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[music] It's all about home.

Nature, memory, and art come to life through color and demotion.

Hello, I'm Julie Cooke.

On this edition of Tennessee is Talking, we welcome artist and educator MaryGwyn Bowen.

Her botanical style artwork is deeply rooted in West Tennessee's natural beauty and personal history, from her grandmother's garden to the shores of Reelfoot Lake.

Let the conversation begin.

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West Tennessee PBS Presents, Tennessee is Talking.

Let the conversation begin.

[background conversations] Thanks for joining the discussion here on Tennessee is Talking.

I'm Julie Cook, and today we're exploring a different kind of Tennessee tradition, one painted in vibrant colors and drawn from the heart of nature.

MaryGwyn Bowen is a botanical artist, a registered nurse, and educator whose work celebrates the seasons of life.

MaryGwyn, we welcome you and we've already had a chance to talk a little bit off camera about things that inspire you so very much, and as you just heard, your grandmother's garden and your aunts' love for birds.

That must have touched you at a very early age.

It did.

It did.

My grandmother had beautiful .. in her backyard, and I would follow her around, and she could tell me the name of every flower.

We would go out there and cut a bucket full of flowers in the morning.

She called it her cutting garden.

Then we would take 'em back to the house and make flower arrangements to go all over the house.

Oh, beautiful.

I would have been about maybe four or five years old.

You even started early in a lot of color and nature.

Loving it.

Yes.

She had all the co..

When did you start to think you could draw these beautiful things?

It was actually my other grandparents that kept pushing me to do that because I love to color.

Then they started buying me painting kits.

Remember the paint-by-number kits we used to get?

They would buy me those.

Then, after that, they started looking for an art teacher that I could go to.

I started taking classes when I was eight in Newbern, Tennessee, over the Rexall Drugstore in Newbern.

Oh, well, not too hard to forget where you got started, right?

No, that was so much fun.

Do you stick pretty much to the nature artwork?

Yes, in school, I had to do abstract and some of the other things, but-- Just never touched you quite as much.

It just didn't get to me.

Why do you think that is?

Because of that?

Probably.

Just seeing my grandmother's love of the flowers, and there were happy memories.

The beauty of the flowers and the colors and all that.

One thing interesting in our intro, you're a registered nurse.

You grew up with art as a hobby, and you had a career in nursing for-- I did.

How long was that?

I still do it.

Oh, you still are a nurse?

I still am a nurse.

I do that and I do the art together, so I do both of them.

Nursing came out of-- I love people, and nursing came out of a need for a solid career because nursing is, it's a good, solid career.

You got that B planned if you're an a.. You do.

-or a singer, or a composer, or any of th..

Exactly.

It's always need to have a plan B.

It is, and that's where it came from.

A need to be practical too, but then I love that too, but art's still in my heart.

Something I was interested that you had taken part in the University of Florida a program called Arts in Medicine.

That's very interesting.

I'd like to know about that.

It was a perfect blend for me as both nurse a..

It was a perfect blend, and I was searching around for things when I found that program.

I had lived in Florida, so I knew a little bit about UF, but I didn't know about this program.

At the same time that that happened, I was working at Vanderbilt, and they had a nursing research fellowship.

I started looking at research and art in the hospital, and that's how-- In relation to healing or-- Yes.

Healing present.

I wanted to see what art could do for healing.

How art could help patients in the hospital.

That was what I was looking at.

How could I do a research project showing how art could benefit the patients?

I was working in cardiac at the time and looking at what do cardiac patients need?

They need to get up and walk.

That's a big part of their healing.

They need to get up and walk.

Could art help them have a reason to get up and walk?

That's what we did.

We looked to see if we changed the art on the walls of the hospital would the patients walk more after surgery?

Then I started looking at what kind of art would be something that patients would enjoy?

We came up with the idea of having the staff make the art.

Then we could put the art on the walls that were made by the nurses and the doctors and the unit secretaries, everybody, whoever.

We just put out a call, and they all sent their art in.

They knew it was from the hospital staff.

Yes.

We put their names under each piece of art so that they would know who it was, where they worked, what their job role was at the hospital.

Then the patients had more of a reason to get up and walk.

They could go see what their nurse had done on-- where that person's art was or their doctor's art.

They had a reason to walk a little further.

They could go see somebody's art.

It changed the environment of those units on the hospital, too.

I'm sure.

It must have been very enticin.. to go a little further to see a little bit more.

It was warmer and friendlier, too.

It was less of a sterile-looking environment, so that was part of it.

The staff loved it because some of them made the art, and then if they didn't make the art, their coworkers did, so they knew the people that made the art.

It was a lot more personal, less impersonal art.

It was people they knew that had made the art.

