Alliance Art Gallery to introduce two new member artists during Second Saturday event

HANNIBAL, Mo. — The Alliance Art Gallery will feature the work of its two newest member artists, Brandy Hurt and Veronica Sandercock, with an opening reception to be held in conjunction with the gallery’s Second Saturday event on Feb. 11.

The reception will run from 4-7 p.m. Saturday with refreshments provided by the artists.  This reception is free and open to the public at the gallery’s new location, 121 N. Main.

Those attending will receive a ticket for a chance to win a piece of art any time during the day. Brief talks by Sandercock and Hurt are scheduled for 6 p.m., followed by the drawing at 6:30p.m. The winner, if not present, will be notified.

Rarely does one think of pottery as “floating” or “soft” in appearance, but Sandercock’s ceramic pieces do that. They soar in an invitingly gentle way. She starts with a solid pottery foundation — the base is thrown using the traditional potter’s wheel. She then uses a coil technique to build the free form image that viewers are so attracted to, adding decorative balls and dots as focal points. She may imprint images into the clay slab.  She calls her work “spontaneous free form.”

“I love working with glazes, seeing what goes together, be it matte, gloss, satin. Some flow. Some don’t,” Sandercock said in a press release.

She also adds that working with porcelain, the finest-grained clay, guarantees there are many ways for the piece to collapse or break. 

Graduating with a studio art degree, Sandercock taught for many years. As retirement approached a few years back, she started transitioning into being a full-time artist. The daughter of a mother who danced and a daughter who writes, creativity flows through this family.  With full-time teaching behind her, Sandercock teaches us how functionality and beauty intertwine to give us a pause, a moment to simply enjoy.

From the time Hurt was five, her father — a talented jeweler — foresaw his daughter’s potential. She admits, “It wasn’t a big part of my life.”

Then the family opened AVA Goldworks in Hannibal. Slowly, she learned the craft. By the time she was 16, she helped out. By 21, she won first  place, bridal category, at the American Gem Trade Association, for a stunning reversible necklace designed by her and built by her father — diamonds and opals on the wedding side, rose gold with coral on the reverse for the reception.

Hurt has created her own line of affordable pendants, rings, and earrings. Starting with a sterling silver bezel (or base), she picks the gem, hand-curls decorative silver wires into the design and stabilizes it with resin.

What lies ahead? Hurt wants to create a line of larger lightweight earrings.

“Heavy metal weights earrings restrict what you can do. Resin earrings from a hand-carved wax model are lightweight, fun, and affordable.”  

This year she offered pumpkin pie …  earrings.