Music inspires Hollingsworth Haffner exhibit

Palm Coast Observer
Neighbors

PALM COAST— Violet Skipp Haffner has been creating art for nearly 40 years, and she will exhibit her body of work in a solo show at Hollingsworth Gallery all this month.

“Song lyrics are the poetry that’s translated into my art,” she said as she sat on a bench at Hollingsworth Gallery, taking a break from transporting her work from her home in Spuds to Palm Coast. “Whatever emotion is transpiring my life, there will usually be a song and a musician that directly relates to that period, and that song become an anthem.”

The words mean so much to Haffner that when she is done, she writes them on the back of her work so they may forever be part of the finished piece.

A couple years ago, the assemblage artist wanted to add paining to her pieces, so she began taking classes with Hollingsworth owner and curator J.J. Graham.

“What I always hope for is that (students) take what I teach them and do their own thing and bring me some alien object that I’ve never seen before,” Graham said. “I think Violet is really good at that. I think she’s a creative spirit and a very different kind of head as an artist. When you see things like that, and you see that originality, those are the type of things that you want to exhibit.”

Haffner uses materials indiscriminately; to her, nothing is sacred. She uses whatever she needs to feel like the piece is right and, often, that includes a visit to a junk yard in Spuds, where she has access to acres of materials.

“Sometimes, just the work itself is a tacky souvenir piece that I push the limits with,” she said referencing her piece “Amadeus,” which is centered around what was originally a plain white bust. “I do like to push the limits, sometimes just because I can.”

Reflecting on Haffner’s work, Graham said: “I have a tendency to not like work that is totally contrived in its happiness. I think that there is a balance as an artist, especially in the world that we live in — between the beautiful and the things that aren’t necessarily so beautiful — and I think you see that in her work. There’s beauty, there’s mystery and there’s also some sorrow and melancholy. And that makes it real for me.”