February is Glass Quest Month! More places to see and buy art in February and March. What are Camano artists up to?
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Art Events on Camano/Stanwood
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Glass Quest, bigger than ever, to be featured on King 5 Evening show.
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Hundreds of glass balls being prepared!
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"Looks like this year's Great North West Glass Quest event is going to be the biggest yet! Now that the Camano Island chamber has taken over the event in totality, it has grown even more. The event has more businesses and parks doing the event this year then ever before. This means that I will be making more glass floats then ever before -- we are at 424 limited, numbered floats now, and that number can grow a bit. We will also be making 100 or so unlimited floats that will be for sale," reports Mark Ellinger.
"King 5 came to the studio on the 24th to do a piece on the event for the Evening show that will include a segment about the blowing of the floats and looking for them at Cama Beach State Park."
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Art Galleries to Visit On Camano/Stanwood
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Have a craving to see some art? You don't need to go far to see a lot of art. Here is a list of local galleries open nearly every weekend, some weekdays and by appointment.
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Vintage Watercolorists of Washington
at Sunnyshore Studio in MARCH
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CAA Artists Jack Dorsey and John Ringen featured
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"Washington State has been home to a host of distinguished watercolor artists over the years like Florence Harrison Nesbitt, Perry Acker, Jess Cauthorn, Victoria Savage, Arne Jensen, and Mike Burns to name just a few. The Northwest Watercolor Society (NWWS) which was founded in 1939 in Seattle Washington, has been a leading organization dedicated to the celebration of watercolor.
In light of this rich tradition, Sunnyshore Studio is partnering with the Northwest Watercolor Society to host the first of five Vintage Watercolorists of Washington art shows. The five artists chosen for the inaugural show are Jack Dorsey, John Ringen, Genny Rees, Nancy Axell, and Thomas Williams Jones. Their original watercolors will be shown at Sunnyshore Studio on Saturdays March 10th, 17th, and 24th, 10:00am-5:00pm, with a reception from 3:00-5:00pm on March 10th. A video tribute will share their journey with watercolor. Their stories will eventually be compiled into a book celebrating their artistic legacy.
It is called the Jack Dorsey Invitational in honor of the patriarch of Sunnyshore Studio and one of the vintage watercolorists of Washington today. Jack Dorsey is thrilled to invite artist friends, colleagues, and peers to this showcase and celebration of their art and cultural contribution."
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Watercolorist John Ebner has been spending time experimenting with alcohol inks on tiles and other hard surfaces. "I like the intense colors and the way they have a mind of their own. I then pour two part epoxy over the tiles. This gives it a very high gloss finish.
The other thing I’m working on is a coffee table book of my art, celebrating my 75 years on this earth, and twenty years of participating in the Studio Tour. "
Hopefully, all you fans will be able to buy the book at the studio tour.
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Chaim Bezalel and Yonnah Ben Levy
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"Yonnah and I will be coexhibiting our sculpture, both collaborative and individual, in an exhibit at the Khan Museum in Ashkelon before we return to Stanwood in April. A portion of our exhibit will be the 12 large bowls (16-18 in. diameter each) called "Bowls of Blessing" representing the sayings of Jacob over his 12 sons in the last chapter of Genesis. They were first shown several years ago in the Bay Area and then at our studio during the studio tour before we shipped them to Israel. Also, here's a video that I made on the project".
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This is a triptych painted by Michele Rushworth this year for a family on Mercer Island. She has also just finished two portraits for the Supreme Court of New York State and will be traveling to the Pentagon in the spring for the unveiling of the portrait she painted for the Secretary of the Air Force.
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April Brauneis: Artist and Author
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"The Navarre Link is a psychological western set in Wyoming/Colorado during the late 1800's. It's a story of two outlaws who realize the error of their ways, and are trying to go straight and earn a pardon from the governor of Wyoming. It's a story about family, friendship, loyalty and redemption. It gets dark at times, but it has fun as well, and LOTS of action!"
In addition to writing the book, she painted the book cover art!
Talk to April and view her paintings at Studio #25 on this year's Studio Tour.
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"One of my more recent paintings is a "classical" still life: fruit with a green glass wine bottle and a colorful drape for compositional interest. Recently some of my artist colleagues have challenged me to use softer lines and be less concerned about reproducing the subject with photographic accuracy. As one person put it, "color outside the lines." In that sense, this painting turned out more or less as I had intended, which is always a source of satisfaction. My wife was also very pleased. But my oldest brother, for whom I have done several pieces, asked innocently, "Is it finished?" He expressed some surprise because it was a departure from many of my earlier pictures in which I have taken the details to completion as much as possible. Beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder!
