Halfway around the world five years ago, Bob and Barb Stevens appreciated more than ever the delicate brushstrokes of an artist who helped put part of the Hoosier heartland on the map.
And they soon came home to Columbus from a visit to France with a passion to figuratively paint a clearer picture of the oversized impact of late Brown County impressionist painter T.C. Steele, one of their favorites and the man credited with cementing the area’s reputation as an enviable artists colony.
In Europe, near the home of painter Claude Monet, the couple found giant easels along the roadsides to alert visitors to Monet’s tourist site in Giverny. The easels were placed where the impressionist master had done some of his most beautiful landscapes. And they also found a sizable coffee shop with food and ample restrooms there to welcome entire busloads of visitors curious about Monet.
In Brown County, sadly, there weren’t even indoor, public restrooms at the T.C. Steele Historic Site — until now. The Stevens, longtime art and arts supporters, were key catalysts and financial supporters to make the recently opened 4,600-square-foot, $2.6 million Singing Winds Visitor Center — named after the Steele home — a reality near Nashville.
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Easels erected on Indiana 46 near Belmont even draw motorists’ attention to the addition.
They chuckled recently about finding motivation far from home to spotlight Steele, who lived in Nashville from 1907 until his death in 1926.
“I think it is not so unusual, to have to back away from a place to see the big picture,” Barbara Stevens said.
“And the big picture is that T.C. Steele was a rock star at the turn of the (20th) century,” Bob Stevens said.
Still is, in fact.
The new building was funded by private individuals, support from the State of Indiana, the Friends of T.C. Steele group and various grants, according to organizers. It features restrooms, programming space, offices, a gift shop and a video introduction to the site’s history, among other amenities.
Along with the new visitor center, visitors will also find new experiences to enjoy around the site, according to promotional material. Families can visit T.C.’s Outdoor Studio, featuring a wagon modeled after Steele’s own traveling studio. There, adults and children may create their own art, play games together, put themselves into famous works of art and more.
At various locations around the site, visitors can explore the real locations that inspired specific Steele paintings, and interactive activities will highlight Steele’s artistic process. Plus, new sounds and scents will enhance the tour through the House of the Singing Winds, along with a newly restored kitchen space.
“With the new visitor center and activities, we’re providing an improved visitor experience for everyone who comes to the site,” said Cathy Ferree, president and CEO of the Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites, in a news release.
Plus, they’re providing a more realistic way to attract tour buses, school groups, you name it, as the Stevens see it.
“Not too many people were going to take a school class to the site with no public restrooms,” Barbara Stevens said.
She and her husband spoke in the dining room of their northside Columbus home where five Steele landscapes are on the wall, creating a casual and rustic atmosphere. The couple’s love for the artist grew over the past 30 years based on an original love for Monet’s work.
A Nashville visit that Barbara Stevens made with friends in the 1980s introduced her to Steele’s work.
“I did not initially understand the art of southern Indiana,” she said. “It took me a while to learn.”
And that is what they hope for others who perhaps haven’t yet discovered or fully appreciated Steele’s gift of capturing Mother Nature’s natural beauty among the Hoosier hills.
“We have a national treasure sitting a half hour away from where we’re sitting right now,” Bob Stevens said.
And now, because of the work of the Stevens and a host of others, more people will be able to see that — and the big picture of a big talent.
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What: Singing Winds Visitor Center
Where: 4220 T.C. Steele Road near Nashville at the T.C. Steele Historic Site that includes the house and grounds that inspired the noted Indiana artist’s famous impressionist paintings.
Hours: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays.
Information: 812-988-2785.
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