If the artists had never come to Brown County, what would Nashville be today?
A new historic marker on the Village Green prompts residents and passers-by to consider the impact of artists past and present and to learn their stories.
Unveiled on May 13, it is the fifth Indiana State Historic Marker in Brown County — the fourth erected in the past six years. Those four, including this new one, were placed through the work of the Peaceful Valley Heritage preservation group and its partners.
Brown County has long been marketed as an art colony, but how much its residents — or its visitors — really know about that heritage has been debated.
Last week’s Arts Week was one way to celebrate, teach and recognize that past, present and future. In addition to the unveiling of the marker, the week included an art contest and an essay contest among local students; storytelling about Brown County’s “mostly true” history; music from Brown County’s performing artists; and demonstrations by members of today’s art community.
About 200 artists currently live in Brown County, reported Indiana Lt. Gov. Suzanne Crouch. More than 700 have worked here since 1908, reported historian James Glass. Brown County has a richer art history than many Indiana communities that claim art heritage, with ours stretching back over 120 years, said Mark Dollase with Indiana Landmarks.
“Never before had I been so thrilled by a region,” wrote Adolph Shulz, one of the first few artists to explore Brown County in 1900, by horse and buggy. “It seemed like a fairyland with its narrow winding roads leading the traveler down into the creek beds, through the water pools and up over the hills. Everywhere I looked there were rail fences almost hidden by Queen Anne’s lace, goldenrod and other interesting weeds and bushes. Picturesque cabins here and there seemed to belong to the landscape as did the people who lived in them. …. A sense of peace and loveliness never before experienced came over me and I felt at last that I had found the ideal sketching ground.”
After the railroad reached a corner of the county, making it more accessible to travelers, Shulz moved his family to Nashville in 1908. By that time, T.C. Steele was already here, building his House of the Singing Winds in Belmont. About 25 artists spent the year sketching, “probably at the time as strong a group of its kind as had ever gathered in a like place in the states of the Middle West,” Shulz wrote some years later.
Many visiting artists stayed at the Pittman House Inn, which no longer stands on South Van Buren Street, and at the Ferguson House, which still stands on Franklin Street. The new historical marker downtown is a block of so from both those places, and it’s next door to the site of one of Brown County’s first art galleries, which no longer stands at 58 W. Main.
Preserving tangible pieces of Brown County’s art history, like artist studios, is something Peaceful Valley Heritage has quietly been involved with, too, Dollase said.
“These markers are storytellers, educational pieces, and as I’ve noted earlier they’re tourist sites,” said Casey Pfeiffer, manager of the state historical marker program. “They teach us about the people, places, events and organizations that have truly helped in shaping our state and our nation, and they also help to show that history is not just a thing of the past; it’s all around us informing us of our present.”
The early artists spurred Brown County’s popularity with the many types of visitors it now reaches today. Artists like Steele moving and working here inspired others to come see what he found to be so special about rural Indiana, Shulz wrote. “Most of these pioneers were well trained artists and it was an honest, heroic and unusual experiment at the time for these men to come from schools of art to paint the country and people they knew, rather than allow themselves to drift to the few large cities which then furnished nearly all the art appreciation which existed.”
This “experiment” led others to discover Brown County. Brown County State Park was established in 1924 and gained in popularity with visitors over the Great Depression years of the early 1930s. During 1934, more than 9,000 people visited Nashville’s Brown County Art Gallery and attendance doubled the following year, Shulz wrote.
The arts helped Brown County follow a different path than many other Indiana counties, one that it continues on today, explained 15-year-old Aidan Schilling, the winner of the Arts Week student essay contest. “Overall, Brown County has gained prominence as a rural sanctuary for art and nature, with landmarks such as Brown County State Park and the Brown County Art Gallery, while preserving its unique culture and economic structure rather than pursuing traditional means of development by its neighbors,” he wrote.
Events like Arts Week — which may become an annual event — help to instill a sense of history and belonging in the young people who are lucky enough to live here, said Laura Hammack, Brown County Schools superintendent.
“I think, too often, our kids, our young people don’t have enough of an appreciation of what the Brown County Art Colony is all about, and it’s our responsibility to make sure that we change that,” she said.
Giving students an opportunity to reflect and be grateful for those who nurtured the arts in Brown County “has been the most extraordinary way to end the most miserable year,” Hammack said, “… for our students to use their creative outlet to be able to show their hearts in a way during a very dark year to then culminate a school year with hope and with optimism, and with color and with creativity.”
Student works which were chosen to be in the visual arts show are on display the rest of this week, until Saturday, May 22 at the Brown County Art Gallery.
The new historic marker will be up on the northeast corner of the Village Green in perpetuity, reminding generations of visitors and residents what they came for and where they came from.
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Local students were invited to participate in visual art and essay competitions during Art Week. The following earned prizes from Peaceful Valley Heritage. Judges were Patricia Rhoden Bartels, Ellen Carter, Jeff Hagan, Brenda Kelley and Rachel Perry.
The visual arts show is hanging at the Brown County Art Gallery, 1 Artist Drive, through Saturday, May 22.
<strong>VISUAL ARTS</strong>
<strong>High school</strong>
First place: Freya Baldwin, "Portrait," $750 prize
Second place: Illayana Cox, "My Brown County Nights," $300
Third place: Savannah Oden, untitled photography, $200
Honorable mentions ($50 each): Brittney Fowler, "Fish Bowl"; Victoria Klaker, untitled acrylic; Ariana Staten, "2 Clay Bowls"; Katarina Laguna, "Iron Fence Photograph"; Audrey Haiflich, "Mountains"
<strong>Middle school</strong>
First place: Cambria Cox, "Silent Watcher," $300 prize
Second place: Chase Woodall, "Dog" (pencil drawing), $200
Third place: Rashel Jaenke, "Just Keep Swimming," $100
Honorable mentions ($50 each): Alexander Schwenk, "Shades of Green"; Julia Burt, "Jax"; Merrill Gibbs, "Shattered Glass"; Colbie Van Zuiden, "Geometric"; Jorie Foster, "Peacock Flower"; Riley McCoy, "Sunflower"; Jasmine Dufek, untitled; Hope Zink, "Extra Flowers"; Remy Gentry, "Parrot Boi"
<strong>Elementary school</strong>
First place: Bristol Bryenton, "Cat Scratch," $125 prize
Second place: Rilan Purlee, "Chicken," $100
Third place: Alex Faulkner, "Music in the Air," $75
Honorable mentions ($25 each): Boston Duvall, "Saber Tooth Tiger"; Damon Robison, "Fruit Bowl"; Wyatt Sanders, "Landscape"; Ruby Love, "Sea Mermaid"; Addie Schwenk, "Queen Bee"; Lily Elliott, "Happiness"; Jacqueline Ernstes, "Hanging Leaf"; Ashton Edwards, "Animal Pinch Pot"; Madison Johnson, "Wall Pocket"; Brileigh Sawyer, "Wall Pocket (flower)"
<strong>ESSAYS</strong>
<strong>High school</strong>
First place: Aidan Schilling, $1,000 prize
Second place: Josephine Fields, $500
Third place: Kateleigh Browning, $250
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