DAA Celebrates Creativity through Collaboration at 2026 Member Showcase

Each year, the Dahlonega Arts Alliance Member Showcase provides an opportunity for our members to share their artistic voices with the community. This year's exhibition, hosted at Old Storehouse Art, challenged artists to step outside their individual practices and embrace a common theme: Collaboration.

Rather than creating work independently, participating members were encouraged to partner with fellow artists, combining different mediums, perspectives, and creative processes to produce entirely new works of art. The result was a diverse and inspiring exhibition demonstrating that creativity often flourishes when artists work together.

The exhibition officially opened with a reception on Sunday, June 14, where members, friends, and visitors gathered to celebrate the artists, explore the exhibition, and enjoy conversations about the creative partnerships behind each piece.

Sheralyn Shadle

A New Perspective

Georgia mixed-media artist Sheralyn Shadle is known for creating atmospheric works that explore the quiet relationship between light and shadow. Drawing inspiration from florals, ravens, figures, and symbolic imagery, her paintings invite viewers to slow down, observe carefully, and discover meaning beyond what first meets the eye.

For the Collaboration exhibition, Sheralyn embraced the theme in a unique way—not by partnering with another artist, but by collaborating with the viewer's perspective. Her painting presents a cowboy looking downward, yet the composition is viewed from an unexpected vantage point: as though the audience is suspended above the figure, looking down from the sky.

The unusual perspective transforms an ordinary moment into something thought-provoking. Rather than meeting the cowboy face-to-face, viewers are invited to consider the scene from a higher point of view, creating a sense of distance, reflection, and quiet contemplation. The composition encourages the audience to pause and reconsider familiar subjects through a fresh lens, demonstrating how changing one's perspective can reveal entirely new stories.

The piece reflects Sheralyn's signature approach to storytelling through atmosphere and symbolism. By challenging conventional viewpoints and inviting viewers into an uncommon perspective, her work reminds us that collaboration can also exist between artist and audience, with meaning unfolding through the act of observation itself.

Rose Flynn & Sarah Clark

The Art of Belly Dancing

Visual artist Bethany Rose Flynn joined forces with dancer and instructor Sarah Clark to create one of the exhibition's most unique collaborations.

Bethany, a North Georgia artist whose paintings explore nature, texture, and color through oils and acrylics, partnered with Sarah, who has spent eighteen years performing and teaching Fat Chance Belly Dance—a modern American style that blends belly dance traditions from across the Middle East and North Africa into an improvisational group dance centered on joyful collaboration.

Their piece, The Art of Belly Dancing, celebrates both the rich cultural history of the dance and the artistic dialogue between visual and performing arts. Belly dancing is believed to have originated in ancient Egypt more than 5,000 years ago and has evolved through countless cultures, making it a fitting subject for an exhibition centered on creative partnership.

Chelsey Lawrence & Janet Ericson

Blooming Moon

One of the exhibition's most imaginative collaborations paired the whimsical illustrations of Chelsey Lawrence with the mixed-media embellishments of Janet Ericson, resulting in the piece Blooming Moon. Together, the artists explored how two-dimensional painting and three-dimensional sculptural elements could merge into a single work of art.

Chelsey, whose work is inspired by the flora, fauna, and wildlife of the Appalachian foothills, created the painting with the intention of inviting three-dimensional additions. The composition depicts a glowing moon surrounded by floating florals and clouds, capturing the lighthearted, whimsical spirit that defines much of her work.

Janet, the artist behind Rabbit Raven Creations, brought that vision to life by adding sculptural details using wire, beading, felted clouds, natural materials, and other mixed-media elements. Her artistic practice reflects the balance of opposites—what she describes as the yin and yang of her own life experiences, from military nomad to disability advocate to emerging artist. Working with natural materials and increasingly exploring painting, felting, embroidery, and fiber arts, Janet found joy in expanding Chelsey's already beautiful 2-D artwork into an immersive mixed-media piece.

The artists described the collaboration as an opportunity to create "a new wonderful way of looking at the world." Chelsey's whimsical imagery and Janet's tactile embellishments complement one another beautifully, transforming Blooming Moon into a celebration of imagination, nature, and the creative possibilities that emerge when artists build upon one another's strengths.

