Barbara Jones HandTybee Island, GAMerida, Mexico

Recently I met a new friend from NYC who asked me where I grew up. When I said North Carolina, she seemed aghast. She said, “No, really, where are you from?” I repeated, “North Carolina, and in fact, I’m from Mt. Airy, the real Mayberry.” She said “No, REALLY.” Her disbelief was so palpable that I was left wondering if she assumed no one ever “escaped?” Or that surely no one from Mayberry speaks correct English? Or wears anything other than overalls?

I knew there was no way I could explain Mt. Airy to her, or how fortunate and proud I feel everyday to have grown up in a wholesome environment with a solid education that prepared me well for the life that has followed.

Some of my memories of those MAHS days include: circling the Freeze in Patti Easley’s Studebaker (or StudBuster, as we fondly called it); Villager outfits with Weejuns, obligatory charm bracelets and circle pins; learning the shag with the doorknob accompanied by my older sister’s beach music records; singing along with Tammi Terrell and Marvin Gaye’s “Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing, Baby;” after-school trips with my running buddy Gray Simmons and her sweet mom to check on her family’s farm in Virginia; wrecking my Mother’s car the very first time out with my new drivers’ license (I ran off the end of Banky Cockrell’s carport); clandestine getaways to Bobby Bradley’s parents’ mountain cabin; sneaking out of the house in the middle of the night to meet up with chums in the cemetery, or sometimes to go for a drive in a “borrowed” car; attending MAHS/East Surry basketball games with Linda Tickle who was giddy over her current boyfriend (and my future husband) Burke Archer; the after graduation trip to Myrtle Beach and gallons of Purple Passion. . . . In their own unlikely way, these experiences taught me important life lessons about responsibility, good judgment, perseverance and the consequences of lack of the above. They also taught me a lot about how to love, to be creative, to live life to the fullest and to have fun.

My life’s career has its roots here too, Though there wasn’t an art teacher at MAHS in our day and my first art class was at UNC, I found inspiration in the everyday surroundings and landscape of this particular place in the South which led to my career in the arts and my specialty in Self-Taught/Outsider/Vernacular Art. Over the years my various roles in this field as educator, museum curator and art dealer have provided me with endless rich relationships, travels and adventures which have fed my soul while providing a living. And a not bad art collection.

Today, after a productive and busy life in Atlanta for over 40 years, I now live with my husband Peter in Tybee Island, near Savannah, Georgia. Barbara Archer Gallery is now virtual, which allows lots of flexibility. I am an active board member of a Foundation that provides funding for worthy Georgia artists and their projects. I swim laps daily and head out in my kayak whenever possible. We live to travel, and spend our winters in Merida, Mexico where I study Spanish (still striving to be fluent!) and have returned, after 22 years away, to making my own art in clay.

My new motto is: “Go where you feel most alive.”