2 new exhibits featured at Sumter gallery through Jan. 10

Sumter County Gallery of Art is proud to present Esther Bynum Sharp's For the Birds and North Carolina furniture maker Amanda Yoder's At Home: Reflections on Time and Material from Nov. 7 through Jan. 10, 2025, at the gallery, 200 Hasel St.

Sharp, a Sumter native, is an internationally collected painter, photographer and sculptor from Pawleys Island. She attended Converse College and graduated from the University of South Carolina with a Bachelor of Arts in English and an MBA in Marketing and Finance from Simmons College Graduate School of Business. She previously worked as a journalist and venture capitalist. She attended Edmunds High School in Sumter and inherited a commitment to service and helping others from her parents, May Bynum Sharp and Glenmore Sharp. She is a member of Bruce Chandler's Breakout School (studio in the old jail, Rice Museum, Georgetown), and she painted with the Federal Hill School in Baltimore, Maryland. Sharp has studied at the Royal Academy, London, with Anthony Luvera; with Alan LeQuire, Nashville, Tennessee; Bruce Chandler, Charlotte, North Carolina; Cissy Marks, Baltimore, Maryland; Robert Burridge, Arroyo Grande, California; and Carolita Harvin Cantrell, Sumter. Sharp's work is in the Visionary Art Museum gift shop, Creative Alliance, and Annemarie Sculpture Garden (Smithsonian Institute affiliate) in Maryland. Since moving back to Pawleys Island in 2016, she shows at the Rice Museum in Georgetown.

Sharp's statement

"For The Birds is an ongoing series of paintings of birds - egrets, spoonbills, osprey, wood storks and even parrots - that currently migrate to or reside on Pawleys Island, where I am lucky enough to live. Other water birds in the series may have a future on the island as climate change introduces us to species we have never seen before. The future of these birds, as ecosystems change and the birds adapt, make the possibilities endless - so, I included a penguin.

"This series began germinating in my unconscious when my husband, Farlow Blakeslee, and I visited friends on a barrier island near Sarasota which hosts many of the same birds as Pawleys Island. Many of my paintings are inspired by Audubon's birds, others by my and other photographers' photos and even renderings of a bird in flight by Sumter's international sculptor, Grainger McKoy. In conversations with Karen Watson, executive director of the Sumter Gallery, and Katie Levi, they suggested a group of large paintings for an exhibition in Sumter, my hometown. At Pawleys, I painted the ospreys I observed nesting in the intracoastal waterway, wood storks pecking in the pluff mud of the creek and pink spoonbills at Huntington Beach State Park, another nearby bird sanctuary.

"I want to give shoutouts to a couple of my local besties, Katie Levi, my beloved long-time neighbor in Sumter who put the bug in Karen's ear and then relentlessly encouraged me to have a show, and to the artist Carolita Cantrell, who taught me and continues to inspire me! Of course, I'm nothing without my wonderful family and patrons in Sumter. The Sharps (Daddy's side) and Bynums (Mama's side), always there for me, buying my early art and cheering me on, my talented artist sister, Elise Moore, who paints with me and took me to my earliest painting workshops. And my sons who love and support me and pack their homes with my art and attend every show they can."

Amanda Yoder, born and raised outside of Raleigh, North Carolina, grew up in a family that was accustomed to building things. Originally pursuing her love of the performing arts, Yoder earned her BFA in Musical Theatre from East Carolina University and spent several years as a performing artist in New York City. When the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the world, she returned to her roots, settling with her husband in the mountains of North Carolina, where they adopted a Victorian farmhouse and founded Cultivate Garden Shop in Waynesville, North Carolina.

It was during this time that Yoder shifted her focus to woodworking, enrolling in the Professional Crafts program at Haywood Community College. Upon completing the two-year intensive program, Yoder launched Coda Wood Studio, dedicated to creating modern, handcrafted furniture and homewares with a deep appreciation for traditional craftsmanship and sustainability. Her furniture pieces are noted for their thoughtful balance of modern design and timeless techniques and have garnered attention throughout the Southeast. Yoder's work has been featured at prestigious events like the International Woodworking Festival (Design Emphasis Finalist, 2022), Artfields (Exhibition Award, 2023) and the International Society of Furniture Designers' Innovation + Design Competition (first place, Student Dining Room, 2023). She is also committed to craft education, having taught woodworking at the John C. Campbell Folk School in 2024, and is scheduled to teach at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts in 2025. Yoder's work reflects her reverence for natural materials and the slow, deliberate process of making. As her practice expands, she continues to explore how functional objects can deepen our connection to both home and environment.

Yoder's statement

"Designing and making home furnishings is both a practice of embodied living - expressing myself in a way that unifies the physical and spiritual - and a study of people now and before. We have so much in common with our collective ancestors, as much as we may protest our differences with them. Perhaps everyday objects and furniture in the home can show us how much our stories intertwine. I often use design to explore this bridge between past and present, placing traditional details on modern shapes and bringing the designs to life with practices and materials that honor the wisdom of old."

On Sept. 27, Tropical Storm Helene roared through Western North Carolina, causing rivers to breach their banks, turning residential, business and arts districts into piles of sludge and debris. Foundation Woodworks, in the heavily damaged River Arts District in Asheville, a beloved Asheville woodshop housing Yoder's studio, was flooded to its roofline, destroying everything inside. Yoder's pristine piece, The Woman in Black originally on the Sumter Gallery checklist, is one of many pieces of art permanently damaged - muddied and broken by days of submersion and moving flood debris. The artist and the gallery decided to exhibit The Woman in Black as an homage to the people and the businesses in Western North Carolina.

Everything the Sumter County Gallery of Art does is made possible by the generous support of businesses and individuals. Many thanks to Katie Levi, Stifel Financial, Assured Partners-Bynum Insurance and Frankenmuth Insurance. Flowers are courtesy of Azalea Garden Club and the Council of Garden Clubs of Sumter.