Has this ever been implemented in other hospitals?

I think it has.

I don't know.

I haven't done it anyw..

I've just seen some research on it.

I know in the University of Florida, which is why I went there, they have done that at Florida, and I don't think they measured if it helped people as far as walking or anything, but they have looked into what it does for the staff and for the patients to have art that's more friendly, more open to-- they can relate to, people can relate to the art, so it makes a huge difference to them.

In public places like that, aren't they usually real careful about colors that they choose?

-Because there is a science of color.

-Very much.

and how it affects people.

Absolutely.

There's a lot of research on that, too.

When I sent out the call for the staff to make the art, I had to list those things because a large amount of red can raise blood pressure.

We didn't want a lot of red for heart-- [laughs] You don't want that in .. No.

Abstract paintin.. That causes stress because they can't understand what it is.

Especially if you have a whole wall of them.

I can imagine where that would be a little o.. Let's just do a flower or a kitty cat or something.

We couldn't have cats.

That's an interesting thing.

We couldn't have cats.

Oh, no animals?

No animals because some .. We had to be careful about that.

We could have children, we could have people doing things, but not people looking straight out at you, because some people are confused by a portrait of somebody staring at you.

We had people engaging in fun things.

This was all in the cardiac units?

All in the cardiac units.

There were three units.

Did you have any stipulations there?

Yes.

I sent all those out, an.. "Why is abstract bad?"

I had to explain it to them, but once people heard why, then it made sense.

It makes total sense, everything you said.

We don't want anxiety.

We want to promote peace and calm, not anxiety.

That's so interesting.

Primarily, now you do the botanical art.

I know a lot of that is centered up around Reelfoot Lake, and you've got something coming up at Reelfoot we want to talk about.

Why do you enjoy teaching this particular type, the botanicals?

I love flowers, but I think so many people do.

We have so many gardeners in West Tennessee.

We have so many beautiful gardens, so many garden clubs.

We have so many things that people just love growing their flowers around here.

If you drive through any neighborhood, flowers are everywhere.

We love our flowers.

I do, too.

I think that people love to draw and paint their flowers.

I think they have a way to capture what's in their garden year-round when they [crosstalk] There are a lot of different layers.

If you do the pedals and there's so much chance to put dimension, I think.

-Oh, yes.

-I looked around one day, and I thought, "Why is it every painting I get, it's always got flowers in it?"

I was like, "Maybe you should change topics or something," but then it's like you have flowers in every room.

They're so friendly.

Flowers are friendly.

How can you not like flowers?

True that.

The native plants and wildlife, how do you go about selecting then what you paint?

After all, I know we have iris, like this beautiful painting, and then this is one of the lilies from Reelfoot Lake?

From Reelfoot Lake.

One of the lotus flowers.

I think the iris just remind me-- they're Tennessee.

We love our iris.

That's our state flower.

It is our state flower.

When the iris are blooming, they're every color in the wo..

Everywhere you go, somebody's got iris, because we just love our iris.

All colors and- Oh, yes.

-the really beautiful ones.

Now, what is this pastel?

Do you primarily work in water [crosstalk] Watercolor primarily.

Are these two-- These are both watercolor.

Watercolor?

Okay.

The iris is what I call mixed media.

It has colored pencil, and it has gouache in it as well.

I don't know what gouache is.

-Gouache is--.

-Oh, gouache.

Gouache is opaque watercolor.

Watercolor is transparent, and gouache is a great way to-- I don't like to use gouache all the time, because the transparency really makes that flower have that velvety look that you're talking about with flowers.

Gouache is a great tool to use for highlights, adding a little highlight.

It's a liquid, it's actually a paint?

It's a liquid.

It looks just like watercolor, except that you can't layer it with all the layers that make it have that velvety look.

It's another watercolor, but I use that.

That you use to layer, I guess.

I didn't know about gouache.

You want to drop a sunshine on your flower, you can add it with gouache after you get to the end.

The same thing with colored pencil.

Some of the details of flowers can be really hard to get with a brush and paint, so you can use a colored pencil to do that.

Good to know.

How much are you able to teach?

I still teach at Belmont in Nashville.

I teach one-day workshops, and I always teach for adults, one-day workshops.

In a one-day class, you can have a completed painting and see the whole way the technique works.

I teach there, I teach around here some, too, and in Murray, Kentucky, and for their Art Center there.

In a one-day workshop, you can learn the basic technique of botanical painting.

That's the mixtures and- Yes.

-about the gouache, yo..

Yes, the gouache.

[laughs] I guess you get a lot of satisfaction out of just being able to teach.

Does it surprise you that people are a lot better than they think they are sometimes?

It doesn't surprise me, it surprises them, I think.

