Coming November 2026, Martha Lower: Legacy of a Portrait Artist. An opening reception will be help on Saturday, November 14, 2026 at 6PM.
Do you have a Martha Lower painting you would like to be considered for exhibition? Deadline September 30. 2026. Contact Curator Judy Gilbert for details at 706-342-5634 or email gilbert.judya@gmail.com.
~About Martha~
Martha Tull Lower is an American portrait artist whose career has been closely tied to the historic town of Madison, Georgia. Her love of art began at home in Atlanta, where she spent most of her youth: growing up with a sister, she watched her father pursue his own work as an amateur artist across a variety of media, and his example kindled a lifelong fascination with, and joy in, art. After graduating from North Fulton High School, she earned an undergraduate degree from Vanderbilt University and a master's degree in English from the University of Georgia, providing a liberal-arts foundation that shaped her artistic perspective and the literary refinement evident throughout her work.
Lower and her four children made Madison their home in 1979 when they moved from Huntsville, Alabama. Her sister had separately made her way to Madison, and in time their mother, the late Ann Tull, followed her daughters there, remaining until her death in 2005. Lower taught high school in Madison for a number of years in the 1980s before devoting herself full-time to her own studio practice. Though art stood at the center of Lower's working life from the mid-1980's until 2018 (roughly 35 years), she began doing portraits as early as 1974.
In Madison she became known above all for her nuanced portraiture, rendering individuals and families with sensitivity and technical assurance. Working in pastel, oil, and watercolor, she brought a versatile hand and an enduring commitment to traditional methods of representation. Her portraits, original works, and prints were widely collected by local patrons, establishing her as a leading figure in the regional art community. Among her commissions, portraits of three Presidents General of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution hang in Memorial Continental Hall, the organization's headquarters in Washington, D.C.
Lower's artistic life was inseparable from her intellectual and domestic world. When her children were nearing college age, she married the late Dr. Charles "Chuck" Lower, a professor of English at the University of Georgia, and together they made their home a center of scholarly and artistic life. The couple traveled often to Europe, particularly the United Kingdom, drawn by academic Shakespeare festivals connected to Chuck's scholarship. Those journeys left their mark on her work. Their shared devotion to literature, history, and aesthetics also found expression in a distinctive personal collection of art, books, and antiques. It was within this setting that she sustained an active studio practice, producing commissioned portraits alongside independent work.
By the close of her career, Lower was widely regarded as an accomplished and respected artist whose legacy rests in both her substantial body of work and her lasting contributions to Madison's cultural life... an art rooted in place, enriched by community, and defined by a lifelong dedication to craft. She now lives in north Atlanta, where she enjoys frequent visits from her four children, nine grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren.