This creation, made mostly of flowers, is one of nine by Molly McBrayer that’s on display at the Ashland Natural Medicine art gallery. McBrayer’s pieces will share the space with paintings by her late grandmother Nancy Puterbaugh, a highly acclaimed oil painter.

Courtesy photo
{/p} It’s one of Molly McBrayer’s fondest childhood memories: she’d step off an Amtrak train and into another world, one of lonely sheds, bowing lilies and dreamy meadows, scenes perfect for a little girl to run through. Or past, since the imagery that still occupies a sacred place in McBrayer’s imagination originally hung on the walls in the home of her grandmother, noted oil painter Nancy Puterbaugh. McBrayer would ride the train to grandma’s house in Walnut Creek, California, from Sacramento often, especially in the summer, and it was there, while walking from room to room or looking over grandma’s shoulder, that McBrayer learned to appreciate art. “My routine when I got there was to say hi to grandma, and then I would, by myself, just take a tour of their house,” McBrayer said. “They had so many collections of art and things that they got on their travels. Also, her own artwork was so constant that the paintings were always changing on the walls; things were constantly being either sold or moved around — different clusters of paintings, her friends’ stuff, her stuff. “At the time I wasn’t painting, but it was really special to grow up with that.” Now a 39-year-old mother of two, McBrayer will see the worlds of her inspiration and its result collide Friday with the grand opening of “Saddle Road,” an exhibit at Ashland Natural Medicine that will feature works by both McBrayer and Puterbaugh, who died 20 years ago. The opening, which coincides with both First Friday and Women’s […]