Painters Helen Fletcher and Eva
Engler find their best work happens when they get lost in the moment.
“Once, I was having an argument with two of my daughters,”
said Fletcher, of Plantation. “ The ocean in a scene I was working on at the time
kept getting rougher and rougher. To this day, it’s one of my best works.”
Engler, of North Miami Beach, agrees. “my best paintings are when
I lose myself and something else comes out,” she said. “When I think about every
brush stroke, nothing happens.”
Their work will be on display through the month of July 2001 at the
West Regional Library, 8601 W. Broward Blvd., Plantation. The women met at the Jean
Leighton Studio in Hollywood, where they polish their |
skills in oil, acrylic and watercolor paintings. Each woman
is displaying about 20 paintings in the library, and most will be for sale.
Fletcher, 74, started painting when she was 11 years old. In the
1960’s, she began painting portraits in New York as a business. She came to South
Florida in the 1970s and worked at Broward General Medical Center as a surgical scheduler.
Her favorite subjects are boats, ocean scenes, dolphins and portraits. Engler fled her
native Czechoslova- kia in 1940 and moved with her family to Palestine. She moved to
Venezuela in 1953, and 10 years later came to South Florida, where her family started
Engler Engineering. For 20 years, she said, she didn’t pick up a paintbrush because
of her involve- ment with the business. Now she takes every Tuesday off to paint. |
