"Big Red Barn," oil on linen by Val Lyle of Bristol, Tenn., was recently purchased for the MeadowView Convention Center in Kingsport, Tenn.
ABINGDON, VA – William King Museum: Center for Art and Cultural Heritage, in historic Abingdon, invites visitors to look inside an artist's workspace.
Val Lyle, one of three artists currently working on-site, keeps a studio on the third floor. Visitors are welcome to explore her working studio which currently features many works in progress as well as completed works in a variety of media, and interact with the artist herself. She has original works, note cards, prints, and her newest catalog for sale in her studio and in the Looking Glass Museum Store. Lyle's studio is open regular museum hours (Tuesday from 10-9, Wednesday-Friday 10-5, and Saturday-Sunday 1-5).
Lyle, an adjunct professor of art and lecturer at Southwest Virginia Community College for the past 11 years, engages in social activism and promoting the arts. As a working artist, educator, and published writer she has a long list of accomplishments under her belt. The Johnson City native received her BFA from Ringling College of Art and Design with an emphasis on sculpture and printmaking. She continued her education at East Tennessee State University, earning her MFA with an emphasis in ceramic sculpture. After spending time creating and exhibiting art in New York City, Lyle returned to her Southwest Virginia roots to continue promoting the arts.
Lyle was recently granted funds by the Tennessee Arts Commission to write and publish a catalog entitled "These Truths: The Brutal Tenderness of Appalachia". This catalog showcases her current body of work while examining the path that brought her there.
Lyle's current traveling body of work, "Sanctuary," will be in its eighth incarnation this fall at The Turchin Center for the Visual Arts at Appalachian State University, Boone, N.C. Each exhibition includes major new works designed especially for the environment they are displayed in. Lyle's work is in museum, corporate, and private collections, and she has public sculpture currently installed in bronze, ceramics, and fiber.
