Half-Blind Enterprise Artist Paints In Vivid Colors
b'While we were in Joseph for a show about art in rural communities last summer, we heard about a painter you might not expect to find in cowboy country, where most of the art leans towards landscapes and wildlife.
\\u201cThere\\u2019s a great artist here named Bob Fergison, who just turned 82, and he\\u2019s at least three-quarters blind,\\u201d said Seth Kinzie, the web developer at the Josephy Center for Arts and Culture.
\\u201cHe\\u2019s very Max Beckmann\\u2013like,\\u201d said the center\\u2019s executive director, Cheryl Coughlan. \\u201cOil painting with a lot of heavy brush strokes that are textural. Lots of nudes. He has one woman that was his model for years, that was very obese, but she only had one breast. If you take him a bottle of wine, he\\u2019ll open his studio.\\u201d
\\u201cHe will also be happy to draw you naked if you feel the need to disrobe in front of a great live drawer,\\u201d added Kinzie dryly.\\u2028
I wasn\\u2019t keen on disrobing, but I couldn\\u2019t pass up the chance to meet Fergison, who currently has a show on display at the Josephy Center through Feb. 17.'