retirement
t runs in the family,” says Judy Bauman about where she gets her talent for painting. “[My mother’s] side of my family was all artists. Every one of her brothers and sisters and her parents were painters or musicians. The most well-known was my mother, Elizabeth Zikmund,” she says. And it didn’t stop with Judy. Her own two daughters, one son and two grandchildren carry the creative gene too. “They’re mostly musicians, and some do acting too,” Judy says. Born and raised in Wilber, Nebraska, Judy had a unique upbringing. “It’s a little town that’s [mostly] Czechoslovakian. I grew up wearing costumes, but we saw them as everyday clothing,” Judy says. In 1963, Wilber was designated the Czech capital of Nebraska. To this day, the town holds an annual festival where residents dress in the traditional Czech folk costumes known as kroje. “My mother’s art was entirely Czechoslovakian. All of her paintings [were] of the people in those clothes. She was more of a realism artist than I am,” Judy says. While Judy has been painting as a hobby for most of her life, she relied on income from other jobs to pay the bills. “When you’re an artist, you can’t live off of it. You have to have something that supports you,” she says. In the early 1970s, Judy and her
Judy in her in-home art studio. After working for 15 years at UNC Hospitals, she and her husband have retired to Carolina Meadows.
blank canvas Retirement means more time for one Carolina Meadows resident to paint
By J am es Dupree | Photography by Peyton Sic k les
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chapelhillmagazine.com
July/August 2022