Currently, this and eight other paintings are on display at the Gastroenterology department of Skagit Regional Clinics in Mt. Vernon, Washington through April. They are located at 1400 Kincaid Street, Mt. Vernon, 98274."
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Chris Tuohy - musician, photographer, painter
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You might know Chris Tuohy as a musician, dance instructor, fine art photographer, commercial photographer, or even polar bear wannabe, but he also paints and draws! Here's one of his latest.
"My wife & I went to Paris for a few days on our way to spend the holidays with family in Switzerland. We stayed at the Renaissance Marriott. The Hotel had various artists' art work all through the hotel. There were three oil paintings that I liked by an artist named Fawn Brachemi. One of the paintings looked like it may have been
influenced by Picasso. She had one breast and no arms, the painting was called “Maternity” so the one breast made sense to me. I was inspired to draw because of this painting. My drawing became very different but would not have happened if I had not seen Fawn’s painting. I did two versions, one was like Fawn's with one
breast. A second was from a friend's request to add a second breast -- the version you see here. My design of the hair was much different, and I also added arms.
I drew four nudes in Paris. They will be on display during the Studio Tour!"
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Coming together
Russ Riddle is working on a couple of geometric pieces in contrasting woods. This round table top is just coming together and will be available at the Studio Tour. "I envision the piece providing several layers of experience: depth, like looking down a funnel, movement, and illusion when viewed at acute angles, and am especially excited to see how the unique and special reflective and chatoyant properties of wood add to the optical properties of the designs. So far, the table top has involved crafting 288 separate pieces of wood."
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Elger Bay Village - A new focal point for art on the island?
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Elger Bay Concept Elevation
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That seems to be the intent of Ahmed Jaddi who is developing plans for a "boutique artistic colony, a mini village" at Elger Bay. The development would include a 2400 sf art studio, apartments, and cabins for artists.
Mr. Jaddi is a structural engineer and urban planner with 55 years of professional experience involving a range of projects from the Jefferson Arch, to Supersonic and 747 plane projects for Boeing, to buildings on the UW campus and Bremerton shipyard, to remodels of Avenues and Parks. He has lived on Camano with his wife since 2003.
Artists are invited to contribute their comments / ideas about the design of the 2400 square feet art studio, an entrance to the village, landscaping and sculptures on the site. Contact Mr. Jaddi at
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CAA Program for February
by
Opal Cocke, fiber artist
Wed. Feb 7th 6:30 pm
Camano Community Center
Public Welcome
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"My earliest memories are of my mom’s hands creating with fabric and yarn. She always had projects underway, and her hands were never idle. Every Wednesday we took the bus to the church to ‘quilt’ with the sewing ladies. I can still remember their hands working with pieces of fabric, their chit chat and laughter filling the room.
Much later, when I was teaching, my passion was to make math and literature come alive for my students. I did this by pushing the limits and edges of the traditional teaching methods. I co-partnered a nongraded multi-age classroom which was, at the time, quite controversial. This left little time for my love of fabric, although I couldn’t resist buying patterns and fabric for a future time.
Since retirement, I have been completely absorbed in fabric art. Although I grew up with needle crafts, I never really learned these skills, so I took classes to learn more about the traditional quilting that my mom did. I also bought a sketch book and began drawing every day. Soon I was exploring watercolors, ink, and mixed media. I challenged myself to draw a bird sketch every day for three months. I drew and painted on tags, index cards, and filled many sketch books.
Later I became interested in combining my love of fabric with this new found art as a way to express my love of color and line. After taking additional classes, I was soon stretching and reaching and making the edges fuzzy between traditional and ‘new’ and loved the challenge of finding my voice in traditional patterns by personalizing either color combinations or composition. Challenging myself later, I created a mixed media fabric journal, a piece each week which embodied fabric, sketches, yarn, and just about anything to respond to a prompt for that week. Three years of these weekly journal pieces record my days exploring composition, color, and materials.
The fabric art I am doing today is vibrant with bright colors and bold lines. I like to include the unexpected, surprise elements. My pieces are usually not planned out, but grow organically from an idea. I use some techniques from traditional quilting combined with innovative layering, raw edges, and decorative hand stitching to composed my fabric art. I continue to challenge myself and push the edges.
My work has been exhibited at the LaConner Quilt and Textile Museum, in juried shows including the Machine Quilters Exposition, Sisters Oregon Outdoor Quilt Show, and QuiltFest in LaConner. Many pieces are in private collections."
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