The What's Good Project
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PAINTINGS

Open to Change

Open to Change contemporary Southern painting of Water Valley Mississippi by Jennifer Drinkwater
Open to Change contemporary Southern painting of Water Valley Mississippi by Jennifer Drinkwater
Open to Change contemporary Southern painting of Water Valley Mississippi by Jennifer Drinkwater
Open to Change contemporary Southern painting of Water Valley Mississippi by Jennifer Drinkwater

Open to Change

$3,000.00

Jennifer Drinkwater, Open to Change, acrylic and tempera on wood panel, 20” H x 30” W x 1.5” D, 2021.

Open to Change arrives wired and ready to hang. My genius husband Aaron Swanson carefully crafts each panel with high-quality wood, mounting a smooth plywood surface onto a sturdy, mitred wooden frame that provides depth and support to the painting. The sides of the panel are sanded and finished for smoothness.

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Twenty percent of profits will support Blackmur Memorial Library in Water Valley, Mississippi, one of the two independent libraries in the state.

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The community story that inspired Open to Change….

I give you my final painting of and about the Water Valley community. The large brick building houses the B.T.C. and the tiny white awning is the Violet Valley bookstore. This one is emblematic of how the community has continued to evolve over the decades, or at least according to the stories that I've heard.

My first trip to Water Valley in 2019 was to attend a local fundraiser for Kathryn York, who was running for Mississippi's 8th District. York is a Georgia native and a Teach for America alum (in Marks, ironically) who just never left the state. She and her husband Joe, an Alabama native, live in Water Valley with their kids and now she was running for office.

Naturally, I had a million questions and cornered this poor woman (and later her husband and pretty much everyone in attendance): Why? Why did they move to Mississippi? What was it about Water Valley that kept them there? Here's some of what folks told me:

  • Water Valley is changing, and is open to change. Remember, this community is/was home to one of the Mississippi's first craft breweries, its only LBGTQ bookstore, Base Camp Coding Academy, and to Fat Possum Records.

  • There's a sense that newcomers are respectful of, and listen to, long-time residents, which makes those folks more open to incremental change.

  • The low cost of living in small-town Mississippi (and I would image the community "openness") encourages folks to try new ventures and not be totally terrified of failure.