THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, October 14, 1995 TAG: 9510140282
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TERESA ANNAS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Long : 106 lines
Seated on the porch of her Ocean View home on Friday, artist Helen Singleton was dressed in fire engine red. Except for her white running shoes, she might have been mistaken for a lit holiday candle.
``I've lately taken quite a bit to red, as you can see in what I'm wearing,'' said Singleton, her pixie-ish face aglow in the afternoon sun. ``And I have something red in everything I paint.''
Singleton will turn 97 on Nov. 11.
The color red, she acknowledged, may hold a key to her vitality.
``Well, I think of red as blood. And, of course, blood sustains life.''
Her age has not prevented her from participating in a string of outdoor art shows this season, including the Stockley Gardens Fall Arts Festival, set for today and Sunday in Norfolk's Ghent neighborhood.
Neither will a broken hip slow this prolific painter. Singleton is recuperating from a fall she took in early September while gardening. After two weeks of resting, she was up and going, and she already gets by without a walker.
Singleton has been toting her canvases to outdoor shows for more than 15 years, often taking home cash prizes. She's even won best-in-show awards, most recently at an August exhibit at Ocean View Beach Park.
``If not for the outdoor shows, all this art would be sitting here getting dusty,'' she said, her pale blue eyes - sans spectacles - sparked with humor.
Her son, Nauman Singleton of West Point, Va., drives her to the shows and helps her set up. Then, Singleton sticks it out herself.
``I'll sit there through the blazing sun and the pouring rain. Oh, yeah, I've done that.''
She wondered about today's weather forecast. ``Well, if it doesn't shower too bad, I'll be there.''
About five years ago, a big storm came at closing time at the Stockley Gardens show. ``I covered up my paintings with canvas. And then I got under the canvas. Then somebody came along and said, `May I take your picture?' ''
At that, she erupted in gentle laughter.
Stacks of her paintings lined the walls in every room of her one-story house. She had spent the morning choosing a dozen or so works to take to Stockley.
``I don't really know what I paint. I guess I paint whatever inspires me.''
While her speaking voice is as light as tinkling bells, Singleton's art has the weight of substance.
She is a gutsy painter, whose atmospheric, dreamy images take her in various directions. She makes abstracts and textural collages. She'll paint figures in rooms or in landscapes. She integrates magazine clippings into her paintings.
The subjects might be recollections of her travels to exotic places like China and India. Or she may interpret a local scene, such as a water lily pond near Sandbridge.
In describing her work, color often is her focus. ``I don't think colors anywhere are as beautiful as they are in the Mediterranean,'' she said, indicating a seascape in glistening jewel tones.
Singleton began painting about 50 years ago. She enrolled in classes, studying with such local luminaries as A.B. Jackson and Walter Thrift, who are deceased, and Charles Sibley.
Her family hasn't always appreciated her art, she said. ``I just kept plugging away. But it was really hard.''
They expected real art to look more like real life. Meanwhile Singleton was producing something more expressive.
``But those are the wild things,'' she said of her art. ``And I really love to do those wild things.''
Since her childhood on a Kentucky farm, where she spent her days tending eight cows, Singleton has always kept busy. Later, she and her husband, who died in 1957, put in long days running an apartment complex in Ocean View.
``Country people are used to working hard,'' she said matter-of-factly.
As a girl, she said, ``I used to sing at the top of my lungs while bringing the cows home. I thought it would be wonderful to be an opera singer.''
She took after her dad, always the dreamer.
Unlike her father, Singleton has been able to live her dreams. In recent decades, she has pursued her art and traveled the world.
She hopes to continue with both. She's still trying to get to Hawaii. And she has yet to run short of ideas for paintings.
Singleton regarded an abstract work, its rich texture created by letting wet papers dry on the surface.
The work has been exhibited at The Chrysler Museum of Art.
``It's really one of my favorites, but most people don't appreciate it. I'd like to try another one - or two.'' ILLUSTRATION: TAMARA VONINSKI
The Virginian-Pilot
[Color Photo]
Helen Singleton's Passion for Painting
Helen Singleton has chosen a dozen or so of her works to display in
the Stockley Gardens Fall Arts Festival today and Sunday in
Norfolk's Ghent.
What: Stockley Gardens Fall Arts Festival, hosted by Hope House
Foundation, features 130 artists, entertainment and food.
Where: Stockley Gardens Park at Olney Road, Norfolk
When: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. today; noon to 5 p.m. Sunday
How much: admission is free
Call: 625-6161
KEYWORDS: PROFILE INTERVIEW by CNB