fbpx
Connect with us

Magnolia Tribune

Wyatt Waters journeys down the Watercolor Road

Published

on

A new book from Mississippi artist Wyatt Waters tells the story of the many truths he has learned along his journey through the South.

When Wyatt Waters publishes a book, it isn’t an overnight process. The Clinton-based watercolor artist recently published a book that was over twenty years in the making. He hasn’t been slacking off during that time. He has many other books under his belt. But this particular book is one he has wanted to do for a very long time. The book is The Watercolor Road: Painting and Writing through the American South. 

The idea for the project began when Wyatt and his wife, Kristi, purchased a 16′ Casita pull-behind travel trailer in 2020.

“I used to VW vans,” says Wyatt. “I have had ten of them over the years. I would hit the road and sleep in the back. I had an idea to travel the Southeast, from Arkansas to the Florida Keys and paint along the way.”

The couple purchased the travel trailer (which they named Lucy) in Johnson , Tennessee in February, just before the world stopped due to the Coronavirus pandemic.

“We weren’t sure what would happen, but we were set to go. We spent the next couple of years on the road. It turned out to be a great project.”

Advertisement

Wyatt says that the seeds for the project were planted over twenty years ago.

“This is the book I always thought I’d do. My roommate at Mississippi College was Stu McIntyre. Stu’s dad was the editor of the Sunday newspaper, and he told me I needed to put together a book of all the paintings I was doing.”

Wyatt is a plein artist, meaning he works solely on site. He doesn’t like to paint from photographs. He prefers to set up his easel and paint on location. Wyatt loves the South and the idea of an adventure traveling around the region with his wife while painting and writing every day sounded appealing to him.

“Kristi made the plans for the trip,” Wyatt says. “She planned an itinerary that kept us from getting too lost.”

Advertisement

The inaugural voyage began in May 2020.

“We hit the road for a couple of weeks,” says Wyatt. They traveled to Savannah, Georgia and created a home base. “We drove about two hours out each day, then we would head to another city.”

Their longest trip was in the summer of 2021, when they were away from home for five weeks.

The trip Wyatt to experience the American South in a closeup and personal way. The book allows the reader to have the same experiences through Wyatt’s paintings and musings. His paintings in the book include familiar places such as public buildings and churches in towns around the South, to the obscure and quirky places like the Georgia Guidestones, a sort of mini-Stonehenge located seven miles north of Elberton, Georgia. It’s a good thing Wyatt painted the stones when he did. Unveiled on March 22, 1980, the stones were destroyed by a bomb on July 6, 2022. Wyatt’s philosophy is, “if it is interesting to see, it can be a painting.”

Advertisement

The couple had many unplanned experiences, mostly because they tend to take the road less traveled.

“On our first trip we spent twelve hours waiting for roadside assistance on a covered bridge in the middle of nowhere when our vehicle broke down,” Wyatt says. “But during that time, we met a lot of nice folks, and I was able to paint the bridge, which was really beautiful.”

The trip was, in part, to help Wyatt understand his home, the South, so that he could better understand other places in the world. He felt the best way to do that was to get out there and see it, up close and personal.

“I can’t see the sky of a Gulf Coast sunset in my studio,” he muses.

Advertisement

The trip not only helped Wyatt learn about the South, but he learned more about himself. In the book’s forward, entitled “Every Picture Tells a Story,” Wyatt says, “I had an idea of taking off in search of this place called home. This place where I was raised had nurtured me, and sometimes, rejected me. I’ve come to terms with the beliefs and traditions of my upbringing. Our collective hopes and fears. With our beauty and faith. With our old scars and new wrinkles. We are both simple and complex.”

Sometimes the unexpected can really make you feel the power of the moment. That happened when they happened to spy a 10- in the swamps while Wyatt was painting.

“Compare an 11-foot alligator in a zoo to a 10-foot alligator on the shoulder of the road a few feet away. Which makes you feel the power of the moment more?”

Kristi let her guard down long enough to shoot an incredible video of two alligators fighting. “That’s just something you don’t see every day,” she said.

