Christina Hammon

The May June Show at the Top Shelf Gallery, The Natural World Exalted, features oil paintings by Christina Hammon. The show opens Wednesday May 6 with an artist's reception from 5-7 p.m..

Hammon's paintings focus on the natural world with vigorous renditions of plants, animals, and rural landscapes on both board and canvas. All are subjects that have attracted her since a childhood spent largely outdoors. "I grew up climbing trees and jumping off cliffs into deep pools of cold water," she says. "Fishing, hunting and hiking were always just 'what we did"".

At four years old, she remembers "stealing my mom's expensive colored pencils " to illustrate little stories. This passion to create "beautiful visual stories" survives, though Hammon now says she "prefers oil paints."

Hammon is self taught and, from an early age, has experimented with different mediums. She cites the American painters N.C. and Andrew Wyeth as inspirations along with Vincent Van Gogh. Her work shares subject matter with the Wyeths and vigorous brush strokes with the French painter.

Her paintings are now quite realistic, but she says that her earlier works sought the spiritual nature of existence and showed an appreciation for Fantasy Art. More recently, Hammon, who is fond of foraging, finds that her work "has been inspired by hikes into woods to gather edible plants and mushrooms."

She sees art as a way of understanding "the relationship between bird and tree, tree and mycelium, mycelium and moss and all of the dances happening between all living beings...What I can see and what I can imagine have become interchangeable."

The Top Shelf Gallery is at Fletcher Memorial Library, 257 Main Street, Hampton. Info at 860-455-1086.