The Johnson Center for the Arts will host an opening reception in honor of its newest exhibit, “Works by Bill Hill: TroyFest 2011 Best of Show Winner” from 4:30 until 6:30 p.m. today. The reception is open to the public and hosted by the Troy Arts Council.

Each year, the TroyFest Best of Show winner receives a one-month exhibit at the Johnson Center.

Seventy pieces of Hill’s work are on loan to the Johnson Center by local collectors and the Troy Arts Council.

Morgan Drinkard, Center interim director, said many pieces are from the collections of Bill and Ann Thompson, Jerry and Cathy Beckett, Mack and Mary Gibson and the late Corley Chapman, Jr.

“The Bill Hill exhibition is a huge show and a great show,” Drinkard said. “It’s absolutely beautiful. Bill Hill does amazingly detailed work. His use of watercolor is immaculate. It is so precise that you would think that it’s pen and ink.”

Hill’s primary mediums are watercolor and acrylics but he also uses graphite, which is not often a medium of choice for most artists, Drinkard said.

“His subject matter ranges from people to buildings to animals and to things imagined,” Drinkard said. “His work can be of things ordinary or ornate or unusual. But, whatever subject Bill Hill chooses, the result is masterful.

“We are looking forward to celebrating the work of local artist Walter Black, who is the 2012 TroyFest Best of Show winner, next May,” Drinkard said.

The exhibit will be on display until May 25. The Johnson Center for the Arts is open 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. Wednesday through Friday and until 4 p.m. on Saturday. Admission is always free.