The last day of this year’s Masters is also the last day of the exhibit “American Dreams: Paintings by John Mellencamp” at the Morris Museum of Art. Some fifty oil and mixed media works by the singer-songwriter are on display at the museum, on the Riverwalk in downtown Augusta, Georgia. The doors are open until 5 p.m. on Sundays, so there would be time to catch the exhibit and still see the end of the tournament, which some say doesn’t begin until the back nine on Sunday anyway.
A John Mellencamp original
But if you can’t make the Mellencamp, Linda Hartough‘s exhibit is open now, runs through April 26, and is more Masters apt in any case. Her “In Celebration of Golf: Landscapes by Linda Hartough” includes a healthy collection of her original oil paintings of classic golf holes.
Among them are closing holes at Harbour Town, Pebble Beach Golf Links, The Olympic Club and many holes from U.S. Open venues—the Black Course at Bethpage, the East Course at Merion, Congressional—and Open Championship courses as well, such as Royal St George’s and The Old Course at St Andrews.
The 16th at Augusta National by Linda Hartough
It will actually be Hartough’s largest showing ever, and will include watercolors and drawings along with the oil paintings. The show at the Morris also seems appropriate since it was a 1984 commission from Augusta National Golf Club (for a painting of the 13th hole), that led to her specialization in golf landscapes.
She’s done an ample number of other holes at Augusta since, many of them collected in the 2013 coffee table book from Stonehouse Publishing, Green Glory: A Visual Tribute to the Courses of the Majors – Golf’s Renowned Venues. Actual collectors of Hartough’s work include Jack Nicklaus, Raymond Floyd, Rees Jones, Ian Baker Finch and any number of golf clubs. Presumably the collectors aren’t buying paintings of holes they’ve botched while playing, since Hartough’s originals have been known to fetch up to $95,000.
Now living in South Carolina, Hartough certainly qualifies for The Morris, which opened in 1992 as a museum dedicated to the art and artists of the American South. There are some 5,000 paintings in the permanent collection, works on paper, photographs and sculptures, dating from the late-eighteenth century to the present. Up to ten special exhibitions are mounted each year. The museum also houses a reference and research library, The Center for the Study of Southern Art.
Related post: Life in the Book Lane
