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Angie Smith presents the original acrylic painting
"One Nation Under God" to New York City Fire
Fighters, Captain of Ladder 151 Walter Werner and
Battalion Chief Steve Grabher. Behind the trio is a
memorial to New York's fallen fire fighters, not
counting those lost in the World Trade Centers on
September 11, 2001. |
As the first anniversary of the September 11 holocaust
approaches, people begin to share memories of where they
were and what they were doing the moment they learned the
apparent accident of an airplane flying into a tower of
the World Trade Center was in actuality a terrorist attack
on American soil.
Stunned Americans listened and watched
in disbelief as the second airplane struck the south tower
and thousands of innocent victims were massacred when the
World Trade Centers collapsed into a billowing cloud of
dust that enveloped New York City and sent shock waves
around the world that continue to reverberate into an
uncertain future.
Angie Smith of Cottage Grove was a thousand miles away
atop a remote mountain in Colorado when fate intervened to
inform her of the disaster.
"We were getting ready to head to Telluride," shares
Angie, who was among a group of friends gathered for a
vacation of four-wheeling in the Rocky Mountains. "One of
the guys had forgotten the key to his four-wheeler and had
to go back to the cabin. He was listening to a CD, but
when he got to the cabin he popped it out and it had just
happened."
As quickly as possible, the stunned biker hurried back to
the group and told them what was happening. As the news
sank in, the festive atmosphere turned to one of
compelling urgency.
"The other plane hit the Pentagon while we were
listening," Angie relates, "Within two hours we were
headed straight home."
"Straight home" is a misnomer for the circuitous route
chosen to keep a safe distance away from highly populated
areas. Angie's solid goal was to get home to her two
children, Brooke, age eight, and six year old Shelby.
Opportunists made the trip harder than it had to be, with
some service stations charging $5.00 per gallon for
gasoline. However, says Angie, "For every place that very
unpatriotic people were willing to charge $5.00 a gallon
for gas, there was another person who didn't raise their
prices."
Still, long lines and longer hours of slow travel made
Angie wonder if she would ever make it home.
Days after Angie finally arrived home to her family, while
en route to Memphis on business, she saw "a gigantic fire
truck with the ladder all the way up," a flag flying from
its summit. The sight was especially profound to Angie,
whose artistic vision melded with her love for her fellow
man to humble her in prayer. "The talent I have, I know
the good Lord gave to me," Angie relates. "I prayed, 'Let
me help...'"
She prayed for direction in creating a painting worthy of
the sacrifice made by the thousands who died, and honoring
the heroes, living and dead, who had created from the dust
of disaster a triumph of spirit that transformed the evil
aspirations of the terrorists into a nationwide revival of
faith, hope, and love.
That evening, Angie spent the evening with friends from
the four-wheeling group, Sharon and Rowland Sylvia. The
Sylvia's had just purchased a new Bible and asked Angie to
take a look at it. Angie thumbed through the New
International Version volume to Psalms 91:1-8.
He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest
in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, "He
is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust."
Surely he will save you from the fowler's snare and from
the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his
feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his
faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. You will not
fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day,
nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the
plague that destroys at midday. A thousand may fall at
your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will
not come near you. You will only observe with your eyes
and see the punishment of the wicked.
It was a passage Angie says had brought comfort in times
past. She showed the words to her friends, noting the
analogy between 9-11 and the numbers of the verses.
"This to me just went with this," says Angie, speaking of
the budding project that blossomed upon her return to the
family home and business, Carmack's Fish Barn, located in
Cottage Grove just outside Como on Highway 140.
Angie's father, Roe McCrary, had waited anxiously for his
daughter's return after waking from a dream in which he'd
had a vision of a painting she was to create. He
immediately arose at 2:00 a.m. and sketched out the
details of his dream.
Says he, "When she came back I asked her if she'd had any
funny feelings." Listening to her father's experience and
reflecting on her own, Angie felt "goose bumps" rise as
she perceived what the Lord was leading her to do.
It was a new challenge for the seasoned artist whose
numerous awards, as well as the breadth of exposure of her
paintings, reflect the degree of her accomplishment. Her painting of the Menemsha fishing village (where Jackie
Kennedy Onassis had once docked) was exhibited at
prestigious Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts, selling
within a month of its display.
Nevertheless, she had always shunned the painting of
faces, a skill that could no longer be overlooked.
Traditionally focusing on farm scenes, she stretched her
vision and artistic limits to produce a symbolic
masterpiece of the events of 9-11.
