Newspaper Page Text
Nick Bowman Features Editor | 770-718-3426 | life@gainesvilletimes.com
She (Times
gainesvilletimes.com
Monday, November 12, 2018
Capturing
movement
& awards
Meet Gainesville artist Ann Goble, known
tor her oil paintings of horses, shorebirds
Ann Goble works on a painting of whimbrels Thursday, Nov. 8, at Blue
Angel Studio in Gainesville.
BY AMBER TYNER
atyner@gainesvilletimes.com
Thanks to her love of horses, local
artist Ann Goble has accomplished one
of her biggest dreams.
The 57-year-old Gainesville resi
dent recently won an Animal Award of
Excellence for an equine painting she
submitted to the 2018 Oil Painters of
America Eastern Regional Exhibition.
“It’s always been my dream to be in
one of their shows,” she said about the
Oil Painters of America. “That particu
lar show is always the one that you want
to strive for. I’m really fortunate that I
was able to achieve it.”
Goble is part of the Blue Angel Studio
in Gainesville, and she has been paint
ing for almost 20 years.
“I went into art after my kids had
started grade school, and (I) took
classes at the Quinlan (Visual Arts Cen
ter),” she said, mentioning that she is
a licensed professional counselor by
training. “I had always been involved in
art in some way but really fell in love
with painting through taking classes. ”
She now works mainly in oils, and
most of her paintings reflect pho
tographs she has taken of horses,
though she’s also known for painting
shorebirds.
“I started narrowing my interests in
terms of subject matter and focused on
painting horses,” she said. “And that
was through my daughter’s love of rid
ing. Because she’s been riding since she
was 5 years old, I spent years and years
driving her to lessons and sitting at
the barn and spending all day at horse
shows. I started taking photographs and
really fell in love with the horse form
and the movement.”
She said she’s also been influenced by
her family’s trips to a ranch in Arizona.
“We’ve been going for 20 years,” she
said. “We quickly realized we all loved
being there, and I started taking photo
graphs. So most of my reference mate
rial is from our trips to the ranch.”
She said her inspiration for the win
ning painting, titled “Company of
Three,” came from a picture she took
on her most recent trip.
“That was one of the photographs
that I really loved,” she said. “I made
some changes to it, but what I loved
most about it was one of the horses had
the light from bouncing off the ground,
so a reddish, sandy desert ground gave
an orange reflection on the belly under
neath. And then it was backlit, so the
side shadow was a really bright blue.
Just those colors really grabbed me,
and it was all nature’s beauty.”
Goble said she had the opportunity to
study equine painting in Colorado three
years ago.
“I spent a week at a ranch in south
west Colorado at the foot of the Great
Sand Dunes National Park with artist
Jill Soukup, and we studied painting
horses from life (and) did photoshoots
with the horses at the ranch,” she said.
“At one point she even, on a white
horse with black paint, painted the
bone structure onto the white horse so
that we could study the anatomy. We
sculpted, we drew, we painted, we did
ink sketches. It was just a great expe
rience, and it was a turning point for
me in trying to work on anatomy and
movement.”
To better her skills, Goble said she
tries to be in the studio everyday.
“It’s like anything else — if you don’t
treat it like a job, then you can’t expect
to make big leaps,” she said. “It’s fine
for it to be a hobby. It’s not that it has
to be a job, but if you want to make big
improvements and learn and grow, it
really does require the dedication of
being there everyday.”
And while she’s ecstatic about her
most recent award, it’s not the first time
her hard work has been recognized.
“Last year I was fortunate to be in
the American Impressionist Society
National Exhibition, which was another
show that I always dreamed of being
in,” she said. “The painting that got in
that show was a shorebird painting. And
Women Artists of the West is an orga
nization I have been with for several
years, and when I’m in their show it’s
always an honor.”
Some of Goble’s work is on display at
the Gallery on the Square in Gainesville
and at Wild Hope Art Gallery in Atlanta.
Photos by SCOTT ROGERS I The Times
Ann Goble has been painting for about 20 years and has some of her work at the Gallery on the Square in Gainesville. Most of her
work focuses on horses or shorebirds.
“Company of Three,” by Ann Goble, won an Animal Award of Excellence in the 2018 Oil
Painters of America Eastern Regional Exhibition.
‘What I loved most
about it was one of the
horses had the light from
bouncing off the ground,
so a reddish, sandy desert
ground gave an orange
reflection on the belly
underneath. And then
it was backlit, so the
side shadow was a really
bright blue. Just those
colors really grabbed me,
and it was all nature’s
beauty.’Ann Goble,
artist
