* Harry Potter Is A Bunch Of Junk! - Summary:
PELL CITY - Marion Pribbenow says there are no mistakes in art..... Article: Quote: PELL CITY - Marion Pribbenow says there are no mistakes in art.*
Pribbenow, 52, lives by that philosophy, using her 92-acre estate on the edge of Pell City like a giant canvas.*
More than a dozen 12-foot-high murals and sculptures made from junk are scattered around the grassy slopes. Many of the vivid images almost leap out at drivers passing on the narrow road that crosses her land.*
There's Harry Potter, made from a water heater, propane tank, car mufflers and bicycle wheels. There's Bob Marley, towering over four of his band members in the middle of a field. There's a set of figures originally planned as Wizard of Oz characters who turned out differently. But that didn't matter. | Quote: "There are so many ways to use your creativity," Pribbenow said. "And there aren't any mistakes. So many fine and fun things come out of things you screw up."*
Pribbenow has raised four children, three adopted, since her husband died of brain cancer in 1987. With her encouragement, the children built many of the yard sculptures. It was one of the ways Pribbenow instilled in them her passion for creativity. | Quote: Camps for children:*
With her youngest child now 18, Pribbenow wants to pass along her love for art to more youngsters. She wants to host summer camps for children who are not exposed to art in their schools or homes.*
"I'm convinced there are lots of children in our county, in Birmingham and in Anniston who could benefit," she said.*
Pribbenow hasn't figured out all the details. She is gathering information on how to establish a nonprofit organization and plans to seek corporate sponsorship. She's held several camps before, hosting groups of 12 to 20 youngsters on three occasions.*
Many were from A.G. Gaston Middle School in Birmingham, which serves some of Birmingham's poorest neighborhoods.*
"They made no eye contact and looked at the ground. It wasn't that they were ashamed. But their self image was so insecure," Pribbenow said.*
Pribbenow filled their camp days with lessons about wood sculpture, ceramics and other art forms. They enjoyed outdoor recreation on Pribbenow's estate, which has a tennis court, swimming pool, volleyball court and horses. And they visited a junk yard, hauling back the materials that would be used to craft the Bob Marley and the Wailers display.*
The children designed the sculpture. Besides using their own imaginations, they had to instruct J.W. Parker, a Pell City welder, on how they wanted to put it together.*
"I think it probably gave a lot of them a lot of self confidence, being actually hands-on, doing something like that," Parker said. "A lot of kids are more gifted than they thought they were." | Quote: Practical study:*
Pribbenow grew up in central and south Florida. She wanted to study art in college but her father insisted she study something he considered more practical. She attended the University of North Carolina at Greensboro but did not graduate. She moved to Tuscaloosa to live with a friend who was newly divorced.*
It was there she met her husband, Bert Pribbenow, who taught English at the University of Alabama and later became an executive with Drummond Coal.*
His job required travel to Peru, and the couple adopted two children from that country. Strud is now 21, and Lee-Lee is 20. The third adopted child, Pennington, 18, is from south Alabama. The Pribbenows' oldest child is Gib, 24.*
Pribbenow's love for art and her family's flair for creativity with household items is displayed everywhere in the spacious brick home. On the walls are family murals, hand-painted Monopoly boards with property names that reflect family history and wallpaper made from magazine covers. | Quote: Bench murals:*
The idea for yard sculptures started about 1996. Pribbenow found one of the wooden benches by the tennis court badly warped after the children failed to store it for the winter. She decided to turn it into art. The family painted a man's image on it, dug a hole near the swimming pool and stood the bench on end in concrete mix. They dubbed it "Fabulous Fred," and it became the first of many of what Pribbenow calls bench murals.*
Soon after that, Pribbenow threw a party to build a sidewalk leading to the tennis court.*
Friends and family brought favorite belongings to decorate the concrete path. Hardened onto the surface are golf clubs, a BB gun, spoons, bottle caps, a belt buckle, license plates, horseshoes, tennis rackets and other items.*
One piece of art that's drawn attention is one that Pribbenow thought she had shrewdly put in an obscure place.*
Her youngest son, Pennington, told her he wanted to paint a mural of nudes when he was about 16. She did not want to discourage his creativity but asked him to paint it on the side of a storage shed that faces away from the house. He obliged, painting the images of four women in sort of a Picasso style on the corrugated metal siding, adding the words, "Real women have curves."*
Pribbenow soon learned the mural, which is about 20 feet long and about 12 feet high, wasn't as hidden as she thought. Her property is just a short distance from the Pell City airport.*
"On their landing approaches, guess what they see? My nudes," Pribbenow said. "It's gotten to be the joke of the Pell City air strip." | Courtesy: Godric's Hollow  |