That's the fun part of teaching, because I'll get people all the time that say, "I can't do this, I can't do this."

Then by the end of the day, they can look at their finished painting and say, "Well, maybe I can do this."

I think that to me is the most satisfying part of it.

Why do you think that is?

Watching somebody learn that they could do something they didn't think they could..

Yes, and just see the joy that that brings.

People love flowers, and then when they want to be painting and drawing them, or they want to be able to do that, because they love their flowers, and they want a way to keep it on their walls, or keep it all year round.

Now, along with your painting, you also enjoy photography.

What is the difference, or how does that feed your soul, I guess, as the painting does?

You can capture the moment with photography.

I take my photography back and use it a lot in the studio.

Like Reelfoot, if I'm going to paint a sunset at Reelfoot, I'll put up a bunch of pictures across the wall for that.

I do a lot of flower photography just to capture what the colors and things are.

I don't like to paint from the photography, because I think it tends to flatten your painting.

You need the live.

I've heard other artists say that, but I just wonder if you've seen it, and you know what those dimensions are.

Does it not help, though, to just have the photo, but you have to put your own depth?

I think you need the live flower for the depth.

You have the photography to go back and check the color, because a flower, The shape and that sort of thing.

The shape, yes.

The flower just won't live forever, sadly, and that's the point of painting them.

It does in a frame.

You can make it do that.

Exactly.

Putting it in the frame.

Do you enjoy one more than the other?

I love them all.

I love it all.

I'd say oil painting is my favorite.

I love painting the sunsets at Reelfoot in oil painting, just because it captures that drama.

The watercolor captures the peace of a flower.

You get very peaceful when you are with a flower, and you paint the flower.

Oil painting tends to be very dramatic to me.

You don't do the botanicals in the oil?

I do some like the irises.

I do some of the irises.

They are pretty dramatic, the colors.

They are.

That's why I like them in oil.

Basically, I do the really sunsets on the water and things like that that need a lot of bright color and drama.

How do you see your work fitting into-- of course, any book you see on Tennessee, it's always got from the mountains to Realfoot Lake to West Tennessee to East Tennessee.

How do you feel like your work feeds into that tradition, that picture we have of the three sections of Tennessee?

I think we have fewer representations of West Tennessee than we do of East Tennessee, so that most people think of Tennessee as the Smoky Mountains.

-As the Smoky Mountains.

-As the Smoky Mountains.

That's true.

They don't know what beauty we have over here.

They don't know about the lush flowers and growing things.

People just don't know about Reelfoot Lake.

That is such a treasure.

Reelfoot is such a treasure that we have in Tennessee.

I know you can go up there during the summertime fishing and the wintertime duck hunting, and you can't stir them with a stick.

I do know that.

[chuckles] Those two, but those are just four months out of the year.

Yes, just a little bit.

That's not spring and fall.

It's not, and that's when the birds are there.

The birds are there, and the flowers are blooming.

That's when there's nobody there.

It's a shame because it's so beautiful.

Few people know about the earthquake story.

That's such a big thing for Tennessee, too, but few people know about it.

The Reelfoot Lake was formed by an earthquake for those who forgetting your Tennessee history.

Exactly.

That's part of the point of it, too.

New Madrid Fault.

The New Madrid Fault and the earthquakes there.

I grew up on that story.

When I got to art school in Washington, DC, for my senior thesis.

I painted a series of paintings of Reelfoot.

People would say, "Now, where is this?

What happened?"

I'm thinking, "That's a shame because this is such a historically sig.. that we have right here in West Tennessee, and few people know it."

I don't remember where I learned that.

It just seems like you always-- we went so much when we were kids, and I guess somebody told us.

Dad or granddad or somebody.

Yes, we grew up with it.

The people outside of West Tennessee didn't.

It's a shame.

In a way, I'd like to see that change, and more people know.

At the same time, I like the peace and the quiet of Reelfoot, t..

I'll think about Reelfoot, and I think, "It gets good crowds."

It's probably about as many as they want around there for that area because I've been up there even when the ice formations.

Have you ever painted any of those?

No, but I've seen some.

The ice formations on the trees.

That's so beautiful.

I know a few years ago, we went and we couldn't find .. We had to go back to Dyersburg.

[laughter] We'd go up and they'd say, "We can't do it.

We've got an hour wait already.

If you go over to so-and-so, they got to wait, too."

I was like, "I guess we're going to have to leave town."

People gather up there for those ice formations on the trees.

Really are beautiful.

That is something I'm going to nee.. That's a good idea.

Do that and you can come back and show us that.

You're still a working nurse.

I wonder, is the teaching the art and actually painting, is that therapeutic for you?

Oh, very.

I'm sure nursing has its stresses..

Very stressful.

