Spring Sampler

Celebrate a beautiful Carolina spring Sunday afternoon with an "art bouquet" at the Carolina Brewery. We will hold an artists' reception for several leading artists of the Chatham Artists Guild on Sunday, May 3rd from 4 to 6 PM. Come, have a brew and some nice bar snacks, and talk with painters, photographers, sculptors and other Guild artists. The Chatham Carolina Brewery is on Route 15/501 just North of Pittsboro


Featured chatham artist Joey Howell tells this story:

Chatham County has a long, rich tradition of hospitality to wildlife. The first European explorers who came here found a verdant place teeming with animals of all sorts. Blessed with three rivers and abundant open space, our county is home to several species that live only here. Even today, while out-of-control development, toxic waste and climate change threaten our commonwealth, wild Life refuses to abandon its traditional toehold on this land.

Last year, in early spring, we noticed a fox hanging around our yard. It grew quite accustomed to us, standing its ground and barking sharply at us if we got too close. At some point we realized it was actually a pair of foxes. We loved our “pet” foxes and relished the daily encounters. In mid June, I came out to my studio early on a Saturday morning, looked out the sliding glass door in the back, and there on the steps was a fox kit! Barely three feet from me. It looked up at me through the glass without the slightest trace of apprehension. I glanced to the side and saw another! And then another! Slowly, quietly, I crept back and grabbed my camera. I managed to snap half a dozen pictures before -of course- the battery ran out, mother fox pacing nervously all the while at the periphery of the yard. By the time I replaced the battery they had vanished. I never saw them again. And so they had launched out from the confines of their den nearby. Our neighbors reported seeing the babies accompanying their mama now on her regular forays to their compost piles.

This is the little kit that was boldly checking out my studio. I like to hope that this spring I will see this same fox again, with its own litter of kits. That would be a really cool tradition to establish.