New Red House artist completes ambitious goal

Johnnie Stanfield, a new artist at Red House Studios and Gallery, set an ambitious goal for 2015 - paint 25 painting in 25 weeks.

That’s quite an undertaking for an artist who recently overcame a serious injury to her right hand that kept her from painting for more than five years. It took hard work and a serious commitment from herself and her physical therapist to help Stanfield gain any function back in her wrist, which was dislocated and broken in four places during a fall in 2010.

“The first year was extremely tough,” she said. “I was unable to move any of my fingers, and I had no feeling in my hand. I wrote like a first-grader, with a big pencil.” She spent a year in physical therapy.

The injury prompted her to return to the classroom, where she pursued a degree as a graphic designer and took on an old passion of hers - photography.

Stanfield’s studio at Red House Studios and Gallery is number 11. The gallery is at 325 W. State St., Black Mountain.