Jun 23

Jun 23 Bob Timberlake 50th Anniversary Exhibit provides insight into the mind’s eye of the artist.

Timberlake stands next to the Pennsylvania Dutch dowery chest he made and painted at the age of 15 that won him first place in Ford Motor Co.’s Industrial Art Contest.{Photo Credit: Vikki Broughton Hodges/Davidson Local}

Lexington artist Bob Timberlake will celebrate his 50th anniversary as a professional painter with a special exhibit at his gallery that opens with a fundraiser June 30 and will be open to the public from July 1 through Labor Day.

But this exhibit is not a retrospective of his long career as a Realist painter. Several years ago, Timberlake celebrated “Seven Decades of Art — 75th Birthday Exhibition” at High Point University, which showcased a comprehensive look at the artist’s body of work, including iconic paintings such as “Late Snow at Riverwood,” from 1974, which depicts his first studio.

Bob Timberlake stands next to a finished painting of the Eli Moore cabin in Davidson County with a black and white study (right) he did years before that showed Revolutionary War soldiers in the roadbed next to the cabin on their way to the Battle of Guilford Courthouse. {Photo Credit: Vikki Broughton Hodges/Davidson Local}

Instead, this latest exhibit gives the viewer insight into the mind’s eye of the artist.

“It evolved into going into the mind of the artist,” Timberlake said. “I’m excited about it. This is going to be a totally different show than I’ve ever had.”

The painter noted he originally was supposed to have 50th anniversary exhibits in 2020 at the N.C. Museum of History, the Harrelson Center in Wilmington, Chetola Resort in Blowing Rock and his Lexington gallery. But the pandemic kept those events from happening so he decided to celebrate in the hometown gallery he opened in 1997.

But he does have a display at the entrance to the gallery that shows the painting titles and the amount they sold for from 23 paintings at his first solo show in May 1970 at the Gallery of Contemporary Art in Winston-Salem, which is now the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art.

Timberlake said having an extra year to pull the exhibit together did allow him more time to add some new original paintings as well as empty the vault to find many early studies that have never been seen for what became finished paintings. For example, he has several paintings and a dozen studies of what is known as the Eli Moore cabin in northwestern Davidson County. When he visited the property with a friend who owns it, he knew there was something special about the place.

“I had a real déjà vu feeling — the hair on the back of my neck was standing up,” he said, noting he did some research and discovered Revolutionary War troops — including his ancestors and those of his wife, Kay — had marched along the old roadbed in front of the cabin on their way to the Battle of Guilford Courthouse.

In addition to the sketched studies shedding light on the origins of many of his paintings, Timberlake has collected a series of a dozen “easel studies,” which are large pieces of paper he keeps next to his easel that he uses to sketch and doodle ideas while painting. He said one of his granddaughters, Evanne Timberlake, who studies business and marketing, told him they were like storyboards used to develop graphic visualizations of ideas. One of the easel studies shows the development of his sketching of a pig face and a checkered race flag that became the basis of a Fine Swine Wine label introduced at the Barbecue Festival.

In addition to the studies that reveal the inspiration for some paintings, there are some older works that show Timberlake’s path as an artist from a young age. At the age of 15, he won first place in the annual Ford Motor Co.’s Industrial Art Contest with a Pennsylvania Dutch dowery chest he made in shop class and painted. He has the chest in the gallery along with a photo of himself with his industrial arts teacher, Artis Hardee. He noted he had no idea then he would end up designing furniture for Lexington Home Brands, Linwood Furniture and Century Furniture.

The exhibit also includes one of his earliest works as an adult called “The Old Feezor Place,” which is an acrylic painting (before he switched to watercolor) framed in an actual wooden window frame from the building that he did in the mid-1960s. The work is one of the paintings he showed in 1969 to Realist painter Andrew Wyeth, who encouraged him to pursue his art. The next year Timberlake left the family businesses to pursue his dream.

The general public can view the 50th anniversary exhibit for free at the gallery, 1714 E. Center St. Ext., from noon to 5 p.m. Thursday to Saturday from July 1 through Labor Day.

There will be an opening night fundraiser from 5 to 7 p.m. Thursday, June 30, with tickets priced at $50 per person. There will be light hors d’oeuvres and tastings from Childress Vineyards wine and Broad Branch Distillery in Winston-Salem. RSVP by Friday, June 25, by calling the gallery at (336) 249-4428 or email btgallery@bobtimberlake.com. Checks should be made to the Salvation Army Joe Sink Empty Stocking Fund and can be brought to the event.

Timberlake said he wanted to use the occasion honor his friend Sink, the former publisher of The Dispatch who died in March of this year. Sink co-founded the Empty Stocking Fund, which helps raise money to buy gifts for underprivileged children each Christmas.