Downtown Marshall,
NC
(828) 649-0134
lee@firewalkergallery.com
Copyright
© 2006-2008
Firewalker Gallery
|
Through Firewalker Gallery,
I am working for a sustainable and creative way of earning a living
while supporting other local, talented artists. The town of Marshall
in Madison County, North Carolina is a truly unique and special
place and more my home everyday. In Marshall, tree covered mountains
drop down to the French Broad River and stores on historic Main
Street conduct business in a setting that feels a little like the
Twilight Zone met Hee Haw.
Woods and wood are
everyplace in my life.
Every where I go gets branches and boards leaning up in the corner.
My people have always been builders and farmers. They were people who made do with what they had and made what they needed from what was available. My ancestors’ connection to their natural surroundings, as well as their resourcefulness and self-reliant living skills, have long inspired me. I have been building one thing or another as long as I can remember. I have been a farmer and a gardener also. Working with natural materials is in my nature.
In the summer of 2004, Johnny Crash (www.crashartist.com) and Pete Whitlock (www.busywiggles.com) came to visit me at my Big Pine home and workshop. We spent a day walking around the mountain farm of Jim and Libby Woodruff where I live in an old chestnut house. Intoxicated with fresh air and too far away from the big city of Atlanta, Pete offered me a job renovating his building here on Main St. in Marshall.
This opportunity to work some rustic magic changed my life.
The building was finished out as five fancy apartments with open floor plans focusing around Crash’s modern cherry and walnut kitchens. I used a whole barn of reclaimed old wood--beautiful chestnut and oak--as well as reclaimed windows, doors, floor joists, roof timbers, bead board, and heart pine trim. A truckload of river stones and a wood stove balance the exposed brick and high ceilings of the 1900 era JF Redmon building and smooth the transition to the lighting and sleek and ultramodern cabinets of the new renovation.
I built oversized window sills for sitting in, giant window trim, arched doorways with transom windows, timber frame joinery, barn wood beams, rustic kitchen and bathroom details, and Swiss style Dutch doors with wooden hinges, springs, and latches. I framed in and trimmed out all sorts of things that you run into in an old building and I built shelves and other rustic oddities from top to bottom. I also scraped and scraped and scraped … and refinished the glory of the old A&P grocery storefront to the original red.
It took almost two years to almost complete. It was so nice when we almost finished… I decided I wanted to stay. I have been here setting up shop and growing the Gallery since the winter of 2006. Bold and talented people surround me here in Madison County. All of the artists whose work is featured in the gallery are dedicated to their craft and committed to living a good life. They in turn inspire me to live and do and be better myself. Support these artists and make them your own wellspring of inspiration. It is this group that gives the glow to the Firewalker Gallery. Come get by the fire. -Lee Walker, Owner |