Advertisement

There were a few perilous moments involving humans as well. Wyatt tells the story of driving in the country and coming upon a stand of bois d’arc trees. A man was standing on the property, and Wyatt assumed he was the owner. Asking if he could do a watercolor there, the man replied, “sure,” then went on his way. When Wyatt was nearly through with the painting, a man with a shotgun approached and asked what Wyatt was doing. When Wyatt told him the owner had given him permission to paint there, the man with the shotgun became agitated and told Wyatt he knew he was there looking for buried gold. Wyatt packed up and left.

In addition to his reflective essays throughout the book, the titles of each painting are worth reading. Wyatt loves to play with words, and most of the titles cause a chuckle. Some are quiet “digs,” his way of challenging the status quo. Some of the titles are obvious, but still humorous. For example, a painting of a horse drawn carriage in New Orleans’ French Quarter is called “Quarter Horse.” A large old growth oak tree with a branch that crosses a creek is next to a footbridge in New Orleans’ City Park. The painting is called “Double Crosser.” A painting of Looking Glass Falls in North Carolina is called “Falls Alarm.” And because it’s so much fun, just one more: a painting of fog rolling in from the mountains over a field in Waynesville, North Carolina is named “Mist Opportunity.”

The result of Wyatt and Kristi’s trip around the South is an impressive collection of 133 paintings, 21 essays, and an array of adages that depicts both the South and Wyatt’s relentless trek to be a better painter as a mindset rather than a destination. This is the first book of Wyatt’s that includes his writings, which feature the many truths he has learned along the way and how he applies them to his art and to his life.

One of those truths was learned when Wyatt had a kidney stone while in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. He was in the emergency room in extreme pain, yet there were others who were in worse pain. Someone had been in a car and was crying in the bed on the other side of the curtain. There was a , and that was sad.

Advertisement

“No one dies of a kidney stone,” Wyatt wrote. “You just wish you could.”

A kind nurse took care of him, and he returned to the Casita where Kristi took care of him.

“Even though I was in pain, I knew I was loved, and I can honestly say it helped.”

Wyatt thought about how similar his physical pain was to the pain we all go through. “The pain inside that will not go away. It makes us frustrated, and we want to lash out to distract us from how unbearable it is.”

Advertisement

Then he was reminded the next day about the importance of being kind. “It’s a choice.”

Wyatt has been painting since childhood, starting with lessons before he went to school. He earned a master’s degree in art and has spent his life in an unrelenting quest to become a better artist. He has had seven other books published, including Another Coat of Paint, Painting Home, and An Oxford Sketchbook, as well as collaborating with Mississippi restaurateur Robert St. John on A Southern Palate, Southern Seasons, An Italian Palate, and A Mississippi Palate. He and Robert also host Palate to Palette, a traveling culinary and art series that airs on Mississippi Public Broadcasting. He also has a gallery on the quaint brick streets of Clinton where he sells his original work, as well as giclee prints. The gallery sells prints, books, stationery and apparel, Wyatt’s belief that art is for everyone.

The post Wyatt Waters journeys down the Watercolor Road appeared first on Magnolia Tribune.

Advertisement

Read More

By: Susan Marquez
Title: Wyatt Waters journeys down the Watercolor Road

Published Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2023 11:35:00 +0000

Did you miss our previous article…
https://www.biloxinewsevents.com/lifting-sins-burden/

Advertisement

Magnolia Tribune

Staring mortality in the face at Christmas

Published

on

My friend Jarrod is dying after an eight year battle with cancer. He’s lived a life worth celebrating, one that has drawn people to Christ.

I was going about my business this when I received a text that stopped me in my tracks. A college friend was being moved to hospice care.

Jarrod Egley was diagnosed with colorectal cancer in early 2017. In the fall of 2018, tests revealed the cancer had spread to his lungs and Jarrod’s cancer was classified as Stage IV.

For almost eight years from the date of the original diagnosis, he’s fought. Through surgeries, radiation, endless rounds and cycles of chemotherapy, and experimental immunotherapies, he’s fought.

