Karen Kistler

karen.kistler@salisburypost.com

 

FAITH — With July 4th just around the corner, the Faith Fourth of July celebration is approaching its 79th year in existence, featuring its traditional parade, amusement rides, fireworks, live music, ceremonies and food.

Since 2019, Salisbury-based photographer Traci Arney has been hard at work capturing all the various aspects of this family-friendly event and on June 25, her solo exhibition titled, “Echos of Summer: Faith’s 4th of July Celebration,” opened, providing an opportunity for people to see her artwork of this longstanding tradition. The exhibit will remain open through July 5 at The Potter’s House, 108 A N. Main St., Faith. 

During the opening, family, friends and others from the community who learned of the event gathered for the reception to see the exhibit, which includes 25 large pieces, which Arney said she wanted to show pure art. 

“I’ve always approached it from a fine art point of view,” she said. “It’s interesting when you go to the park, you don’t see people on their phones and it feels like you are stepping back in time. People are actually interacting with one another and it feels magical and stepped out of time, and that’s kind of what I’ve tried to show in the selection of pieces I have.”

The exhibit also includes a wall of 200 4x6s showing a wide variety of scenes from past celebrations some of which include portraits, the fair, parade, street dance and people at the park.

On the last day of the celebration, anyone can come and take any of the 4×6 photos off the wall for free. These photos, Arney said, are “a gift to the community for letting me take pictures for so long.”

Pointing out different people she knew in the photos, Pat Morgan said she grew up in Faith and had gone to lots of the July 4th events and these were bringing back memories for her. She had learned of it at church and came to check them out.

Taking an up-close look at one of the photos of children playing on a merry-go-round, Pam Crist said this was one of her favorites.

Crist said Arney used to work for her in a photography lab she owned in Greensboro and wanted to come to support her, not just because she was one of her employees, but, she said, “Traci was probably one of the best employees we ever had” adding that “she is amazing photographer. She has a great eye.” 

Multiple from the local artistic community came, and Arney noted all of the support she has received from them, including people from Mooresville Arts, Waterworks and The Light Factory.

Anne-Scott Clement, executive director of Waterworks Visual Arts Center, said she was “so excited for Traci. Her work is just incredible and I’ve enjoyed getting to know her through the years.”

She said Arney teaches at Waterworks and would be teaching a photography class this summer.

Dixon Handshaw and Dina Dembicki, both with Mooresville Arts, attended and studied the various photos in the exhibit.

Handshaw said he was at the fair last year photographing it with Arney and said he saw her at work and was so impressed, noting that this event has been a huge part of her life since she was a little girl.

“She just had the best time walking around with the camera at that fair and I had the best time, just mostly watching her,” he said.

Mike Ritzie from Mooresville said he knew Arney through photography and he, like Dembicki, had learned of the event from her and wanted to come and support her and see the work.

“I see it online,” said Ritzie, “but it makes a difference to come and see it in print, hanging on the wall. It’s really gorgeous stuff.”

Having visited the park her whole life, Arney said that when her oldest son was old enough to go to the park, she began to take her camera. She moved, but it was when she returned to Salisbury that she said, “I decided to shoot the project in earnest and it’s always been such a big part of my life.”

That was in 2019, and the photos in the exhibit reflect events from that timeframe through 2024.

Arney said she took time off of work and arrived at the park when the trucks pulled in and stayed until the park was completely closed and everybody gone, taking photographs at night, repeating the process until the trucks pulled out, therefore catching every possible facet of the celebration.

Attending the Faith 4th has been a family event as Arney shared that her parents Jean and Guy Johnson had worked at food booths and taken her from the time she was very young.

Seeing the photos during the exhibition, Jean said that her daughter has “always had that spark” to which Guy said, “it’s like if she had a camera between her and another person, she was a different person. Because of the camera, she was free to do whatever. She’s always loved it ever since she picked up that first camera in junior high school.”

In a release, the exhibition has been described as a “visual tribute to the enduring spirit of the Faith 4th of July Celebration, and it captures the vibrancy of this tradition.”

Wanting to capture this Faith 4th event because it feels like home plus having a respect for it and wanting to make sure the history of it is preserved, Arney said, “a lot of the things that I shoot are about historical processes or preserving memories.”

Noting the support she has received from the artistic community plus friends who traveled a distance to support the show, “has been so meaningful to me,” said Arney. “Having them see something that has been a passion project for me for so long and really be able to see why I love the Faith 4th, why I’ve spent so many years photographing it, it’s really meaningful.”