August First Friday Celebration with artist Tom Sheppard

Date and Time

• Friday, Aug 1, 2025  5:30pm - 7:30pm

Location

Category

Arts

Details

Join us as we welcome back beloved local artist Tom Sheppard as he shows his watercolor collection inspired by the landscape and culture of New Mexico. We will be open late, until 7:30, for a reception during Lincoln’s First Friday Art Walk on August 1st! We can’t wait to see you there!

About the Show:
“The watercolors in this show are primarily from a trip I took with my son, Aaron, the summer after he graduated from high school. We went to Santa Fe, Taos, Abiquiu (home of Georgia O’Keeffe) and many out of the way places in New Mexico, Colorado and Nebraska. On that trip we painted various locations, wrote poetry and prose, and sampled an excellent assortment of food. We were fortunate enough to be able to rent a 120 year-old adobe in the hills above Abiquiu that had been modernized recently (painting of it is in this show). There will be a book of our trip on display as well.”

About the Artist:
Tom Sheppard grew up in Harvard, Hastings, Fullerton, Neligh and Kearney, Nebraska, as well as Culver City and Monrovia, California. He graduated from Manilla (IA) High School in 1964 and then attended Hastings College, graduating with a B.A. in Art Education with supporting areas in English and coaching (physical education). In art he studied under Richard Brink, Gary Coulter and Anne Kingsbury. He has taken numerous hours of studio art from the University of Iowa (Iowa City), the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and Concordia University (Seward, NE). He received his M.A. in Art Education from UNL, and spent many years teaching art, coaching, and painting.

Note from the Artist:
“After graduating from Hastings College I began my teaching career but I also began painting in earnest, having discovered it to be the most enlightening activity I had encountered. I began entering competitions with my paintings and maintained as rigorous of a schedule as I could, trying to experiment and refine my work. I have always considered watercolor a favorite and use it to advance my technique and develop better hand-eye coordination. Many examples of my watercolors will be considered to be representational (but rarely what I consider to be realistic). Most of my larger paintings on canvas are abstract and non-objective. Even so, I consider my time painting in watercolor as my primary method to further enhance my skill, even on the larger more abstract work. The Sheldon and the Museum of Nebraska Art (MONA) both have examples of my work in their holdings.”