Watercolor on paper, monogrammed and dated 1987, inscribed at lower left, float mounted and framed under glass. This is a study for the 1987 U.S. Olympic Festival poster for which she earned the North Carolina Poster Award.

Sheet size 5 1/4 x 12 1/4 in.; Frame dimensions 19 1/2 x 12 1/2 in.

Somerhill Gallery at Straw Valley, Durham, North Carolina

The daughter of the Caswell County sheriff, Maud Gatewood was born and raised in the rural town of Yanceyville, North Carolina. She began her art studies at the age of 10 at Averett College in Danville, Virginia. In 1954 she graduated from North Carolina Woman's College (now UNC-Greensboro) with a B.F.A., studying under Gregory Ivy. The next year she earned her M.A. in Painting from Ohio State. And in 1963 she was awarded a Fulbright grant to study under Oskar Kokoschka in Austria.

She returned to North Carolina in 1964, where she was founding head of the Art Department at UNC-Charlotte. She was a faculty member of UNC-Charlotte until 1973. In 1975, she returned to Caswell County and became a professor of art at Averett College, a position she held until her retirement in 1997. Gatewood traveled extensively throughout her lifetime, but was always drawn back to her Caswell County roots.

Gatewood exhibited widely throughout the Southeast and her work is now among the most collected and sought after of North Carolina artists. She is represented in numerous public and private collections including the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, D.C.; North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh; Asheville Art Museum; Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, North Carolina; Nasher Art Museum at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina; and Coca-Cola, Atlanta, Georgia.

Some fading to colors; not examined out of the frame.