One of the most subversive locations in town is a simple house by the Rio Gallinas. The house mirrors its owner: small, sturdy, quiet. If you look at the house, at the woman, you will miss the secret interiors, the scrape of paintbrush against synapse, the pile of discarded collage scraps fighting for a second chance at beauty. Meredith Britt owns this space, owns the strange and wondrous recess of thought between her ears that echoes the murky depths of the river that divides our town.

Meredith’s art doesn’t mimic any great master, rather, it sings a unique tune as undulating and deceptively simple as the Great Plains. Heartfelt splashes of yellow and burnt red open the canvas, pull you inside. Her art will remind you of your best childhood memories – not the kind thoughts of winning spelling bees or hugging your best sixth grade friend, but of the moment you first realize your beloved dog won’t live forever, writing an essay that you know will frighten your favorite teacher, breaking into a haunted, abandoned house at midnight with your sister. Meredith paints the bittersweet places you still carry in your belly, those sepia snapshots that refuse to escape, the muted scent of the first boyfriend who left you for another. Her art is juicy stuff.

My favorite Meredith work is a painting of the interior of a local utility office. Who paints something like that, you ask? Yeah, exactly. But I remember paying my bill a day too late, begging to have my electricity turned back on. I remember the way the sterility of the office was offset by a puppy calendar.  The kind people who sit behind those desks and compassionately deal with one meltdown, then another, deal with the consequences of inflation, our town’s growing unemployment situation. It’s a thankless job. Meredith made the office as bright and colorful as a Grand Canyon sunrise, managed to paint the interior of her subjects’ minds through a careful palate of somehow-vibrant grays, greens, blues. A city office never looked so damn artistic, loving, funny – anything but plain, utilitarian. She captured just the way it feels when the kind clerk says I will help you.

Meredith agreed to answer a few questions about her work. If you get the chance to visit and talk with just one artist on June 12th, during the Las Vegas Celebrates the Arts Studio Tour, please choose Meredith Britt. You won’t regret it:

What inspires your work?

Art inspires me more than anything. Some paintings just jump out at me. Also any very innovative, far-out stuff like giant installations with dynamite and huge vats of maraschino cherries or airplane parts cut into toothpicks and inserted in the ground encircling the earth at the equator or bubble machines rigged up to car mufflers or shoes filled with rhinestones, jello and mouse skeletons. You know, that sort of thing. Andy Warhol, Edward Hopper, David Hockney, Frida Kahlo, Vince Van Gogh are big for me. Many many other artists. Definitely local artists. Also, Las Vegas architecture.

When did you first know that you were an artist?

Gee, Birdie… Well, I have to say that Sister Mary Peter always put my work on the bulletin board.

Tell me about your favorite piece?

Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto in B flat major opus 18, second movement. Oh, you mean of mine? “Woman in the Desert” comes to mind. All I have of it is a snapshot. It’s a woman seen from the back in her office clothes carrying her purse walking in the desert.

What kind of art can folks expect to see at your home studio this upcoming Second Saturday during the Studio Tour?

I’m happy to say I have work at the new El Zocalo Co-op Gallery, 212 on the Plaza, and that will be my tour site this year. I have collages and paintings there. People have gone nuts for the collages. I can’t keep up with them. Most of them are made-up scenes of my vision of rural northeast New Mexico, another big huge inspiration for me. They depict my sense of sunshine, strong shadows, bright colors, small homes, closeness to the land and peacefulness that I associate with New Mexico.

Are you a dog or a cat person?

I am both. I wag my tail and purr.

You may reach Meredith Britt at meredithbritt@msn.com