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The Oak Tree

by Steven Spires

Hardcover: $19.99

Life is good for a southern oak and the family who lives near it. It grows and thrives as the children play on and around it, and the entire family takes in the abundance of shade from the tree’s many leaves and branches.

However, when a massive storm heads toward their community, the tree fears the worst and is worried about the safety of the family it loves.

“The Oak Tree” is beautifully illustrated and told from the perspective of an old southern oak. As it stands tall, enduring the power of a large hurricane, losing many of its branches and twigs, it watches the destruction of the family’s home and clings to the promise from the family that they will return. 

Review presented by Books Along the Teche 

337-367-7621  |  106 E. Main Street, New Iberia 

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SAMANTHA HEBERT

Work: Abstracts on Yupo 

Medium: alcohol ink

Price: $125 each

Available at: Judice Art Collective, Lafayette

Samantha Hebert has spent hundreds of hours perfecting her unique artform, which uses a combination of alcohol ink, isopropyl alcohol, and air. Her process begins on a sheet of thick synthetic Yupo Paper, a plastic-like, waterproof substance. To the Yupo Paper, she applies highly pigmented alcohol ink on its surface, then strategic adds drops of 91% isopropyl alcohol to activate the flow of the ink, bringing it to the surface and allowing her to literally blow the ink into desired swirls and designs. She then mounts her final works onto cradle boards and seals them with resin. 

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KRISTIE MAYEAUX

Work: Celosia

Medium: mixed media on board

Price: $1,200

Available at: Bare Walls, Lafayette

Kristie Mayeaux is made of many parts: artist, academic, contemplative, community supporter. The former curator of visual arts for Basin Arts, and active participant in many initiatives in the Lafayette art community, earned her BFA at ULL and her MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She’s more recently been exploring our interconnectedness with one another and with our natural world. In a profile for Bare Walls, the artist says, “I aim to model a healthy relationship between experiencing/participating in the world and working towards a lifelong body of work that is authentic, exploratory and evolutionary within content and medium.”

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TED BERTRAND

Work: The Waxia Road Crowd

Medium: acrylic

Price: contact artist

Available at: ARTworks by Ted Bertrand, Sunset

In this 48×60 acrylic on canvas, artist Ted Bertrand employs the same vibrant colors, scale and impressionism for which his previous works have gained an enthusiastic following. The retired teacher, husband, father and grandfather was born and raised in Opelousas, and now runs an art gallery in Sunset. There, he shows his own art and at least two others’ on a regular basis. His affection for the Acadiana countryside is clear throughout his portfolio of work, depicting Acadian-style homes, farms, and Louisiana landscapes. He hosts an open house every first Friday of the month at his gallery, ARTworks by Ted Bertrand.