Last year, I flew out to California and spent some time with Jarrod and his wife, Emily. We sat outside one night. He acknowledged to me that it was not a question of ‘if’, but ‘when’ the cancer would claim his life. I told him I was sorry, because what else is there to say?

We talked about our faith, about the trials of Job, about Jacob wrestling with God, about Paul’s affliction. But mostly we reflected on our time together in school, on the good things, and the mundane things, that happened since.

Jarrod and I met at Tulane . One Sunday morning in the Spring of my freshman year, I rose from my dorm room bed, dressed, and began walking down Saint Charles Avenue in New Orleans with no particular agenda. I walked until I came across First Baptist Church and the thought flickered in the vacuous recesses of my brain to enter.

Advertisement

Some would say it was a lark. The Calvinist in me says providence. The walk that morning changed the trajectory of my time at Tulane and my life on the whole. Intervarsity Christian Fellowship and the Baptist Collegiate Ministry became central to my life and put me in regular league with Jarrod. I met him first at the BCM and we ultimately ended up attending church together.

Jarrod was a faithful servant on and off campus. He helped organize a group of us that would weekly make our way down to the Esplanade seawall on the backside of the French Quarter to feed the homeless. On Friday nights, he could be found at chapel with a small cadre of students foregoing Bourbon Street for early 2000s worship music.

Jarrod was a loyal friend in those years. Never rude or biting. Not prone to an insult for an easy laugh. Persistently encouraging. An engineering student, his mind worked linearly and was oriented to problem solving. There were never a lot of wasted words — always a lot of deliberative questions when he disagreed or did not understand a point. He exhibited intelligence, empathy, and the kind of moral conviction that sets someone apart.

He also had a wry and dry sense of humor and a penchant for beating people at Madden football. He was fair-to-midland on the ultimate frisbee pitch. Along the way, there were crawfish boils, Mardi Gras outtings, poorly attended Tulane football , and more than a decent amount of wing eating.

Advertisement

After college, I lost touch with Jarrod. He moved back to his home of California. He got married to his college sweetheart, who could not have anticipated her husband’s journey, but has been a steady and constant helpmate throughout. Jarrod became a very successful engineer and a bourbon connoisseur. One of his bucket list trips took him to Kentucky, where he got to meet and became friends with bourbon “Hall of Famer” Freddie Johnson of Buffalo Trace acclaim.

Jarrod at Buffalo Trace Distillery (Spring 2022).

Sitting in his backyard nearly 20 years after graduating from Tulane, I saw many of the same qualities I had grown to admire when we were students together. I saw a husband who doted on and supported Emily’s passions. But I also saw someone whose body had been beaten to hell and back, who was tired, and who, like Jacob, had been wrestling with God. We quickly fell back into friendship, which perhaps is the mark of good friendship.

We all have aspirations in our youth — for the kind of spouse or parent we might be, for what we might accomplish, for what we might experience. Along the way, dreams are satisfied, modified, or they die on the vine. The clock inevitably works against all of us. That night in Oceanside, California, Jarrod, a numbers guy, saw that time was not on his side. He believed, as we all would, that he still had more to give, more impact to be made, and more things to see and experience.

After that , Jarrod and I stayed in touch, most frequently triggered by news of his cancer. It has been mostly the bad variety in recent months. Now spread throughout his body, down to his bones, he has lived in constant pain for months. Not even a steady diet of morphine and an implanted pain pump solve for it. Jarrod’s been hospitalized twelve times just in 2023.

But his matter of fact sense of humor and way of seeing the world remains in tact. So too does his faith that despite these trials, he has always been safe in the hands of Christ.

Advertisement

There are people in the world who believe that life is random, disordered, and without reason. I am not among them. I think my friend is staring mortality in the face at Christmas for a reason.

For thousands of years before Christ came, there was darkness and despair. Sin and shame gripped the hearts of . Until one holy night, God, in His infinite love, mercy and wisdom, sent His son to save. Jesus is the light of the world and the hope of man. He has won victory over and Jarrod’s will not be the exception. Jesus came for Jarrod, and for you.

