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Show 'Mindscapes' Reveal Artist's Expression Of Innermost Fantasies "Mindscapes" she calls them. The lovely paintings, executed in oils or watercolors, are scattered among the many paintings she has done at the Three Gables Gallery in Panguitch. Like every artist, Mabel Fischer has her favorites. Her "Mindscapes", she says, are the expression of her innermost fantasies and are meant to reveal a spiritual, ethereal mood. She describes them as "rhythmic and unstructured" and claims they are a way of fully expressing the artist's soul, often only understood by those who can respond with a similar sensitivity. As with most impressionistic paintings, however, they still have great appeal even though they may not be fully comprehended, for their beauty lies as much in their unique shapes and vibrant colors as in their almost hidden meaning. With her skills not limited to impressionistic painting, she also finds expression in landscapes, still life and pen drawings as well in other arts and crafts. Here in Panguitch she feels she has finally come full circle, going from childhood in a rural area to many years spent in large cities and back again to a more rural life. Reared on a farm in Hosmer, South Dakota, she attended the traditional one-room school with all eight grades learning together. The peaceful rural setting nourished her sensitive nature. An only child until she was 13, she was also the only girl in school. She loved to read, and with no library nearby, she ordered her books by mail order from the South Dakota State Library. Books opened her eyes to a whole new world and she says she "could hardly wait to get off the farm," With times hard and paper costly, her mother ordered free wallpaper catalogs and from these she created some of her first artistic attempts. When she was 13, at confirmation exercises into the Lutheran church, her godparents gave her a dollar with which she purchased her first box of oil paints, using old window shades as canvas. She married a "city slicker" and moved to the big city Aberdeen, South Dakota where she continued her interest in art. She took art classes as she could and, after her two children were born, did most of her painting at 2 a.m. while they were sleeping. After moving to Denver, she worked for a year and a half with a puppet theater and then taught arts and crafts at the Inner City Parish, a church converted to a special school for inner city minorities. In Denver she was inspired to earn her high school diploma by Emily Griffith, a school teacher who had used her life savings to found the "School of Opportunity." Determined to attend college, she bagan at the "University Without Walls" in Denver where she was able to obtain credit for much of her life experience and achieved the equivalent of two years credit before going on to new pursuits. As a summer project she taught art at the Mexican Center in Denver where she helped to instill pride in their heritage in the first through sixth graders. She was the only teacher in the school whose heritage was not Mexican. She also taught at Salvio House, founding an arts and crafts program at the school for delinquent boys. During the summer for several years she taught at MAD (Music-Art-Drama), a summer camp sponsored by the Presbyterian Church in Denver. Meantime, her art career was moving along, with shows in Denver at banks, restaurants, libraries and even along the sidewalks. Finally, her work was accpted at galleries there and then , she took her portfolio to Taos, New Mexico, a popular artists' colony, renowned in the West as an art center with its more than 40 art galleries. Back in Colorado, she subsequently divorced, later taking up folk dancing at which she became a skilled performer. It was while performing that she met and married Bob Demint, also a proficient folk dancer. Demint was soon to retire as a government chemist, and with a successful career behind him, he was eager to help his new wife Dursue her career in art. A gallery. of her own had long been her dream, and with a new husband to help, the dream soon became a reality. Bob remembered backpacking in Utah where many beautiful old homes were available. Previously reluctant to retire and face a life with little challenge, he now looked forward to a new and interesting career in a new part of the country. Built as a pioneer home in 1890, the Three Gables Gallery now rivals, the works of arts it houses. Bob and Mabel have spent the years since 1974 renovating its Interior and sprucing up its outside. Beautiful flowers in typically old-fashioned flower beds abound each summer, setting off the lovely old hand made brick home with its spanking white trim. Claus Harp, a Danish cobbler, built the home and practiced his trade on the premises. The Reid family who bought and enlarged the house were tilers of the soil. Molly Reid, the mother, is fondly remembered by Panguitch residents as the midwife who delivered some 300 babies. Mabel and Bob believe that the spirit of these early Mormon pioneers permeate the rooms and are an inspiration to self-suffiency, "reinforcing our beliefs that the industrialization of the world has revived a desire for the personal touch attached to the handcrafted arts." ' They have dedicated themselved "to deal strictly with hand made art ob jects and original paintings, carrying on the tradition of the Mormon ' pioneers." The two have found that travelers love the charm of Panguitch as much ' as they themselves love the tourists who bring something of every country Into the old home each summer. Last winter, the two arts and crafts lovers wintered in San Miguel, Mexico , where Mabel studied more life ' drawing, advanced design and pre- ' Columbian art. Bob learned to "hand build" pottery, ' using no potters wheel, but simply 1 rolling out the clay which is then coiled , or pressed into molds much as the ancients worked. Ever the chemist, Bob has been J experimenting with a .variety of glazing technique's and the two artisans have : blended their talents well. If, on rare occasions their artistic temperments i clash a bit, the tension eases quickly i because of their motivation to work to gether and try something new, to discover all that is interesting and beautiful about the world around them, i The world around them in Panguitch , abounds in color and beauty, and the challenging tones of Bryce Canyon National Park, Red Canyon and the brilliant colors found throughout the J county were soon mastered by Mabel , who has learned what the tourists like to buy to remember their visit to one of the nation's most attractive areas. ' Bob, in addition to creating his own ceramics, mats and frames Mabel's paintings. He also does all the ' bookkeeping for the talented pair. His ! ceramic specialty is "neriage" which ( mixes different colors of clay right on the potters wheel. Often his white clay and white glaze combinations are colorfully painted by Mabel. Years ago when her first painting ' sold, Mabel was delighted to get a substantial price and she just knew that she was on her way as an artist. A later rejection left her unable to paint for many months and when she did paint, she worried - "Will it sell?" She ' Anally learned a valuable lesson, though, and is no longer troubled by the thought. Now she paints for herself, to ! satisfy her own internal guide and doesn't worry. Sooner or later it will sell, she has found, because she has painted what the artist inside her has ' decreed. "It's difficult," she says, "to sell my own paintings. I'm too emotionally connected to them." Better, she says, that someone else does it. Their objective approach does a . much better selling job. Sometimes, for a while, when it is too difficult to part with a particular favorite, she will ' price it abnormally high just to keep it around for a while. Their gallery is still open this winter, and the cold weather which keeps them inside more, means that, come summer, the walls and display tables will be covered with their artistic new creations which have evolved over the long winter hours. On U.S. 89 at the North end of Panguitch, Mabel Fischer and Bob Demint welcome the art lovers, the travelers, the pioneer hl3tory addicts to ' their beautiful Three Gables Gallery. They also love to have their neighbors just drip in; they're beginning to feel they belong in Panguitch now after ! eight years of becoming acquainted with the Garfield County area. The J friendly old house beams "welcome" to , everyone and its charming, talented and interesting new owners would t make its builder proud. Talented artist, Mabel Fischer, stands beside one of her paintings a "mindscape." Along with her hus band, Bob Demint, the two creative people are proprietors of the Three Gables Gallery. |