Aug 15, 2010

Putting an artist’s touch on ValleyBy Joanie CradickJournalStar.com

Valley, NE — Wendy Deane has put her artistic touch on this town of 1,800 along the Elkhorn River about an hour north of Lincoln.

Since 2003, she has bought and renovated three old buildings, now housing The Gallery and Loft; Eclectic … gifts and more; and Delicious! … pastries and cafe, operated by her sister, Trudy Fennell.

Deane said her role in trying to make Valley a destination for visitors from Omaha, Lincoln, Fremont and beyond began not with a plan but a request. One of her four sons, Jason Himberger, owned an Omaha restaurant and wanted to decorate it with his mom’s artwork.

Deane had begun painting contemporary art for fun in the basement of her home in Ginger Woods, north of Valley.

She describes herself as self-taught, other than studying under the late master landscape artist Oscar Sormani. A stay-at-home-mom, her only job experience had been working in a flower shop after she graduated from high school.

Her home’s basement studio had no windows and the floors were concrete. Himberger called it a dungeon. But the work she created there won an audience at Himberger’s Grillhouse restaurant, so much so she needed a bigger and better place to paint.

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