It’s unlikely you’ve ever seen anything like the Echo Gallery in Johnson City before. Even if you’ve visited here previously, it’s going to be different because everything here changes so frequently.
At a quick glance, it might look cluttered but look carefully. You’ll discover unique fine art and vintage furniture, you’ll see trash turned into art, you’ll even see holes in the wall that owner Linda Haddock is quite proud of.
Her goal here is to eliminate the barriers we tend to form, separating art from antiques, for example, or formal décor from breaks in the sheetrock exposing the building’s original brick.
“This is not your standard gallery full of standard art,” Linda says.
Echo brings it all together.
Art can repurpose what you’ve always thought of as trash. Take at look at Escama Studio’s purses and fashion accessories created from pull tabs that most of us would toss away. The unusual work is created by artists working in co-ops in Brazil.
Or marvel at the unique chess set made by Sky Tomson, who also makes bird houses from toilet floats.
You’ll discover functional art you can wear or sit on or that pairs up well with fine art. You’ll discover a room filled with vintage cowboy boots for sale. And you’ll see plenty of fine art, whether by Hill Country icon Ira Kennedy or the legendary Peter Max. You might even notice a couch covered in Emilio Pucci fabric once used to make Braniff flight attendant uniforms.
At the age of 19, Linda went to work as a flight attendant for Braniff International Airways and credits that phase of her life for setting her on the path she now embraces.
“I was flying all over the world in a high-fashion environment,” she recalls. “Everywhere I went I was always dragging stuff back home. I’ve always loved art.”
Linda always loved art and doing things artistically and credits the years traveling with Braniff as helping to bring it all together.
When Braniff went bankrupt, she went to college and got a degree in rehabilitation science at age 38. She taught social skills, behavior and ethics to grades 6 through 12. But art kept tugging at her and she came to Johnson City and opened her non-gallery gallery where she is helped by husband John Sone, a retired U.S. Army colonel and a government relations consultant.
Even the gallery itself is repurposed. Linda opened Echo Gallery in 2014 in an old laundromat up the street from its current location. She moved Echo in 2016 to this 6,000-square-foot building that was originally a Ford dealership.
Painted on a pillar outside the building is the phrase “Crossroads of Art and Science,” which is appropriate since Echo is surrounded by other art and vintage galleries and is across the street from the Science Mill, a hands-on science museum especially for children.
Linda says this gallery is the culmination of her life. “This is where my life comes together.”
She explains that her art is the gallery itself, an installation that echos her life.
“Everywhere I go, everything I see I bring back here. This is assemblage art on a huge scale,” Linda says with a broad smile. “It’s been fun.”
The Echo Gallery is located at 100 N. Nugent Ave. in Johnson City. It is open Mondays, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., Wednesdays and Thursdays 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., Fridays and Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Sundays noon to 4 p.m.
For More Information
830-321-0080, echoinjohnsoncity.com.
