Downtown Rapid City continues to evolve with new restaurants, shops and entertainment. Last week downtown just got a little cooler with the recent addition of the Bonzeye Art Gallery.

In this week’s Art Beat, we meet the artist gallery owner, who combines her love of nature, weather and light to create her original works.

Bonny Fleming has been a professional artist for 15 years… but she has been creating art as long as she can remember.

She is a photographer, she paints, sculpts and is a graphic artist as well. When she takes a hike in the Black Hills, she sees nature differently than most of us.

Bonny Fleming says ” So you really know what it is, it’s the way the light hits things. If it’s shining off a piece of grass or a leaf or sometimes you look out there and things blow you away because they’re beautiful and i can’t put a pin in what it is that does that for me, but it happens all the time and so what I try to do is try to figure out how to use the camera to bring it home with me as much as possible.”

Her original works of photography combine the beauty of the Black Hills with technology and nature. The result is true beauty.

Bonny Fleming says “These are all done using a series of photos, I stack different photos I’ve taken throughout the years on top of them and I’ll start with a buffalo and just let it tell me what’s going to happen from there and I’ll go find some trees and it’s been really amazing to find the connections with these, how feathers look like forests and how much fur of the buffalo can turn into a waterfall.”

Her photos aren’t just on the walls in her new gallery, but they are also transformed into jewelry and photo cards. Both tourists and locals have the same reaction to her work.

Bonny Fleming says “What so neat about these pieces and having them in the window and watching people walk by and double take and have that reaction that emotional connection to the pieces which I think when you can attach the artist to a piece you really have that ability to move someone rather than just art on the wall.”

At 14, Bonny learned photoshop and after a few classes and some practice she was designing websites and promotional material. Some of her current designs are for the Black Hills Community Theatre and Central High School playbills.

The Bonzeye Gallery has only been open for a week and Bonny’s enjoying meeting tourists and visiting with locals.
Bonny says “It’s been great to have people walk off the street. It’s been great to have conversations with tourists and locals and connect with everybody.”

The Bonzeye Gallery is located downtown on 6th street next to the Elks Theatre and it’s open every Saturday and most afternoons.