For thousands of years since Jesus’s death, burial, and resurrection, His disciples have been used as divine instruments to point the way to God. Jarrod is among them. If life expectancies were the measure, Jarrod would be at the midway point for most people. He’s made a lifetime of impact for the Kingdom and on other people.

So, to my friend Jarrod, you were placed here with a purpose. You have run your race. You are loved. And when this chapter closes, you will hear “well done, my good and faithful servant.” There is no greater evidence of a life well lived.

Advertisement

While Jarrod and Emily have been fortunate to have insurance, their portion of the medical bills so far in 2023 have eclipsed $30,000, and Emily is facing additional uncovered expenses during Jarrod’s hospice care, a night nurse that costs over $400 a night. If you would like to defray the cost, a contribution can be made at their Go Fund Me page.

The post Staring mortality in the face at Christmas appeared first on Magnolia Tribune.

Advertisement

Read More

By: Russ Latino
Title: Staring mortality in the face at Christmas

Published Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2023 15:05:22 +0000

Did you miss our previous article…
https://www.biloxinewsevents.com/magnolia-mornings-december-15-2023/

Advertisement
Continue Reading

Magnolia Tribune

Magnolia Mornings: December 15, 2023

Published

on

Important state and national stories, market and business news, sports and entertainment, delivered in quick-hit fashion to start your day informed.

In Mississippi

1. Laurin St. Pe’ named CEO of Singing River Health System

Laurin St. Pe

The Board of Trustees of System announced the immediate appointment of Laurin St. Pe’ as the Chief Executive Officer on Thursday.

“We are thrilled to announce Laurin St. Pe as the new CEO of Singing River,” said Steve Ates, Board President in a statement. “His wealth of healthcare experience and proven track record make him the ideal leader to steer our health system toward its next phase of growth and success.”

St. Pe’, who has been serving as Interim CEO since July 2023, said he is honored to assume the role of CEO at Singing River. He has worked at Singing River as Administrator of Singing River Health System’s Pascagoula Hospital and Gulfport Hospital, in addition to overseeing program service lines throughout the entire system to his subsequent appointment as Chief Operating Officer of Singing River.

The health system says St. Pe played a crucial role in the financial revitalization of Singing River Health System while steering the organization toward financial stability.

2. Gulfport-Biloxi airport, Stennis evacuated after threats

The Gulfport- International Airport was evacuated on Thursday morning “out of an abundance of caution,” airport officials said, after receiving an emailed threat to certain transportation entities across the .

The airport was thoroughly security swept, cleared and reopened in just over two hours. Gulfport-Biloxi is now operating regularly.

Advertisement

The threat was also sent to Stennis International Airport. Their staff and personnel were also evacuated until the facilities could be swept and cleared.

Any passenger whose travel was affected by the evacuation is encouraged to contact their respective air carrier.

3. Cassidy arrested in Iowa for beheading Satanic Temple statue

Former Mississippi congressional and legislative candidate Michael Cassidy was arrested this week in Iowa for beheading a statue at the state’s Capitol erected by The Satanic Temple.

Cassidy reportedly decapitated the statue and turned himself to police on Thursday. He was charged with fourth degree criminal mischief. He then started an online legal defense fund where he’s raised upwards of $20,000 as of Thursday night, according to his X account.

Advertisement

4. “Serial fraudster” ordered to cease offering investments into companies

According to the Mississippi Secretary of State’s office, on October 26, 2023, Secretary Michael Watson and the Securities Division issued an order against Stephone N. Patton. The SOS says Patton is a serial fraudster with multiple criminal convictions in Mississippi and Florida.

Through business filings with the SEC and Mississippi, Patton has held himself to be the CEO of various companies, including Star Oil and Gas Company, Inc., North Gulf Energy Corporation, Inc., Patton Oilfield Services, Inc., and Patton Farms, LLC.

The SOS says using these business filings and company websites, Patton claimed to have raised hundreds of billions of dollars through investment opportunities. Through investigative efforts and collaboration with the SEC, the SOS discovered none of Patton’s companies are operational, have any assets, or generate any revenues. Account records show Patton spent investors’ funds almost as soon as he received them on personal expenses. The total amount of known investments made to Patton’s fraudulent companies is over $80,000. Further, none of Patton’s investment offerings have been registered or notice filed with the Mississippi Secretary of State’s Office.

