It’s the tick marks that catch your eye. Thousands of tiny marks fill one particular canvas in “Visual Conversations,” the exhibit by Melinda Hoffman that hung in the small gallery at Greenville’s new Senior Action center this past fall. Each mark represents the life of an American soldier who died in Iraq or Afghanistan. One of Hoffman’s edgier works, the print she titled “5,778” (the number of fallen soldiers)—as well as the four others displayed with it—is done in what she refers to as her “political voice.”
“When I did this piece [10 years ago], I never dreamed that we would still be ticking off lives, but here we are,” Hoffman muses. “So that becomes another conversation in itself.”
Despite the political tone of the Senior Action exhibit, Hoffman doesn’t limit herself to any one theme or medium. “I do what hits me today,” declares the artist, who grew up in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. That might mean painting landscapes, making prints, doing metalwork sculptures, or even penning children’s books.
These days, it’s art installations that spark her creativity. She’s done several installations for ArtFields, the show that transforms Lake City, South Carolina, into a living art gallery for nine days each spring.
“My ArtFields entry for 2022 is going to be an installation of 500 bullet casings hanging on wire from a 20-foot ceiling,” she explains. “And 30 of them, one a day, will drip red to the floor.” It’s called “That’s What Bullets Do,” a simple truth she wants people to ponder. “The core of my personality is that I care about what I’m saying. There’s something I’m saying to you in my art that I think you ought to take notice of.”
And the ambidextrous painter says it with both hands, often using her non-dominant (right) hand to put more “energy strokes” on a canvas while integrating recurrent themes including migration and the environment. She draws confidence from her “magic brushes”—two expensive brushes her brother gifted her—which, she says, “make my work sing.”
Her introduction to the arts was studying piano, beginning in fifth grade. She enrolled in Indiana University as a piano major, and a couple of years later, she split her major with art. But it wasn’t until some 10 years ago after she had raised her children and enjoyed a career as program director for Anderson Cable 8 television station, that Hoffman came back to art.
She brushed up on her skills by taking printmaking classes at Clemson and branched off from there. “Because of my age, I bring much more to the table,” the 72-year-old says. “When you’re older, you have so much [experience] under your belt.”
In addition to providing Hoffman with a means to exercise her creativity, her art practice also generates the opportunity to connect with both fellow artists and folks who view her work. She loves to watch people’s reactions when they walk around one of her installations.
“I like knowing that my work grabs people,” she admits.
There are just so many avenues to art.”
You can see Melinda Hoffman’s work at her Mauldin studio by appointment. Contact her via her website: melindahoffman.com.