Elaine Chambers

Le Jardin

Since retiring in 2001, Elaine Chambers has devoted herself to painting, finding endless inspiration in the beauty of the natural world. Her work often celebrates nature's colors, textures, and forms, translating familiar landscapes and flowers into expressive works of art.

For the DAA Member Showcase, Elaine presented Le Jardin ("The Garden"), a vibrant interpretation of a flourishing rose garden rendered in a Cubist-inspired style. Rather than depicting the flowers realistically, the composition breaks the garden into geometric shapes, layered planes, and bold patterns, inviting viewers to experience the familiar beauty of blooming roses from multiple perspectives at once.

The painting demonstrates Elaine's willingness to blend her love of nature with artistic experimentation. While the subject is unmistakably inspired by the organic forms of a garden in bloom, the Cubist approach transforms the scene into a mosaic of color, movement, and texture. The result is a work that feels both timeless and contemporary, encouraging viewers to linger as individual shapes gradually resolve into blossoms and foliage.

Although this year's exhibition centered on collaboration between artists, Le Jardin reflects another kind of creative partnership—the ongoing dialogue between artist and nature. Through her distinctive interpretation of the garden, Elaine reminds us that even the most familiar landscapes can be reimagined through a fresh artistic lens, revealing new beauty with every viewing.

Bryan Garris & Beth Brightwell

Color Meets Light

This year's Member Showcase offered artists the chance to venture beyond their usual creative practices, and the collaboration between Beth Brightwell and Bryan Garris beautifully demonstrates how two distinct artistic mediums can enhance one another.

Bryan, who has been a film photographer for more than sixteen years, is known for capturing the landscapes, wildlife, and quiet beauty of places across the United States. For this collaboration, he selected three silver gelatin photographs: a radiant sunflower, a graceful deer, and a peaceful scene along Frogtown Creek near Blood Mountain.

Beth, owner of Old Storehouse Art, is celebrated for her vibrant, expressive paintings that bring colorful energy to subjects ranging from birds and wildlife to jazz musicians and musical performances. Using alcohol inks, she transformed Bryan's black-and-white photographs with rich, luminous color while preserving the timeless character and fine detail of the original silver gelatin prints.

The resulting collection is a thoughtful conversation between photography and painting. Bryan's carefully composed monochromatic images provided the foundation, while Beth's intuitive use of color introduced a fresh emotional dimension, inviting viewers to experience familiar natural scenes in an entirely new way. Their collaboration highlights how artists working in different mediums can honor one another's craft while creating something neither could have achieved alone.

Beth Brightwell & Augustus Brightwell

The Hound's Last Bite

One of the exhibition's most personal collaborations brought together mother and son Beth Brightwell and Augustus Brightwell, combining visual art and creative writing to reinterpret a dramatic moment from Irish mythology.

Beth's painting depicts Macha, the raven-form of one of The Morrígan, descending toward the legendary warrior Cú Chulainn as he prepares for his final battle. Rich, textured reds and earth tones create a striking backdrop for the raven's dark wings, while the composition captures the tension between fate and heroism at the story's climax.

Augustus complemented the painting with his original poem, The Hound's Last Bite, written from Macha's perspective. His verse reflects the goddess's complicated relationship with Cú Chulainn, who she repeatedly encounters throughout his life in different forms—"eel, wolf, maiden and crow"—first to challenge him, then to warn him, and finally to guide him toward his inevitable fate. The accompanying interpretive text explains the mythological background, describing how the mortally wounded Cú Chulainn ties himself to a standing stone for one final act of defiance before Macha lands upon him in the form of a raven, signaling to his enemy that the legendary warrior has fallen.

Together, Beth's expressive painting and Augustus's evocative poetry create a narrative experience that invites viewers to engage with both image and story. Their collaboration demonstrates how visual and literary arts can deepen one another, transforming an ancient legend into a compelling contemporary work that reflects both artistic partnership and the unique creative bond between mother and son.

Celebrating Community Through Art

The annual Member Showcase continues to highlight the incredible talent found within the Dahlonega Arts Alliance while encouraging members to explore new creative possibilities. This year's theme reminded us that art is often strongest when ideas are shared, skills are combined, and artists inspire one another.

Thank you to every participating artist, everyone who attended the opening reception, and our partners at Old Storehouse Art for helping make this exhibition a success. We invite everyone to visit the gallery and experience these collaborative works in person while the exhibition is on display.