Special September Exhibit

"This Land is Your Land: 30 Vintage Landscapes of America the Beautiful"

Six Days Only. September 9, 10, 11, 16, 17, 18 Thursday and Fridays 12 - 5

Saturdays 10 - 5. Admission is free.

Hot Tamale Antiques Store, Aledo, Texas. 15 minutes west of Ft. Worth

Call for easy directions. (817) 291-3952

For Immediate Release

Hot Tamale Antiques

P.O. Box 930

Aledo, TX 76008

(817) 291-3952

JanOH4@aol.com

www.HotTamaleAntiques.com

Art Exhibit Honors America the Beautiful at Hot Tamale Antiques-Aledo

8/26/04 For six days in September, Hot Tamale Antiques of Aledo will offer a free art exhibit entitled This Land is Your Land: 30 Vintage Landscapes of America the Beautiful. "With the country so divided over the election," says shop owner Jan Orr-Harter, "this artwork invites us to step back and see the bigger picture of what unites us." The show will run Thursday, Sept. 9 and Friday, Sept. 10 from 12-5 pm and on Sat. Sept. 11 from 10-5, running again the following week on Sept. 16, 17, 18 at the same hours at Hot Tamale Antiques on Jenkins Road, Aledo.

Each of the 30 landscapes presents a view of America through the eyes of an artist in the early decades of the 20^th century. The exhibit ranges from a panoramic photo from a T. P. Railway

Station in its original 1910 mission oak frame to a 1950's "color-by-number" landscape in a frame decorated with soda bottle caps. Some works were created by trained artists, others by amateur "Sunday artists" and still others by folk painters expressing their love of the land from the heart.

"This Land is Your Land" covers the broad scope of America's countryside, including mountains, deserts, Texas bluebonnets and even a New England scene portrayed in yarn on a hooked rug. Several selections come under the heading of "souvenir art," briskly painted scenes that depict a destination that the early tourist sometimes observed while the artist worked. Some of these come from Montana and are painted directly on slabs of tree trunk. Others come from Colorado and New York state, including a wide view that would have just barely fit into the back of the model T Ford that probably drove it home.

One landscape hung for decades in one of Aledo's oldest homes. The lucky person who guesses which one it is will get to take it home! And, of course no exhibit would be complete without views of the Grand Canyon, which will range from a wide-angle early colorized photo to a large vividly colored oil by a child's hand. Seen altogether, the 30 landscapes inspire and humble and help put the human presence in a larger context. At the same time, each work celebrates the individual American who left behind this tangible memory and interpretation of America's meaning to them.

The exhibit runs concurrently with the Fall Unloading Sale at Hot Tamale Antiques which presents 150 new discoveries in American antiques. All Artwork is also for sale. As a memorial on Sept. 11, a portion of all sales that day will benefit the Children's Department of the East Parker County Library. Hot Tamale Antiques is located in the A.J. Hood pioneer home on Jenkins Road in Aledo, TX, just 15 minutes west of Ft. Worth. Admission is free. Refreshments will be served. For easy directions, call (817) 291-3952. For more information, see www.HotTamaleAntiques.com

Pictured: Original Artwork in the exhibit, "A Tree Grows at the Grand Canyon"