Nansemond-Suffolk Academy’s 27th annual art show and sale will begin Jan. 26 and continue through Feb. 3.

The show benefits the academy’s fine arts program and provides a showcase for new and established artists. This year’s honorary chairman, Carole Böggemann Peirson, has been involved in the show for about seven or eight years.

“I always loved to draw and paint as a kid,” Peirson, 41, said in a luncheon in her honor at the academy recently. She is a native of the Netherlands and moved to America in 2000, settling on the Eastern Shore, where she still lives.

She took her degree in design and communication in 1996 at Ichthus Polytechnic in Rotterdam and began work as a graphic artist. However, her hobby was always painting.

When she moved from a crowded Dutch city to the rural Eastern Shore, she knew she could never go back. She gradually worked at her outside job less and focused more on her painting.

“It became a hobby, and I realized I loved it and wanted to make it a profession,” she said.

She now is a full-time professional artist, working almost exclusively in oil painting and preferring landscapes, still life and floral scenes. She enjoys “plein-air,” or outdoor, painting.

“I like the variation of it,” she said. “After a couple of landscapes, I want to do something else.”

She increased her creativity and technical ability through studying with now-late Joe “Adamo” Adams, a well-known painter from Painter, Va., who also has been involved in the NSA art show.

“I was very fortunate to have such a great teacher,” she said, adding that he helped her realize the photographs she often works from do not have to be exactly replicated in an oil painting.

“He really made me realize the difference between a photograph and an oil painting,” she said. “It’s the difference between a poem and a technical manual. It’s really a personal vision.”

Peirson now is passing along the love of painting by teaching.

“I love painting, so I love teaching and making other people excited about it too,” she said.

Teachers at NSA incorporate the artwork, which hang in school hallways, into lessons, school officials said. Peirson likes the idea.

“Creativity is so important in a child’s life, because you need creativity in any profession to be successful,” she said.

Peirson will have several works in the show, which will feature more than 150 artists representing a wide variety of media. Prices at past shows have ranged from $25 to $7,000.

The public is welcome to attend the show. Guests can visit with the artists and enjoy refreshments and entertainment during the opening reception on Jan. 26 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The show continues with the following operating hours:

• Jan. 27, 1 to 4 p.m.
• Jan. 28 to Feb. 1, 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. each day
• Feb. 2, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
• Feb. 3, 1 to 4 p.m.

For more information on the show, call Melissa Hlinovsky at 539-8789 ext. 3333 or email her at mhlinovs@nsacademy.org.