Spring may be playing hide-‘n’-seek from the Tri-Cities for now, but this April, every season will be found inside the Jonesborough Visitor Center.
During the month of April, the Visitor Center will showcase a photography exhibit by Trish Hollman-Sluss of Trish Hollman Photography, Kingsport.
Hollman-Sluss is making her debut as a solo gallery artist with seasonal photography called “Scenes of the Seasons and More.”
This collection will be the first of several collections to be displayed throughout the rest of the year, Hollman-Sluss said.
Each month through November, the Tri-Cities area will have the opportunity to sample different selections of artwork by local artists on display.
“Throughout the year, artists of every genre are invited to send us their work for a selection process,” said Carolyn Tomko, Visitor Center director. “We focus on local artists because they will bring more people into our center.”
Hollman-Sluss’ “Scenes of the Seasons and More” is a colorfully diverse collection of “spring flowers, trees, old churches, barns and bridges,” the artist said. Birds, gardens, gates and landscapes are other aspects of distinct seasons included in the collection.
Although Hollman-Sluss has shown her work in collaboration with other artists, the Jonesborough exhibit will be her first salon showing, the photographer says. The solo display “is very nerve-wracking,” she said.
Hollman-Sluss admits she’s a tad nervous even though she has been in the photography business for many years. She began exploring the art of photography in the early ’90s when she worked for a portrait and wedding photography studio in the Knoxville area.
Much of her time was spent “reflecting on brides and ceremonies,” she said. “I began making observations about people. With each observation, one concept remained, that everyone has dreams and goals they are working toward, and they should never give up faith in one day seeing their goals achieved and their dreams coming true.”
Although she continues to enjoy photographing portraits and weddings as part of her “traveling studio,” Hollman-Sluss said that this newly realized concept has “taken my photography to a whole new light. My interests have crossed into new territories.”
For the first time, she said, she has found an appreciation for the beauty in the simple things of nature. “It has become part of my dream to try to capture on film the little things that God has placed before us,” she said.
These little things are what Hollman-Sluss finds to be the best photography subjects.
“Have you ever just quietly sat back and observed a deer grazing in the grass, a butterfly perched on a flower, a lone tree out in a field beautifully displaying its leaves, or maybe even the amazing rainbow of color seen in a spectacular mountain sunset?” Hollman asks. “If you have, then you have seen a photograph in the making.”
She has already seen many simple things of nature around her and in her travels across the United States, she said, but she adds that “there are still many adventures and much more enchanting creations out there yet to enjoy.”
These creations of nature captured on film by Hollman-Sluss shine with her enjoyment of her art and sparkle with the clarity of her observing eye.
Although she said that she does not have one specific favorite out of all of her artwork, she does have a print that won recognition in an art contest with a third place ribbon. “‘Serenity’ was the first photograph that I entered into a contest,” she said.
“Serenity,” one of the photographs featured in Hollman-Sluss’s collection, is a photo taken in Charleston, S.C., of a garden hidden behind an iron gate. “Since we can only see a portion of the way into the garden in this print it seemed a bit mysterious,” Hollman-Sluss said. “It made me wonder what was on the other side.”
The photographer often wonders about – and seeks to discover – what’s on “the other side” in her work and leisure time. Although Hollman-Sluss grew up in Montana, her family moved to Tennessee when she was a teenager.
She has lived in the Tri-Cities for four years with her husband, Chris. The couple devotes much of their spare time to their church, Trinity Baptist, where they are members of the choir and of the Trinity Gospel Singers.
When they can find the time they also enjoy roaming the countryside. “Chris and I love to get out and travel to locations where we’ve never been,” Hollman-Sluss said.
They take roads just to find out where they go, knowing that just around the bend ahead may be a photograph waiting to be captured. “It is still part of my dream today to capture life on film and share it with the people I encounter in my life,” she said. “Take time to come by and enjoy what I have been so blessed to see.”
Her work will be on display throughout the month of April at the Jonesborough Visitor Center.
The Visitor Center hours are Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, call 753-1010. For more information on Trish Hollman Photography, call 578-8155.

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