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 One wintry Sunday in the rural Arkansas Ozarks, a fledgling artist wedged herself into the corner of a church pew and, using paper from Sunday school, she drew glamorous clothes for her paper dolls. Her dad’s finger tapped her shoulder from the bench behind, a silent sign to pay attention.

From paper dolls sketched with a lead pencil on lined notebook paper to country courtyards and garden paths, Glynda Turley taught herself to paint. Today, she’s an internationally-known artist and designer with a collection of Glynda Turley prints, bedding and accessories in JC Penney stores. As president and sole artist of her company, Glynda Turley Prints, Inc., she affirms that faith, family values, and a conservative country upbringing influenced her artistic career.

 Growing up, Glynda studied life around her home in Ida, Arkansas. From her family’s porch swing, she memorized the petals on her grandmother’s roses and old-fashioned hollyhocks. Their beauty enchanted her. Today, the artist carries that childhood wonder into each painting.

Married at seventeen to an Arkansas boy only two years older, Glynda honed her painting skills at her kitchen table with two toddlers clutching her sleeve. She taught neighborhood children, her fees barely covering a new tube of paint, a brush, and another book of instruction.

Classes outgrew the kitchen and Glynda moved to Pangburn Schools. Her students progressed to win top prizes at county fairs.

Through the early years of marriage, the committed artist taught classes on weekdays. Weekends, she packed up her paintings and headed to regional craft shows. After thirteen years, Glynda left the school classroom and established a studio in Heber Springs.

In expanded classes, Glynda focused on florals, country scenes, and nostalgic images. She encouraged her students saying, “We can fix any mistake!” Novices dubbed their teacher’s brush as “magic.”

Her student painters often lamented that Glynda would one day be rich and famous and not have time for classes. She vowed to teach even if her paintings were celebrated worldwide.

However, in the mid 1980s, orders for her work mushroomed from art galleries, furniture markets, and gift shops. To keep up, she broke her pledge to her students. Her husband closed his contracting business to become Glynda’s full-time partner. From their gallery in Heber Springs, the couple traveled from state to state, showing her prints at wholesale markets and craft fairs.

 
Orders escalated. The Turleys invested their life savings in equipment and a new building. They organized a family-owned corporation. Daughter Shannon King, a fresh business degree tucked under her capable arm, took over the details of trade shows, licensing agreements, and her mother’s hectic schedule. Son Shon stepped in as purchasing manager. Their spouses, respectively, took roles in the manufacturing plant and personnel. Extended family members, former art students, and longtime friends staffed the new company.

From original oils, Glynda expanded her decorative paintings into limited and open edition prints and her collection at JC Penney. The Browsing Post in Heber Springs houses her gallery. Spacious stores in Factory Shoppes at Branson Meadows in Branson, Missouri, and in Heber Springs bear the Glynda Turley name.

The Turleys travel approximately nine months each year. As the artist, Glynda receives the applause, but she quickly acknowledges that she could not do her job without her family. “Their support allows me to paint and market my work,” she says.

The artist often immortalizes her family with their images painted into her work. “Circle of Friends” stirs Glynda’s memory of her own son, kneeling with curiosity to observe the tiny details of a rabbit’s ears. “Flowers For Mommy” captures her daughter accepting flowers from her young son. “Fishing on the Little Red River” with Sugar Loaf mountain as a backdrop depicts her husband, son-in-law, and two grandsons netting fish.

In “Secret Garden II,” three children playfully pose under an arbor of trailing blossoms. Glynda points out: “This is my house and these are my grandchildren. But I don’t grow flowers!”

Glynda describes her artwork as, ”... romantic nostalgia.” With a contagious laugh, the animated artist, noting her love for the Victorian era, admits that she possibly lives in the wrong century.

She says, “My ideas come from my romantic imagination, my family, my travels, or simply looking out the window of my upstairs studio.”

Arline Chandler is a writer from Heber Springs, Arkansas

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