Provided

This painting is part of Victoria Platt Ellis’s “Scheherazade: 1001 Stories” art show, featured at Art Central Gallery.

Victoria Platt Ellis is Art Central Gallery’s “Artist of the Month” for April. She is one of the founding members of our co-op gallery located in downtown Summerville, as well as a co-owner of Ellis-Nicholson Gallery, which is located at 1.5 Broad St. in downtown Charleston.

Q: Tell us about the title of your show at Art Central for the month of April? What does it mean to you?

Ellis: The title is “Scheherazade: 1001 Stories.” I got the idea when my husband (who likes Rimsky Korsokoff music) played the “Scheherazade” piece (pronounced sh?-her-?-zäd) for me. Scheherazade was the fictional wife of a sultan and the narrator of the tales of the Arabian Nights. My husband told me that she kept herself alive by continuously telling stories to her murderous husband. It intrigued me and wouldn’t leave me alone...and so came the idea of using it in conjunction with my work!

Q: So you decided to tie your paintings to stories…did I capture that right? Tell us about all that.

Ellis: Yes. Possibly I can explain it by telling you about the first piece and its own story. Earlier this Spring, Art Central’s artists were collectively working on a “painting animals” project in order to raise funds for the SPCA, and my piece turned out to be a watercolor of beagle puppies all huddled together in a peach basket. Now, here’s my “story” part: I own 6 siblings. In the spring of 1991, our father died. We all sat around his living room,…crying, grieving, reminiscing,…all draped over each other protectively. I remember thinking “we are just like a litter of new-born puppies…each one all wrapped around the next, belonging together…just content and taking strength from each other.” It was a time like…puppies.

Q: Didn’t you start out painting in watercolor and then switch to oils later on? If so, why’d you switch?

Ellis: Actually, I did start in watercolor. At that time, all the local artists were painting in watercolor, even the biggies, like Eva Carter and Rhett Thurman...it was a dream to be selected for the ‘Traveling Show” sponsored by the South Carolina Watercolor Society. Actually, I don’t consider myself a “switcher” because I still do some watercolor pieces. I painted in watercolor for 25 years, and had pushed and pulled it every which way and sort of “gotten to the end of it”. Still wanting to be a painter, I jumped in with oils.

Q: Is there something you haven’t “done” yet as it relates to art and if so, what would you like to do?

Ellis: Travel around and look at what others have done, specifically the Old Masters. (Not pictures in books, but the real stuff...and not just paintings, other art forms too.) And on the other end, I like to see the exciting things youngsters are doing as well.

Q: Looking back over your career, what were some of the highlights? And what do you wish never happened??

Ellis: Largest accolade: being selected by the US State Dept for their ART IN EMBASSASIES program. It was a program whereby selected art was placed in our embassies around the world. (Mine were in our Barbados embassy). Secondly, being asked to be interviewed by the Journal Scene for their “Women in Business” project. Third: Making a painting that says exactly what you wanted it to say. And, as for what I wish never happened?… I wish I had never spilled India ink on the church Bible!

To see Ms. Ellis’s art, visit Art Central Gallery, 130 (Short) Central Ave., Summerville. (871-0297). For additional examples, visit her website at www.victoriaplattellis.com. For information about purchasing $10 tickets to Art Central Gallery’s 2009 Open Studio Tour (when seven artists, including Ms. Ellis, will open their studios to the public on April 18), gallery directions, or other 2009 gallery events (including Art Walks every third Thursday), visit www.artcgalleryltd.com.

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