A life of art, blessings

    With the season of Thanksgiving fast approaching, Evelyn Matthies has a lot for which to be thankful. Her smile and laughter is abundant despite the fact that due to a heart condition, her heart has stopped several times in the past few years even with the help of a pacemaker. She now appreciates life more than ever. “I’ve had a very good life!” Evelyn proudly claims. “A person can adjust with the right attitude.” Both she and her husband, Bill, are retired teachers, but they have continued on with the other careers they have held through their 56 years of marriage (Bill, a professional scuba diver, will be featured in the December issue of the Senior Perspective). Today, Evelyn, a former art teacher, has two art studios in Brainerd, a city that has been the Matthies family home for 53 years. Her Porthole Gallery is located in the same building as the Minnesota School of Diving, the business which she and Bill are co-owners. She sponsors up to eight artists a year in this gallery who display their works for an extended time. “The artists have to be qualified in order to be sponsored and they should have at least 40 works of art,” Evelyn said. “Many of them have been my students.” Evelyn’s art work is displayed at her second gallery and studio, Studio II, which she opened in 2006 in the Franklin Arts Center, the former junior high school.  The art center rents space to a variety of artists in painting, photography, pottery, printing, woodcarving, stain glass, weaving, knitting, sewing, jewelry making and more. This is where she paints and instructs up to 12 students per year from 9 years of age to 92 years old. She has had showings in other galleries and entered many juried art shows which have earned her many awards. She also has judged many shows. Evelyn creates works of art with watercolor, acrylic paints, water-based markers, and bottled ink. She used to paint with oils, but due to allergic reactions, she no longer can. Her love of art has caused health issues that originated when art teachers were not aware of toxins that can affect their health. “In the earlier years we were exposed to asbestos that was used in paints and inks and the lead used in ceramic glazes,” Evelyn explained. “Also, the exhaust systems in the art rooms didn’t bring in fresh air so my lung capacity has been reduced.” She tries to avoid strong cleaners, fumes from new carpeting, and other items with strong odors. Both she and Bill were born and raised in Albert Lea where they became high school sweethearts in the ninth grade. As a child, Evelyn always liked to draw or paint. “I drew birds and flowers and I made dancers of the hollyhock flowers that grew by our house,” she remembered. “My mother, who was a first grade teacher, saved everything that I made and I still have them today.” But she also liked music and sang in the school choir, played the clarinet in the band, and took piano lessons starting at the age of five. Following her high school graduation in 1954, Evelyn enrolled at Mankato State University where she earned a degree in elementary education. She took her first art class in college. She and Bill moved to Brainerd in 1959 where they accepted teaching positions – Bill as a math teacher and Evelyn as an art teacher at the high school. She taught there for three years followed by a year as a teacher at the Baxter Elementary School. In 1966, she was hired as an art instructor at Brainerd Junior College, now known as the Central Lakes Community College, a position she held for 30 years. During this time she earned a master’s degree in art education. She retired in 1996 due to the allergies she was experiencing from the certain toxic art supplies. Looking back at her years of teaching, Evelyn remembers when women teachers were not allowed to wear slacks in the classroom. But as an art teacher, she said wearing a dress was difficult when straddling the bench of a potter’s wheel. “So I brought the president of the college into the ceramic classroom and asked if I had to wear a dress,” Evelyn laughed. To her relief, she was given permission to wear slacks when working with pottery. Through the years, she taught over 8,000 students and organized and led several art study tours to Europe with college students. In 1993 she received a Bush Grant that she used during a sabbatical for the purpose of studying and painting scenes along the Mississippi River over a three-month period. She authored the book, Images of the Mississippi River and Other Locations. The book includes 35 paintings and prints of the river from the headwaters to Little Falls, and other places in the world that Evelyn has visited. She wrote about her research that includes the botany and ecology of the area she studied and painted. Both she and Bill are licensed pilots, which allowed her to pilot her own plane to do research and take photos of the river for her book. “When I was learning to fly, I often followed the Mississippi, using it as a highway from the sky,” she stated in the book. In describing her painting, she wrote in her book, “When I paint, I am totally caught up in the visual impact of the objects, landscapes or people that become the subject matter. Rather than catching a fish as I sit by the water, I catch an effect as I paint on canvas. . . Whether it is a tree, a mountain, a building, or a boat, the challenge of how to organize the site is always foremost in my mind. I often decide to forget all subsequent theories of art and do the painting the way I feel about the setting at the time. This direct approach is exhilarating and refreshing!” She illustrated three poetry books written by her good friend, Maxine Kaiser Russell, a Minnesota Poet Laureate from Brainerd, who died in June at the age of 100. During her teaching career, Evelyn shared her artistic talents that included painting sets for the community theatre or helping with many other art events in the community. She founded the Minnesota Community College Fine Arts Festival for college students held annually in the community colleges in Minnesota. In addition to organizing nine art study trips to Europe for students, Evelyn has also visited Denmark, the country of her heritage where she has researched the genealogy of her family. Due to the interest in her ancestry, she is a co-founder of the Danish Sisterhood Amber Lodge in Brainerd. The national sisterhood was established in the 1800s to help Danish immigrants with financial aid and social issues. Today, the lodge helps descendants connect with their heritage. “My grandparents came from Denmark and my grandmother started an internationally known art colony in Jutland, Denmark,” Evelyn shared. “She was thought of so highly that I was treated like royalty when I visited Jutland.” Bill and Evelyn raised three children – son, James, and wife Melissa, have three children and live in Mankato; daughter, Jane, and husband Keith, and their son, make their home in Alaska; son, Todd, and Darlene, and daughter live in Brainerd. They have one great-grandson. Since her retirement, Evelyn active lifestyle has slowed down slightly. In the summer of 2000, she fell and severely fractured her right elbow that required a metal plate, six metal screws, and months of physical therapy. Due to her intolerance to many drugs stemming from the art classroom, ice was her only pain reliever. “I was afraid I’d never be able to hold a paint brush or pen again,” she recalled. “But, thankfully, now I can.” The usage of her right arm has decreased by 20% as it is slightly shorter. Due to a heart condition discovered several years ago, Evelyn’s ventures from home are limited to about five hours at a time as she needs the data from the pacemaker transmitted to a “Merlin” transmitter, a medical device in her home which sends the information to cardiology experts via a phone line even while she sleeps. Evelyn said she is now a “case study” since she cannot take nitro glycerin or any other medications for her heart. With her heart having stopped several times, even with the pacemaker, Evelyn said that at least twice she knew she was close to death. “It’s hard to explain, but a couple times I had a very peaceful feeling,” she said with a smile. “I wasn’t afraid. I was very relaxed and happy. I guess you just have to have the right attitude.” With a strong faith, she added with laughter, “It’s me and the good Lord! Why do I need Merlin? I’m ready, I feel good and I have no qualms.” But her paint brushes haven’t been put away yet.

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