The SOS order requires Patton to cease and desist from offering investments with his companies, requiring Patton to permanently deactivate his companies’ websites to prevent any further dissemination of his false or misleading information. Patton is also ordered to pay an administrative penalty of $25,000 to the Mississippi Secretary of State’s Office for these violations, in addition to restitution owed to all his Mississippi investors.

Advertisement

National News & Foreign Policy

1. Congressional retirements mounting as 2024 election cycle nears

Retirement and departure announcements are piling up ahead of the start to the 2024 election cycle. The New York Times has developed a Retirement Tracker that currently shows 22 Democrats and 11 Republicans who are in Congress now will not be seeking re-election next year.

“Dozens of members of Congress have announced plans to their seats in the House of Representatives, setting a rapid pace for congressional departures, with more expected as the 2024 election draws closer,” the NY Times reports. “Given Republicans’ razor-thin House majority, the wave of exits has the potential to lead to a significant shake-up next year.”

You can find the tracker here.

2. Texas, Daily Wire, The Federalist sue U.S. State Department over media censorship

The U.S. State Department’s Global Engagement Center has come under fire as Texas Ken Paxton along with The Daily Wire and The Federalist have filed a federal lawsuit alleging that the department funded technology that could “render disfavored press outlets unprofitable.” They claim that the department has helped social – Facebook, YouTube and X (formerly Twitter) – to censor free speech while funding technologies used to censor right-leaning outlets such as theirs.

New Civil Liberties Alliance is representing The Daily Wire and The Federalist. Paxton and the outlets claim the Global Disinformation Index (GDI), a British think tank, received a $100,000 grant from the State Department in 2021, and NewsGuard, which rates the “misinformation” levels of news outlets, received $25,000 from the State Department in 2020, according to the lawsuit.

According to the State Department’s website, the Global Engagement Center’s mission is to direct, lead, synchronize, integrate, and coordinate U.S. Federal Government efforts to recognize, understand, expose, and counter foreign state and non-state propaganda and disinformation efforts aimed at undermining or influencing the policies, security, or stability of the United States, its allies, and partner nations.

Advertisement

As reported by Reuters, the lawsuit cited a GDI-produced list from December 2022 that ranked The Daily Wire and The Federalist as among the 10 “riskiest sites” for news while the least-risky included The New York Times, Associated Press and NPR. Reuters notes that the lawsuit alleges such “blacklists” are reducing revenues to The Daily Wire and The Federalist along with their visibility on social media and ranking results from browser searches.

Sports & Entertainment

1. SEC releases 2024 schedules

Wednesday evening, the Southeastern Conference released the 2024 football schedules for its member schools, including of interest in the Magnolia State the schedules for Ole Miss and Mississippi State.

It is the first schedule that includes new conference members of Oklahoma and University of Texas, bringing the conference to 16 schools. Each SEC team will play eight conference football games plus at least one required opponent from the ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac 12 or major independent, each team will have two open dates.

The 2024 season will be the first year the SEC will play a schedule without divisional competition since 1991. The top two teams in the league standings based on winning percentage will play in the 33rd SEC Football Championship Game in Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta on Saturday, December 7.

2. White, Jesiolowski, Jones honored by MAIS

John White

The Midsouth Association of Independent Schools (MAIS) in Mississippi, comprised of non-, announced this week that Madison-Ridgeland Academy’s senior quarterback John White was named the 6A Player of the Year while Hartfield’s Reed Jesiolowski and Hartfield Chris Jones were named the MAIS 6A Offensive and Defensive Players of the Year, respectively.

All three have committed to play college football at the University of Mississippi.

Advertisement

White is Mississippi’s all-time leader in career passing yards with 15,259 yards, a record he broke during the 2023 season.

MAIS, like the Mississippi High School Activities Association (MHSAA) for public schools, is broken down into classifications, from 1A to 6A. However, MHSAA added a 7A this season.

