Mardi Gras traditions are meaningful to many of us, but they gave Gary Brady an epiphany that put him on his path as a full-time visual artist. 

The Mobile native was well into his 20s before he even gave much thought to art.

"I never drew or painted or anything like that when I was a kid," he says. "I was really into sports. I would go outside and ride my bike and climb trees, and later I played football, basketball, and baseball."

Gary's surprise trajectory from athlete to artist was remarkable and unexpected, and so are his paintings. An exhibition of his latest works opens Wednesday, Aug. 6, at Sophiella Gallery in downtown Mobile and continues through the Art Walk event on Sept. 12. There will be a reception from 7 to 8 p.m., followed by a music performance by his wife, the well-known musician Molly Thomas, who will be accompanied by guitarist Rick Hirsch.

While it's immediately clear that Gary has natural talent, he has also pushed himself through extensive study and training, just as he did in his athletic pursuits. 

His skills as a quarterback at Davidson High School earned him a scholarship to Lindenwood University in St. Louis. After a couple of years there, he returned home and started classes at the University of South Alabama with an eye toward a career in broadcast journalism. While there, he took a part-time job helping to build floats for Mardi Gras parades. Being around so many creative people, he says, inspired him to follow suit.

"I just thought, 'This is interesting to me, and I bet I could do it, too,'" he says, "so I started drawing."

He changed his major to art but decided to fully immerse himself in classical technique. To get the solid foundation he wanted, he enrolled in the Schuler School of Fine Arts in downtown Baltimore.

"I went there for three years, and there were 25 students total, so it was very small," says Gary. "I learned a lot, and it was very intense. The professors would yell at you, and I responded well to that. I wanted somebody to push me."

Gary tends to move around a lot, usually staying for a few years to really get to know a place before embarking on the next adventure. Besides Mobile, St. Louis, and Baltimore, he's also spent considerable time in New Orleans. That city's unique character is prominent in much of his artwork.

While living there in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Gary seized another opportunity that provided invaluable hands-on education. Knowing that scores of paintings had been damaged, Gary grabbed a phone book and called the New Orleans Conservation Guild to ask if they needed help with restoration work. 

He did that for five years.

"There were so many paintings that were damaged," says Gary. "They were from private collections, museums, auction houses, you name it. I worked on Monets and Renoirs and Boguereaus and got to take a Van Gogh out of the frame and hold it in my hands."

He and the other artists and interns at the lab cleaned and repaired over a thousand paintings, some with slight damage and others that had been ravaged by the rising floodwaters. In the process, of course, they were able to closely examine how they were created. This gave him unusual access to paintings of virtually all styles, ranging from realism to Impressionism to Abstract Expressionism.

Gary's own approach is hard to pin down because he loves to blur the stylistic lines. He is known for his liberal use of bright colors, so the series he is introducing at Sophiella next week is a dramatic departure from his usual style. For the exhibition, he's putting the finishing touches on 14 starkly monochromatic paintings.

"Sometimes, as a painter, you just wake up and say,' You know what, I'm going to paint in black and white for a while," he says. "Technically, it's known as grisaille, which is the use of one color — in this case, gray. I didn't intend for it to go on as long as it has, but I've really kind of fallen in love with it."

Some of the paintings feature a striking cityscape and the shadowy silhouette of a woman, facing away. Another is a portrait of his wife, Molly, expressively coaxing sounds from her violin.

The two got together in 2020, not long after Gary had a heart-related health scare. He works in a studio in their home that's almost adjacent to the room where she professionally records her music. 

"She's the biggest champion for my art, and I'm the biggest champion for her music and her pottery and jewelry making," he says. "And that's one of the beautiful things, that we are both so passionate about our respective art forms, but we don't step on each other's toes."

There's no admission fee for the event next Wednesday at Sophiella Gallery (111 Dauphin Street), but donations are encouraged to help with expenses related to the recording, production, and promotion of Molly's new album. The reception will take place from 6 to 7 p.m. downstairs, and then guests can proceed upstairs for the hour-long listening-room performance. (Seating is limited. You can reserve your spot by contacting Sophiella Gallery or by texting (251) 583-7087.)

Once the exhibition is over, Gary's paintings will remain available for purchase at Sophiella. He has been among the many artists represented by the gallery for nearly two years, and he says he's happy that owner Kim Kelly suggested that he and Molly team up for this special event.

"We've wanted to do something like this, to have a show where we combine our art together," he says, "and I hope that we're able to have more opportunities to do it."

In the meantime, he is enjoying having his own private studio space in such a peaceful setting as Point Clear. He thinks of the calmer, quieter sense he gets from viewing his recent works and wonders whether it's partly because of his surroundings, and so fewer distractions.

"In other places, you do sometimes have excitement and uncertainty and stimuli that are not so much in your control," Gary says. "Working on my paintings here is different because this is home, and it's such a relaxed setting."

You can view his latest collection of contemporary art at GaryBradyStudios.com

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