Local artists Sharon Ferguson and Marilyn Vendemia are the featured artists for November at the Campbell House Galleries.

Sharon Ferguson, a native of Pinehurst, became interested in art at the age of 4 when she started painting dinosaur murals on her parents' walls.

After attending college, she worked and exhibited locally - winning awards, selling paintings and building up a clientele. She also began accepting commissions for pet portraits.

In 1985, Ferguson began working for The King's Custom Framing, where she continues to work today as the manager.

"Looking at art from a framer's perspective has helped me with my own work," says Ferguson. "I look at color, composition and values in a whole new way."

Still feeling like something was lacking in her art education, Ferguson sought instruction from Kamille Corry and D. Jeffrey Mims, both painters of classical realism.

Ferguson says that "under the tutelage of Corry and Mims, I finally found what I was looking for - a firm foundation in drawing coupled with working from life. I have always maintained that before one can paint, one must learn how to draw; and before one can draw, one must learn to see."

Marilyn Vendemia studied fashion design and retail merchandising at Youngstown State University in Youngstown, Ohio. She now lives in Pinehurst and works at The King's Custom Framing as a framer. She paints primarily with oil but sometimes uses watercolor as the subject matter dictates.

Vendemia describes herself as a tonalist painter. Tonalism is rooted in the French Barbizon movement, which emphasized atmosphere and shadow. The tonalist style employs a distinctive technique by the use of a color's middle values as opposed to stronger contrast and high chroma, resulting in an understated and compelling overall effect.

"I allow room for experimentation with different styles in my collection of paintings," says Vendemia. "I am as excited about the warm, tonalist paintings of Turner, Whistler, Twachtman and Inness as I am of the nonobjective abstract color fields of Rothko, Frankenthaler and Diebenkorn. And then, there is my love of the ocean - a pull to capture that lovely, meditative sense of order that nature provides.

"Ultimately for me," concludes Vendemia, "painting is a spiritual language, a way to describe those special, elusive moods and emotions, and a way to document and share what moves me in a way that words cannot."

"Inspirations, Musing & Reflections," featuring works by Sharon Ferguson and Marilyn Vendemia, opens Friday, Nov. 2, with a reception to meet the artists from 6 to 8 p.m. The reception is free and open to the public.

The exhibit is on display through Dec. 20, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays. The -galleries will be closed on Nov. 22 and 23 in observance of Thanksgiving. The Campbell House Galleries are located at 482 E. Connecticut Ave., Southern Pines.

For more information about the exhibit, contact the Arts Council of Moore County at (910) 692-2787 or visit the website www. mooreart.org.