COMM 310, Advanced Writing, Public Relations

Your turn to critique a story!

A local art gallery communications intern has written the short personality profile below for the monthly “in the galleries” newsletter, designed for distribution to patrons and customers interested in local art. As director of communications, you need to evaluate the work and offer helpful suggestions to this PR student. On a separate piece of paper, use the checklist below to evaluate the work, based on our writing discussions this semester. Be sure to include examples from the text.

1. Spelling, grammar, proofreading errors. Where?

2. Effectiveness of lead paragraph, using SAVE formula: why or why not effective? Suggestions for improvement?

3. Strong verbs. Which could be strengthened, and how?

4. Blah clauses, (there is/are, for example) awkward sentences (too long, for example), boring adjectives (“very,” other overused adjectives, for example). Which are good, which could be improved?

5. Transitions—offer examples of good ones, as well as examples that could be strengthened. How?

6. Passive voice. Where used, is it appropriate, or would active voice be stronger? How?

7. Ending. Does it tie up the theme of the story? Could it be made better? How?

Artist profile: B. Cummings

The claim to fame may be in the name. Think of Cher, for instance. Prince. Sigourney (née Susan) Weaver. B. Cummings.

That’s B., not Bea, although everybody calls her that. At least a thousand paintings showing that signature hang in homes around the Twin Cities, B. estimates, and countless hundreds others brighten walls locally and nationally. B., Moorhead, Minn., artist and charter member of Gallery 4, a local cooperative gallery, has never kept count. “I used to buy canvas by the roll.”

Canvas and paint have been her passion nearly as long as most regional artists can remember, reaching back to 1957, when B. lived in Perham, Minn., with her husband Joe and six children. “I began entering the Red River Annual (juried exhibition sponsored by Rourke Art Gallery in Moorhead) when we still lived in Perham,” explains B., “and Jim Rourke started calling me B. Bernadette was too long, he said.”
When the family moved to Moorhead in 1963, local artists already knew Bernadette as B., and the nickname stuck so well that many artists today don’t even know it’s not Bea. Nor do many realize that B. is one of only two 1974 founders of Gallery 4 who are still members (the other is Lula Brown of Pelican Rapids, Minn.), and that she has no formal art degree.

“I did take lots of classes and workshops,” explains B., who considers herself to be an oil painter, but does watercolors because they sell better in today’s market. “I went to Fergus Falls, (Minn.), studied under Charlie Beck for, goodness, about 10 years.” Beck is a well-known regional artist, now retired.

B.’s work diverged from Beck’s, however. B. does not do woodcuts or engravings. Her first love is oils, made with what she describes as a limited palette. “If I have five colors on my palette, that’s a heck of a lot. In watercolor I have three. I have a lot of trouble with that many colors, I don’t know what I’d do with more.”

B. has tried faster-drying acrylic, but “it dries faster than I can think. I’m a slow painter. I build. But I do like to finish things.”

Her finished work at Gallery 4 includes the occasional oil painting, but her longtime patrons are seeing more watercolors and mixed media. “When I started painting, watercolors were non-existent. Now they’re hot.” As for her jewelry, she observes that Gallery 4 seldom sold smaller things before moving into a mall. She now makes jewelry for mall browsers. “The art business is hard, and maybe we’re not willing to please the public as we should,” she says. “ There are so many young people so determined to do what their heart tells them to do, but the public doesn’t necessarily buy that. Charlie Beck told me once he painted signs for a living for years.”

But matching tastes won’t make a regional artist immediately self-supporting. B. and her husband Joe, who owns F-M Jobbing Co. in Fargo but also is a potter and 13-year Gallery 4 member, note patrons generally don’t buy art as they did when Gallery 4 was younger. “In the ’70s, it was wonderful. People were not intimidated by our gallery. “And in 1970s Minneapolis, B. discovered young professionals who had extra money and loved art. She exhibited in the Uptown Art Fair for 17 years, sometimes completely selling out, up to 125 pieces in a weekend. She also is a co-founder of the Fargo Street Fair.

Now, she observes, more artists compete in a tighter economy. The luxury of art is the choice of affluence when times are good. Too, B. faults professional interior designers, who choose trendy art for people who used to make their own decorating decisions.

But B. has successfully weathered nearly four decades of changing tastes with consistent enthusiasm. “They said a gallery like ours lasts an average of two years,” she observes. Gallery 4 will celebrate its 27th year in 2001, growing from 15 artists on the fourth floor of Block 6 (hence, the “4”), to 38. And B. continues to produce new works, with one concession to the years. “I used to do all my paintings on location, but now I do it all in the studio. I like my comfort.”