Markets & Business

1. Consumer retail sales up as energy, gas prices move down

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported this week that the Consumer Price Index rose 0.1% in November after being unchanged in October. Retail sales rose 0.3% in November after rising 0.2% in October, meaning consumers continue to spend at the start of the holiday season.

The CPI or inflation rate is 3.1%, higher than the Federal Reserve target of 2% but below the 9% peak in 2022 which reached a 40-year high.

As for the energy index, BLS reported that it fell 2.3% in November after decreasing 2.5% in October. The gasoline index decreased 6% in November, following a 5% decrease in the previous month.

Advertisement

The index for fuel oil fell in November, decreasing 2.7%. However, the natural gas index rose 2.8% over the month after rising 1.2% the previous month. The index for electricity also rose 1.4% in November, after increasing 0.3% in October.

The energy index fell 5.4% over the past 12 months. The gasoline index decreased 8.9%, the natural gas index declined 10.4%, and the fuel oil index fell 24.8% over this 12-month span.

2. Week’s market rally continues into Friday

At close of trading on Thursday, the U.S. markets continued the week’s rally, pushing the Dow up 158 points to 37,248 while the Nasdaq and S&P also made gains, 27 points and 12 points, respectively, to close at 14,761 and 4,719.

The record high for the Dow on Thursday moved futures up 102 points.

Advertisement

According to CNBC, the major averages are headed for their seventh straight positive week. As of Thursday, the Dow is higher on the week by 2.8%. The S&P 500 is up by 2.5%, while the Nasdaq Composite rose 2.5% this week.

Stocks rallied after the Federal Reserve left rates unchanged this week while members look towards cuts in the new year and beyond.

The post Magnolia Mornings: December 15, 2023 appeared first on Magnolia Tribune.

Advertisement

Read More

By: Magnolia Tribune
Title: Magnolia Mornings: December 15, 2023

Published Date: Fri, 15 Dec 2023 13:00:00 +0000

Advertisement
Continue Reading

Magnolia Tribune

New water rates expected in Jackson come 2024; those who don’t pay face shut off

Published

on

Interim Third-Party Director Ted Henifin said this week that only about 59% of the City of Jackson’s water customers are paying their bills.

JXN has announced new rates and fees coming in 2024. Those who are not paying will be at risk of shut offs.

The company, which was established by federal appointed interim Third-Party Director Ted Henifin, has been overseeing the ‘s water system for the better part of a year.

estimated that the average cost for water in the city was $76 per month for . Henifin clarified that JXN water will not attempt to recoup any charges prior to November 29, 2022, and will work with those who have failed to pay since that time.

He said only about 59 percent of the city’s water customers are paying their bills.

“You can’t forgive bills, so we have to be creative in how we part that,” said Henifin in reference to Mississippi’s laws that prevent giving away water.

Advertisement

According to a release by JXN Water announcing the rate changes, residents in single family households with small meters that use up to 748 would see a bill increase of roughly .30 cents per day. Research indicates that the average U.S. family uses 300 gallons per day.

SNAP customers will have a new rate tier that could lower their bill by up to .69 cents per day, on average.

“Those who need to save the most benefit from saving money by drinking tap water. This new rate structure makes water affordability possible for 12,500 JXN Water customers who receive SNAP benefits,” said Henifin in the release.

Read more about the anticipated rate changes here.

New fees will also be implemented, a new service fee of $50, service deposit of $100, returned check fee of $25, service restoration fee of $100, and meter tampering charge of $500. 

JXN Water has continued to encourage residents to use the water, with Henifin going on the record in a federal status hearing saying that the water “was safe to drink.”

Advertisement

More conversation regarding the billing is expected to at next week’s City Council meeting.

The post New water rates expected in Jackson come 2024; those who don’t pay face shut off appeared first on Magnolia Tribune.

Read More

Advertisement

By: Sarah Ulmer
Title: New water rates expected in Jackson come 2024; those who don’t pay face shut off

Published Date: Fri, 15 Dec 2023 20:00:00 +0000

Continue Reading

Trending