(March 2005)
Amy V. Lindenberger, CPSA
Soon after graduating Summa Cum Laude from the University of Akron (OH) with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Drawing, Ohioan Amy Lindenberger, CPSA began a 15-year career as a portrait artist, completing over 600 privately commissioned portraits between 1981 and 1996. In 1985 she opened The Linden Tree Fine Art Studio in North Canton, OH, which offers adult drawing classes, a program of drawing instruction for children, and special focus workshops in drawing and colored pencil techniques. In 1996 Amy began combining her experience in depicting human expression and emotion with her lifelong passion for the Civil War era in Beyond the Battlefield, a series of large-scale colored pencil images which focus on the war’s effect on the citizen-soldier, his wife and children, and society as a whole. Amy’s work depicts with great sensitivity the personal realities of the Civil War in the lives of both soldiers and civilians, and provides a wonderful complement to the battle scenes and high drama depicted by other Civil War artists. In the Spring of 2004, she opened Civil War Fine Art in Gettysburg, PA, a gallery which showcases this body of work. In 1990, Amy became a charter member of the Colored Pencil Society of America (CPSA), which now has over 1600 members in 16 countries. In 2002, Amy was awarded Signature status by the CPSA, and in July 2006 received the Society’s Five-Year Merit Award. She has shown her work in a wide variety of local, regional and national exhibitions, receiving numerous awards. Her work has been published in four internationally-distributed books: The Best of Colored Pencil, The Best of Colored Pencil II, Creative Colored Pencil Portraits, and The Best of Colored Pencil IV.
The vast majority of contemporary Civil War artwork focuses on the “grander” dramas of nineteenth century life: the large-scale battle scenes, the well-known generals, and the heroes of the battlefield. Those things are stirring and inspirational to all Civil War enthusiasts, and there are a good number of highly-skilled artists portraying them with accurate detail and powerful emotion. But just as in our own era, in the life of the common man such larger-than-life experiences and people were the exception, not the rule. Most of life’s fabric consisted then, as it does today, of quieter, less obviously dramatic moments. In the hope that these moments – the threads which run through the lives of all of us, binding us to other generations and making us more fully human – will not be overlooked or forgotten, I present my series of Civil War images, Beyond the Battlefield.
The series is comprised of two categories: Sword Across the Threshold and Women of Distinction. Together they present a chronological portrayal of events and experiences of this defining epoch in our American heritage.
The paintings in Sword Across the Threshold take us back to situations in which an 1860’s man – a citizen-soldier – and his family might have found themselves as the drama of the war unfolded. Whether Union or Confederate, the war created many of the same circumstances and emotions in the day-to-day lives and relationships of those who were destined to fight it.
The Women of Distinction group focuses on women of the era whose contributions to the Civil War were notable and whose images deserve to be made more recognizable than those seen in century-old photographs.
Through Beyond the Battlefield, I plan to take my audience through the events which were played out in thousands of lives and homes of American soldiers, north and south. The series is not about just one family; it is about many families. It is often not about a specific soldier, but about the majority of soldiers. And, in a larger sense, it is not even exclusive to the Civil War era, but addresses emotions and scenarios which repeat themselves throughout generations, including our own.
A.V. Lindenberger, CPSA
To learn more about how the series is developed, read Amy Lindenberger Paints a Story.
October 2006
