The 20th Market Street Festival wrapped up early Saturday evening after being blessed with what is often called “Chamber of Commerce” weather.
Tucked among the 220 vendors that set up shop on the streets of downtown Columbus, Nancy Waggoner and Curtis Shumate plied their handiwork from different locations — Waggoner on Fifth Street across from Rae’s Jewelry, Shumate in the lot behind Old 82 Restaurant next to Catfish Alley.
It is no stretch to say that as recently as five or six years ago, Waggoner and Shumate would have been far more likely to be shoppers than vendors, joining the thousands Saturday who happily peeked in to one vendor tent, then another all along downtown.
The Market Street Festival is sort of like catnip for impulse buyers — clothing, jewelry, toys, home decor — an inexhaustible array of things that nobody really needs, but somehow can’t be resisted.
After 20 years, an awful lot of the wares are familiar now. In fact, we sort of expect to see animals made out of scrap metal and tables made from drift wood. We expect to see funnel cake vendors and home-made ice cream and various meat products sold on skewers. Each year, we search among the sea of tie-dye T-shirts and tinkling wind chimes to find something new, something a bit different.
Waggoner and Shumate were counted among those whose work struck that chord this year. Both are relatively recent arrivals to the arts/craft scene.
Waggoner, 58, is a Columbus native who has made her home in Carthage for the past 35 years. Shumate, 45, was born and raised in Lauderdale County, a dozen miles north of Meridian.
Waggoner is a painter, Shumate a craftsman. Both put off their life-long creative instincts to pursue more practical demands, Waggoner as a stay-at-home mom and Shumate working in home satellites sales and installation.
“I loved painting ever since I was a little child,” says Waggoner. “The first real painting I ever did, one done on canvas, was when I was about 8 years old.”
As a busy mom of two, she put her art aside for years, only to resume painting when her youngest was 16.
“When she got her driver’s license, that’s when I started painting seriously,” she says.
That passion has returned, and with a fury.
“Since then, around 2009, I’ve painted every day, usually about 12 hours a day, sometimes longer,” she said. “I have a studio above the garage that used to be the kids’ playroom. Now, I start painting around noon and finish around 1 or 2 in the morning.”
So prolific is she that her canvasses are purchased in bulk, delivered by an 18-wheeler.
Waggoner’s paintings are of full of whimsy and striking colors and patterns. Her favorite subjects are animals – dogs, cows, birds.
“There is fine art and then there is fun art,” she says. “That’s what I do, fun art. They’re almost all abstracts and I love colors. I get a lot of ideas from fabrics I see and I often incorporate those patterns into my paintings.”
Like Waggoner, Shumate arrived by accident. He is a master craftsman, working in wood.
“About five years ago, I had a buddy who had bought some wine barrels in California and wanted to know if I could make him some furniture out of them,” Shumate said. “I had always loved working with wood, making things, but when I started working on those wine barrels, something sort of clicked. There’s something about the arc of the wood and how each barrel is unique in ways that you don’t notice right away. Now, I can see a barrel and I know, ‘That’s a bench’ or ‘That’s a chair.’ I can’t explain it.”
For five years now, he has devoted his full energies to crafting an ever-increasing variety of objects out of the barrels — everything from lazy susans, to tables, chairs, planters to serving trays. Even the metal bands are converted into art pieces.
“I love the idea of recycling these barrels,” Shumate says. “They are all white-oak barrels, made from trees that are at least 125 years old and often cured for as long as 15 years before they are made into barrels. They are used for the better quality wines and when they are emptied, they discard them. We have them shipped from Napa to Meridian, 200 barrels at a time.
“The beauty of the wood is something that struck me. To give them a new life in a new form, it’s just something I find very satisfying.”
Among the sea of predictable wares, stumbling across Waggoner’s paintings and Shumate’s hand-crafts is what keeps the Market Street new and interesting.
Every year, it’s something.
And it’s been that way for 20 years now.
Slim Smith is a feature writer and columnist for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected]
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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