GOOD NEIGHBORS: MARGARET WATTS
“The Nativity”
An Inspired Artist
Local painter Margaret Watts’ larger-than-life gallery—68 pieces in all—surely must inspire the congregants of the equally larger-than-life Queen of Peace Catholic Church on SR 200 on a typical Sunday. But her paintings are also remarkable for their timeless stories from the Bible and for the memories they evoke from the artist who created such lovely works.
26
BY CLAUDIA O’BRIEN • PHOTOS BY STEVE FLOETHE
F
or decades, professional fine artist Margaret Watts has delighted people near and far with her memorable art. Some of our readers may even be fortunate enough to have one or more of the Ocala painter’s works hanging on their walls. Margaret is perhaps best known locally for her realistic oil and pastel landscape paintings. Many of her works, inspired by places in and around Ocala and Marion County, offer a strong sense of place and an aura of serenity in our often too-hurried world. Readers may also have seen her lovely drawn and painted renditions of local
OCALA’S GOOD LIFE retirement redefined
past and current historic structures made into popular notecards and used in books on the history of Marion County. There is, however, one aspect of Margaret’s art that many of her fans may not know about. It’s the magnificent collection of her Bible-inspired paintings that hangs on the walls of Queen of Peace Catholic Church on SR 200. TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO, Father Patrick J. O’Doherty, pastor at Queen of Peace, asked fine artist and professor John Briggs at the then-called Central Florida Commu-
