Orange's Simon achieves success in solo art show

A lawyer by day and artist by night, Lindsay Simon of Orange has been relatively unknown in the art world locally. Only her family and friends were aware of her immense talent featuring waterfowl and racehorses.

That changed Saturday night, when a reception for her first solo art show "Flights of Fancy: Defying Gravity" was held at the Texas Artists Museum in Port Arthur. A good turnout is always a nice indication of success, but a better indicator is selling art and Simon sold five pieces on opening night.

"It's a very nice turn out, I was surprised," said Simon. She is an introvert by nature and is usually not comfortable in large crowds but handled the evening with ease. Simon prefers the quite solitude of snapping photos of birds in their natural habitat or horses rounding the track. Simon grew up around racing and raising Arabian horses.

Her style is photo realism taken from her own reference photos.

"You're not sure if it's a photograph or a painting. You have to get right up to it and you're still not sure," said Pam Trosclair, executive director and curator to Texas Artists Museum, referring to Simon's work. "It's almost as if you could touch the feathers on the bird, you can touch the horse's tail, it's that real."

Currently Simon works in pastels. Previously she has worked in acrylics and colored pencils. She is mostly self-taught in these disciplines.

She attended Lamar University as a communications major and took some art classes.

"I was into photography," said Simon. "Those were the classes I liked." She studied photography with Keith Carter and took some graphic design classes.

She then went to law school in Oklahoma and became a lawyer for the state of Texas. Simon stopped painting for almost 10 years while attending law school, then picked it back up again. She returned to art with a picture of American Pharoah who won the triple crown in 2015. Art is her way of breaking away from the stresses of dealing with family law.

Simon has travelled to racetracks across the country to acquire her photos of horses with jockeys and trainers. Her favorite piece is a representation from a photo she took during a trip to Los Alamitos. "I like the lighting, the back lighting in the paddock," said Simon. "It was fun to paint." Paintings with interesting lighting are some of her most striking pieces.

Her favorite waterfowl photos have come from Cattail Marsh in Beaumont. "I remember almost every photograph I've painted," said Simon. "I remember exactly where I was when I took it."

An unidentified admirer of one of the waterfowl pictures was overheard saying, "I like this one, it's peering into my soul."

Simon is currently working on a submission for the Federal Duck Stamp Contest and another piece with a family of Roseate Spoonbills that should be completed soon. She is also in the process of creating prints of some of her favorite paintings.

"This should be seen, she does a great job," Chris Legnon, who was in attendance Saturday. "It was well received, well attended for sure," said his wife, Betty.

Simon's art will be available for viewing through the middle of August at the Texas Artists Museum, 3501 Cultural Center Dr., Pt. Arthur located behind the Bob Bowers Civic Center.