"I only really painted it because I felt the good Lord
told me to; otherwise I never would have done it, and I
still did it with respect for what happened," she says.
She prayed over every symbolic component of the painting,
each stroke of her brush a tribute and testament to the
emotions that ruled the events depicted, as boundless
horror, unspeakable pain, and widespread fear and panic
gave way to undaunted courage and healing in a nation that
had understood neither the depths of its despair nor the
breadth of the combined strength and convictions of its
diverse peoples.
The buildings in the painting are painted to scale, the
gradually clearing skies rising to reveal an angel in the
space the ominously absent twin towers would have
occupied.
"The World Trade Center would have come to angel's
shoulder," Angie says reverently of the awesome height of
the towers that, filled with people, had collapsed in
fleeting defiance of their apparent strength. Yet, the
painting proclaims victory over the forces of evil as the
angel's wings enfold the nation.
President Bush, his eyes raised heavenward as if seeking
wisdom, is shown in his finest hour. Children, modeled by
Angie's own young, pray side by side while, in another
section of the painting, students gather around a flagpole
to pray, its flag at half-staff. Below them, New York
firefighters raise a flag amidst the ruins. Also nestled
in the clouds is a police officer cradling a child whose
head rests trustingly on his shoulder.
Gazing at the painting, one feels the joint sorrow and
triumph of America's great sacrifice is superbly
portrayed, and discerns the echo of God's pronouncement of
a job well done, "It is good."
The job complete, Angie set out to make money from the
prints, the proceeds going to benefit various charities.
With monies from all over the United States being funneled
to New York, Angie reasoned, "charity begins at home", and
decided to donate monies earned through the sale of the
prints to local needs.
Nature provided an immediate need for donations with the
tornado of November 26, 2001. Around $2500 was donated to
victims of the storm and to project graduation and a local
fire department. Other prints were donated to fire
departments in Paris, Cottage Grove and Missouri for
fundraising events, with two prints auctioned in Rolla,
Missouri and Paris netting around $400 - $450 each.
"One print went to the Supreme Court in New York and
Senator Fred Thompson carried one to the President, but I
haven't heard back from it yet," tells Angie.
In a special arrangement, Brother Fred Morris of Grace
Baptist Church in McKenzie bought 50 prints and had them
framed for presentation to the 47 pastors who attended the
church's 19th Annual Pastor's Conference.
"That was an honor all in itself," says Angie, "Every
pastor that attended was given a framed print, which was
super nice of them to do. That all started because
somebody gave him (Brother Fred) a print at Christmas last
year."
The 12.5" x 27" prints come with a 7" x 9" card on which
the painting is depicted along with Psalm 91:1-8. The
prints, beautifully moving on their own, are especially
impressive when framed in a specialized mat including a
space for commemorative stamps and the $20.00 silver coin
minted in honor of September 11's victims and heroes.
"It's managed to raise some money; it's been a blessing in
many ways," says Angie, who says she would like to have
given hundreds of thousands of dollars away. "It's done
what it needed to and the print now is all over the
country."
After considering selling the original and donating the
money, Angie decided instead to present the painting to
the New York Fire Department. Aided in her request for the
honor by her cousin, Maxine Strauss of Hartford,
Connecticut, Angie's application passed through two
reviews before she was invited to travel to New York for
the presentation.
Having been to New York on prior occasions, Angie's trip
took an emotional turn with the glaring absence of the
towers that formerly were the main focal point of the
city. "No matter where you were, you would see them, and
this time they were not there," Angie shares, recalling
previous visits to the Windows on the World restaurant
atop the Trade Center.
Her visit coincided with the same week closing ceremonies
took place at ground zero, and she was able to visit the
site with other onlookers. "It was something I wanted to
do," she says, "Having been there before, then going back,
it just takes you away. Out of all the people standing
there looking, no one said a word. It's hard to imagine
such a great loss of life there, and that week they found
more bodies..."
Elsewhere in the city, people shared memories of that day,
Angie relates, "talking about what they had to do to run
and get away."
"There's no way we can imagine what they felt and how
scared they must have been," she says with respect. When
she hears discussion of how ground zero will be replaced
with new buildings and a memorial to the thousands who
died, Angie says she feels that as a country we have
already surpassed that goal:
"To me we have already rebuilt something far greater -
faith in the nation and faith in God."
To learn more about Angie's art and view more of her
fabulous paintings, follow the link at
www.mckenziebanner.com to the Angie Smith's Art Website.
Special thanks to Wayne Bannister for suggesting this
article. |
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