife and young daughter to illness caused by conditions in the South following the war. To overcome the pain and guilt about his loss, he now travels back and forth across the plains, leading the western pioneers to their destinations.

Hilltop House: A Snapshot in Time features a once-popular hotel in historic Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. Site of a battle in September 1862, the town is not far from Antietam, where the "bloodiest day in American history took place." Not long after the war, Harpers Ferry was a component of the counties removed from Virginia and made part of the state of West Virginia.

"Civil War, A Nation Divided" by MMSikes

I note in the Hilltop House book that the Civil War had a big impact on my childhood. Not only did I attend an elementary school with floors bloodstained from use as a hospital during the war, but I lived about a block from Sunken Road and Marye's Heights where a furious and deadly battle took place in 1862.

"Even today, I still recall the terrible depressing sensation I felt while walking along old Sunken Road," I read from my book to those attending the talk.

My mixed media painting, "Civil War, A Nation Divided," is among the illustrations in the book. This painting is part of my "Will There Be Peace Anywhere?" series of work.

We always seem to be a world at war. Why that is I do not know. I suppose the Civil War is a very suitable, yet sad theme for an authors' book fair.

--Mary Montague Sikes