UA News

Sandra Montgomery paints on old wood-frame windows of different sizes and shapes, with peeling paint, tarnished hardware and all. Montgomery states, “My first thought is to create a scene you could see looking out a window, if you had one. The paintings have evolved to still life as well. A well-worn old window is interesting and funky. Yet painted with a scene and hung on a wall, it becomes fine art. Hung in another window, with light coming through, the drama is significant, the colors expand. Mounted outside on the patio, it becomes garden art. I am a gardener, and most of my subjects come from my garden, the desert, mountains and a lot of old barns. I am from a homestead family in Yuma, Ariz. by way of Alabama.”

Montgomery started the Old Window Art business in 2003. A graduate of The University of Arizona, class of 1975 in radio and television, she always sketched and painted for fun. She got serious after painting a barn picture on an old wood-frame window from a 1948 house in her central city neighborhood. She fell in love with the art form.

Montgomery collects old wood-frame windows from across the country, from salvage yards, friends, construction sites and more. She literally recycles old windows. The dumps are full of them, broken and wasted. She salvages the whole ones, cleans them up, paints them and turns them into art. Still, they are a limited resource.

Paintings are done in permanent acrylic and are sealed to withstand weather. Some window frames are painted, while others are left natural to show the beauty of the grain in the wood or the ravages of time. Each painting is an original.