The Creative Arts Guild is celebrating Independence Day with a two new exhibits — the annual Flag Show celebrating the American flag in the Main Gallery and the visual humor of Don Stewart in Gallery 111.

The Flag Exhibit is a chance for artists to celebrate the American flag and its influence upon the art world and our communities.

“I am excited about the many variations of the American Flag to covering the walls of the gallery. It is our hope that the artwork will encourage conversations, evoke memories and promote feelings of patriotism and pride,” said gallery director Megan Roddenberry.

Participating artists include professional, amateur, Friendship House students, Dalton Community Center, adults and children and includes paintings, glass, photography and multi-media.

“I believe gallery visitors will be pleasantly surprised and delighted as we celebrate Independence Day in such a creative way,” said Roddenberry.

Don Stewart takes an intellectual, yet humorous approach to art. The artist’s preferred medium, a holdover from his academic past, accounts for the crisp detail in his whimsical drawings. Ballpoint lines bring out tones and textures unattainable with conventional pen and ink; the black and white renderings come alive with hidden images and visual puns.

Stewart earned a bachelor’s degree in biology and art from Birmingham-Southern College, where he enrolled in drawing classes under Raymond McMahon and Robert Shelton as a break from a strict premedical curriculum — unaware of the impact they would eventually have on his life. Here he discovered Arcimboldo’s classic substitutional paintings, M.C. Escher’s masterful tessellations, and the composite renderings and sculptures of classmate Tom Wilkes.

Stewart also experimented independently with techniques in ballpoint pen drawing — especially after the instrument was banned from Shelton’s classroom.

He continued to sketch as a hobby during medical school in Birmingham, and throughout his surgical internship at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. There, in addition to keeping a 24-hour call schedule, Dr. Stewart managed to win awards for short fiction and poetry, and successfully published his first two composite drawings.

After a year of resident training, the pen finally proved mightier than the scalpel, and the young doctor’s creative interests gained the upper hand. He finished his internship, earned his medical license, and promptly turned his full attention to drawing.

For the past 20 years Stewart has made his living as a self-styled visual humorist, hammering words and pictures together at the DS Art Studio Gallery in Homewood, Ala.

July’s Second Friday reception is Friday. The opening reception begins at 5:30 p.m. with traditional Fourth of July fare served. All gallery receptions are free and open to the public. Both exhibits are held at the Guild, 520 W. Waugh St., Dalton.

The Creative Arts Guild, the oldest multidisciplinary community arts organization in the state, is the Dalton/Whitfield Commission for the Arts. This program is supported in part by the Georgia Council for the Arts (GCA) through the appropriations of the Georgia General Assembly. GCA also receives support from its partner agency, the National Endowment for the Arts. For more information about the Guild or any of its programs visit the Web site at www.creativeartsguild.org or call 706-278-0168. -