Diane Kilgore Condon loves to paint big.
Really Big – In size and substance.
Each painting is inspired by nature’s beauty and recollections of idyllic times with her beloved grandmother (Helen to grown-ups and Gram to grandkids) who loved big, too.
Helen’s bigness was a powerful aura that wrapped itself around many. She never flashed fireworks. She had fire nonetheless, warming the world with her inner muse.
Helen owned a Victorian home in Wisconsin bedecked with heirloom gardens, meandering pathways, and trellises hung in ruffles of color, texture, fragrance, and sheer magic. The family savored Gram’s veggies, buds, blossoms, and divine afternoon dinners. Diane says, “It was in her grandmother’s simple joys and small choices that several of her grandchildren became artists, I among them.”
The family also spent a great deal of time in Florida. There, they’d garden in a warmer clime. Imagine alternating between Victorian and tropical environs. The best of everything.
Family themes are everywhere in Diane’s life. She embeds her childhood wonder and the art of gardening into her own layers of life at home, studio, and the ArtBomb.
ArtBomb is a renovated general store she and cohorts transformed into what’s approaching a 25-year booming business in Greenville, South Carolina. It’s boosted the art scene, helping restore business and attraction to West Greenville.
‘Tis no surprise Diane has marvelous gardens at ArtBomb. Renovating an old, bedraggled general store and establishing gardens took a lot of artists and massive time to materialize Diane’s dream.
She says, “My superpower is, I can make something out of nothing,”
She’s not bragging. It’s just the truth.
Her Gram taught her how. This explains why each big build or each big canvas requires not mere inches, but feet, maybe yards or an entire block.
Diane’s paintings celebrate the animal kingdom: songbirds of the sky, the delightful depth of dog-ness, and the captivating creatures whose powers spring forth while colors flash. These images and more (the Big kind) have been featured at Bob Jones University (where Diane attended school), many galleries and businesses in the Greenville area and all over the Southeast.
On the Plateau, Toby West Home is a gallery home for Diane. It’s where antiques and the Kilgore-Condon aesthetic merge into jaw-dropping interiors.
See more of her work online at artbombstudios.com, or at Toby West Home, or visit her studio at 1320 Pendleton Street in West Greenville. On Facebook, look for artbombstudios.
Meet Diane at The Laurel’s June Cover Artist Reception at High Country Wine and Provisions in Highlands on Tuesday, June 3, 5:30 – 7:00 P.M. – and raise a glass to her. RSVP to info@thelaurelmagazine.com.
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