This Family Business

My Painterly Sister Weatherly

New work by Weatherly Stroh
New work by Weatherly Stroh

Spring’s half sprung! And it’s full of artistry. Never a drab moment spending it with family members as talented as this.

 

In Middleburg

The artist Weatherly Stroh was back in Middleburg this week, exhibiting her new work at Middleburg Common Grounds and visiting Uncle Gari Melchers’s studio at Belmont. I feel very lucky to have put a red dot on this painting of a hound just picking up the scent.

The equine sculptor Susanne Stroh, my stepmother, showed equally beautiful work.

my sister the painter Weatherly Melchers Stroh
my sister the painter Weatherly Melchers Stroh

Come visit us in the Virginia countryside and check out Susie’s bronzes and Weatherly’s latest series of animal portraits and hunt country landscapes, with settings in Metamora and Ocala.

 

 

 

 

Near Fredericksburg

It’s also the best time of the year to spend time sketching in the garden, strolling through the gallery or writing in the gazebo above the Rappahannock at Belmont.

images-10
Belmont, house and studio of Gari Melchers near Fredericksburg, Virginia

images-11

Self portrait by Uncle Gari
Self portrait by Uncle Gari

Fredericksburg is always closer than you think.

images-12
Virginia in springtime by the American Impressionist, Gari Melchers (1860-1932)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Munnings in Middleburg

And then there’s the Alfred Munnings exhibition happening at the National Sporting Library Museum. Dozens of really gorgeous paintings by my favorite equestrian painter of all time. Many of them are masterpieces from from private collections. Honestly: it’s worth the trip.

Sir Alfred Munnings (1878-1959)
Sir Alfred Munnings (1878-1959)
images-8
To my eye, Munnings’ old fashioned, elegant, painterly style embodies the best of two ways of seeing horses in the landscape: impressionistic and anatomical
With a feature film produced in 2012, award-winning screenwriter Suzanne Stroh’s period drama Scotch Verdict is in development at London’s Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. Suzanne hails from Michigan, where her family brewed Stroh’s beer for five generations. She lives with her family in the Virginia countryside.