No View of Water

1999

6” x 8”

Primary Techniques:

Line etching, dry point, and pastel

No View of the Water represents a cabin located near Lake Hyco, North Carolina. When tobacco farming was profitable and the new power dam and the lake that would form behind it had not yet been conceived, farmers chose this land for its ease of farming. After the dam was built and the lake filled, a view of the lake raised the property values as vacationers built large houses on the lake’s edge.

As the quality of the farm land played out, formerly successful farmers and their families abandoned their farms as their land became worth next to nothing. Meanwhile land on banks of the lake, only a quarter of a mile away, was desirable and costly.

Because of the poor quality of the land, and its distance from Lake Hyco, a family of poor dirt farmers became squatters and converted the tobacco drying barn into a home. No View of the Water is a reflection of that time and place.