When art is instilled in a young person's mind, interpretations of beauty and a fascination with surroundings can lead to creations beyond expectation. Charlotte Woodham is a seven-year-old student at the Community School in Sun Valley who is presenting her first art collection at The Coffee Grinder & Gallery in Ketchum on Wednesday, June 6, and Thursday, June 7, from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m.
With guidance from her mother, Charlotte was inspired to create.
"I borrowed mom's camera and shot pictures and put bees' wax over the photo and oil paint over that," Charlotte said.
Woodham's mother, Caroline Woodham, does her own encaustic work with photography. She once owned a stock photography business in Sun Valley.
Inspired by a trip her family took to Hawaii, Charlotte's "Palm Tree" is a photograph of a palm leaf that she covered with bees' wax and oil paint. She used a little tool to scrape away the layers, leaving leftovers in the cracks adding to her design.
Several of Charlotte's pieces have the same process but are all very different in their subject, color and ideas, such as the piece "Mixed Media."
"I didn't know what to call it, and it had so many things in it—gold leaf, color and green wax," Charlotte said. "'Pua' is a Hawaiian flower, a hibiscus, kind of like 'Palm Tree' except it's a flower and has carvings in it."
Charlotte has taken art classes at the Sun Valley Center for the Art summer camp, and pottery classes at Boulder Mountain Clayworks.
"Charlotte doesn't labor over her work," her mother said. "She does art with friends. She did 'Rosa' with her friend Katie Peters who also did one in blue."
In her work, "Tornado" Charlotte used panels on the canvas and drew her cat Zebra who died at 16 years old.
"I would dress the cat in clothes," Charlotte said. "'Tornado' is a little person in a tornado and the person is a cat with clothes on."
Charlotte's use of glue over paint was her own idea, but her mother handled the heating of it, which is part of the encaustic process.
"I got a little crazy sometimes," Charlotte said. "'Practically Everything' is practically everything. We have a book of Chinese characters, and I used compassion."
Having been successful with a lemonade stand and other ventures, Charlotte is inspired by the entrepreneurial part of selling her work. She plans to give the proceeds from her exhibit at The Coffee Grinder to her school.
"I will put a red dot on the sold ones," Charlotte said. "'Rosa' is for a cousin."
At seven years old, Charlotte Woodham has created a collection of encaustic art on exhibit June 6-7 at The Coffee Grinder & Gallery in Ketchum.
