Yvonne Agee, a former Louisa High School math teacher, opened a new art store on March 15, called Turn up the Color. The store offers gallery viewings, art classes, and purchases of her current art. 

    Turn up the Color is located at 205 West Main St. in Louisa. Gallery hours are from 11am-5pm on Mondays and Tuesdays, and 11am-7pm on Wednesday through Saturday.

    Agee offers exploratory art classes on Wednesday’s from 10am to 12pm and on Thursday’s from 1pm-3pm, along with 6pm-8pm. Materials are provided during these classes and no experience is required. 

    Taking a step up from the exploratory classes, she also offers open studio sessions. Every first and third Saturday of the month, she will have a still life composition or a model for life drawing. Materials are required during these sessions, as she only provides art benches and easels. 

   Agee will also hold adult/child art experiences on the first Saturday of each month from 10am-11am. Each event offered will cost $25 per person, not including the open studio sessions which will cost $20/ticket.

    The prices of her art range from $15.50 to $35.22. She focuses her art on a “disrupted” realism and mainly enjoys using oils, charcoal, and pencil.

   “The art I create is probably the only real magic I have encountered in my life,” Agee said. “It heals; it is pure. I am on a constant quest for those moments in life that allow me to tap into my creative spirit, challenge my tenacity, and entice me to continue to learn as an artist.” 

    Agee’s art is usually a series of different pieces, all connecting back to each other. She starts her paintings off as still-life pieces, but they are often difficult to do because of the change in landscape.

   “…I take pictures capturing a moment that attracts my eye,” said Agee. “Painting from a captured photograph leaves room for imaginative twists inspired by memory and emotion of that encounter.”