I've done some classes for nurses, too, because it is a great way to unwind.

It is a great way to unwind.

You just let all the tensions of the day and some of the stressful things you've done, and some of the emotional stress.

You think refocus?

Yes, let's it go.

It demands your full attention.

It does.

When you are home, you get away from that, and you need to unwind, and there's not a whole lot you can do to unwind, then art is a great way to do that.

You come home and you have all that tension still wound up, wound tight, and then you come-- I just go in and start painting something and it just flows out.

I don't know if a lot of people can do that, though, because you feel like if you do something, it needs to be really good.

To me, if you could just shift your focus and put all your stress in that one place, then it's gone and it doesn't stay inside, and it doesn't play tricks on your body, and that kind of thing.

It does, yes, and your blood pressure.

Any kind of relief from stress is always the best.

Oh, it is.

I think you hit on a good point that people think they have to have something, they have a fix in their mind of what their painting's supposed to look like or what it's supposed to be.

I think once people let go of that and that it's not supposed to be, it's just supposed to be what it's supposed to be, then that tension starts to leave.

Many people come into a class, and they're fixed in their mind with what this painting that they're going to do is supposed to look like.

That puts pressure on me.

[laughs] What's in your brain doesn't alwa..

It doesn't.

It never does.

All these years, I've never seen one that does.

Just let it be what it is, don't make a judgment.

You see amazing things when that happens, too.

I notice that with every painting, everybody does, including me, that you get to a point where you think, "Oh, this is awful.

I'm not going on, this is awful, I'm throwing it away."

Put it in the closet, and you tell yourself-- Yes, put it in the closet.

If you push on past that, then it's when you.. to become something that you didn't think about.

Then it starts to become something beautiful, and you think, "Oh, I did that."

That's the fun part of teaching, too.

I think anybody could do that, nursing, anybody in a stressful situation, start letting it flow out into the art, and it makes a huge difference.

Especially if you have little ones, because that's always great if they have things like that growing up in their home.

I think music or any kind of thing like that.

All of the arts.

We've just got a few minutes, but I want to talk about your programs that you're going to be having at Reelfoot, your classes.

We do retreats.

I call them retreats.

As we go over there for the weekend and we go usually to the Southshore Resort, that's in Sandburg.

It's the end of the Lake Road.

It's in a very quiet cove, and then it has a Boat House Restaurant there that has a panoramic view of the cove where the flowers grow.

Then there's a little park there.

We're inviting all the local artists and craftsmen to come and have a tent and show your stuff and sell it out there too.

Then we have people that want to come and paint.

We set up right there in the Boat House Restaurant with the beautiful view.

We paint right there all day in the restaurant.

We do one when the pelicans come.

The pelicans come to Reelfoot in October.

We do one painting there when the birds are all out there in the cove.

We do one when the lotus flower is blooming, we do one when the pelicans come in, and we do one when the eagles are there.

I was going to ask you about the eagles.

How do you paint those?

You go out and take pictures.

[laughs] You have to take pictures.

That's one thing.

Do you take photos for them to go by?

We go out there on the water.

The people at Southshore, the Speer, that's the name of the family that owns Southshore, they take us out with a guide.

They take us out and we get pictures in their boat on the water, and they know where all the nests are.

Those you take photographs?

Those, we have no choice.

Instead of paintings.

Yes, we have no choice.

It'd be great.

You can go behind-- the museum, usually has live eagles where they have their program there that they help the eagles that can't fly.

They have the live ones behind the museum there.

How do we find out about the-- They're on my website.

It's marygwynsart.com.

It's Gwyn with a Y, not an E. It's marygwyn, G-W-Y-N, S-A-R-T.com, and it'll have all the information on the retreats, or they can call the resort, Southshore Resort, or the Boat House Restaurant.

[chuckles] It'll be easy to find up around Reelfoot Lake.

What is the name of the resort again?

Southshore Resort.

Southshore Resort at Reelfoot.

At Sandburg.

In Sandburg?

Okay.

We have definitely enjoyed being with you today, and I think we brought out a lot of good points.

Just paint if your heart so desires, and let things fall as they may, wouldn't you say?

Yes, absolutely.

[laughs] All right.

Thanks so .. We are out of time, but thanks so much for tuning in to Tennessee is Talking, and we thank MaryGwyn Bowen for joining us and sharing her story, blending art, and the natural beauty of Tennessee, along with nursing and teaching and other types of things that she does, and photography.

If you do want to re-watch the program or share it with a friend, just remember you can stream this episode and all local Channel 11 programs anytime on the PBS app or at westtnpbs.org.

Keep the conversation going by following West Tennessee PBS on social media as well.

Until next time, keep on talking, Tennessee.

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