Allen Artwork to Explode With Color at ArtWalk
Homer Allen will be showing his paintings at ArtWalk 2022, held May 7 and 8 in Fayetteville. Allen is new to Art-Walk but not new to the region. Years ago, Allen painted the well-known Fayetteville sign on Highway 71.
The artist was born in Cheylan, West Virginia. When he was 5, his family moved to Akron, Ohio, where his father was an accountant. In addition to his job at Goodyear Tire and Rubber, his father found time to start and run the Goodyear Musical Theater.
Allen’s introduction to art was through painting, building and designing sets in his father’s theater company. He worked with professional set designers; graphic artists; and scenic artists. His undergraduate and graduate work focused on graphic design, printmaking, and painting, with a minor in accounting. While in college, he continued to work in his father’s theater company and began designing sets and backdrops.
He used his art training to teach and continued working as a scenic artist. He was an art instructor and theatrical technical director at St. Vincent-St. Mary High School and became a scenic artist at EJ Thomas Performing Arts Hall in Akron, Ohio, which included a six month production run in Las Vegas.
In graduate school, Allen was the graduate assistant to Dean Henry Lin, the head of the Fine Arts Department at Ohio University. His job was to receive the prints and paintings acquired by the university, archivally frame them and install exhibitions of the works. He handled works from artists like Warhol, Lichtenstein, Dine, Rauschenberg, Oldenburg, Hockney, and more. He studied the techniques and images they used to create their art. These experiences drove him to know more about the commercial production of imagery.
After receiving his Master of Fine Arts, he moved to Houston and worked at Sterling Outdoor Advertising as a pictorial painter on billboards. In addition to painting the pictorial images, he learned lettering techniques from master sign painters. He states, “To me, signage is like theatrical presentations – the scale is also similar. Being a production artist in the theater and sign industry, I learned many trade techniques and methodologies that are applied in my current flower series. By painting on re-cycled billboards, I can paint large and get a bonus in that the paintings are waterproof and can be displayed indoors or outdoors.”
Being a production artist in the theater and sign industry, he learned many trade techniques and methodologies that he currently applies in his artwork. He enjoys painting graphical flowers. The subject allows him to interpret them in infinite variations while they still appear as flowers. His flower paintings have been very well received and have grown in demand.
Homer Allen will exhibit his original artwork at ArtWalk on Saturday, May 7, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and on Sunday, May 8, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. ArtWalk is an annual art festival sponsored by Arts for Rural Texas, a 501(c)3 not for profit organization that serves the Fayette County region. For more information call (979) 378-2113 or visit the website at www.artsforruraltexas.org.