David Davenport & Gerry O’Neill Artist Talk - August 22 @2pm
Join us on Saturday, August 22nd at 2pm for an artist talk with David Davenport and Gerry O’Neill. They will discuss their work in Sense of Place and their artistic practices at large.
Sense of Place brings together the work of David Davenport and Gerry O’Neill, two painters whose landscapes are shaped by memory, observation, and a lasting connection to the places that define us. Through scenes drawn from rural roads, quiet structures, open fields, and shifting light, both artists reflect on the ways ordinary landscapes can hold beauty, memory, and a deeper sense of belonging within the world around us.
David Davenport draws inspiration from the rural landscapes of eastern North Carolina, returning frequently to houses, barns, and abandoned structures at different times of day and across the seasons to observe the changing play of light and shadow. “I have always been fascinated by the stories and mysteries stored within these weathered, ark-like structures,” he says. Davenport makes sketches and paints in the field, revisiting the same subjects throughout the year before refining the work in the studio. He describes his process as combining “memories, imagination, and photographs to capture the essence of the subjects,” balancing careful observation with a distilled sense of atmosphere and place. His use of crisp lines, bright color, and smooth surfaces instills familiar rural scenes with a quiet warmth and luminous presence, transforming everyday structures and landscapes into meditations on light, memory, and time.
After a career as an illustrator, Gerry O’Neill turned his focus toward landscape painting, bringing with him a keen sense of composition and visual storytelling. His work is informed by decades of exploring the backroads and changing landscapes of North Carolina and beyond, an interest that began in childhood during regular trips from suburban Maryland to West Virginia. Nearly twenty years ago O’Neill started painting en plein air, creating studies and photographs while working directly in the landscape. Some of these early images have stayed with him over the years, drawing him back to places where a particular light, atmosphere, or memory left a lasting impression. Revisiting them allows him to return to familiar subjects with the insight and sensitivity developed through years of painting. “It might be a glimpse of a line of trees, or the way light hits the side of a shed that compels me to engage with that place in paint,” he says. Through painterly brushwork and an intuitive response to atmosphere and light, O’Neill seeks to convey the experience of being present in a place and forming a deeper connection with the landscape.
