“Keep an Eye Out for…” By Craig Kincaid

I’m really looking forward to showing my photographic art during the Open Studios Art Tour.

My “one man show” at Linnaea’s Cafe during the month of April was well received.  My idea to create “abstract” photographic art comes from my respect of painters who created abstract and impressionistic art: Henri Matisse, Vincent van Gogh, Cezanne, Braque, Kadinsky, Mondrian, Miró and Picasso to name a few.

Abstract art uses a visual language of form, color and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world.  While I don’t create abstract art, I see it in natural objects and scenery which when isolated without a frame or border looks abstract.  Many times I get the question, “What is it?”  Here are 3 examples of pieces from my gallery that will be for sale . . . Did I mention that each piece is large: 30″ x 40″?  I look forward to meeting you during the tour.

Under the Bean

Dry Vernal Pool

Full Moon Over Angel Island

More of Craig’s pieces can be seen on his blog and at his San Luis Obispo studio during both weekends of ARTS Obispo’s Open Studios Art Tour.

Origins: Rich Lasiewski

I have spent a large part of my life looking at pictures–mainly of people’s insides, and in black and white. I am a retired Diagnostic Radiologist.

I’ve loved glass since I was a kid melting glass rods in a Bunsen burner.  Shortly before retirement I decided to learn more about art and art glass, so I started with weekend beadmaking and fusing classes. With the creative process being difficult for me, I began with art classes at Hancock and Cuesta College. I then became a nearly full-time student at Cal Poly for 3 years, thanks to Crissa Hewitt and George Jercich, studying glass fusing, casting, blowing, and metalsmithing. This lead to teaching “Summer Glass” classes there for 7 years.

At home, I built a studio and then filled it with the equipment (a.k.a. toys) needed to make kilnworked and torchworked glass, metal and glass jewelry, and sculptures. Glass is my medium, and I have always loved paperweights.

My wife of 43 years, Kersti, and I collaborate frequently–especially with jewelry, where she will incorporate my glass beads into beautiful pieces. I enjoy experimenting with different methods to produce the final work: different colors, materials, shapes and sizes. I try to avoid repetitive pieces which would be boring and have been accused of playing rather than being a serious artist.  I really do enjoy it.

I have had enough ‘serious’ in my life as a physician, now I want to enjoy myself and also people do seem to get enjoyment out of seeing our finished pieces.

Rich & Kersti’s Arroyo Grande studio will be open both weekends of ARTS Obispo’s Open Studios Art Tour.  Stop by and see them!

Inspire Me! By Cheryl Barton-Petrie

Beauty in Organic Form

I don’t think of ‘starting’ as an artist, but just responding to the beauty in the world around me. The simple form of nature is what I try to capture in my etchings, drawings, and gel transfers.

Be sure to stop by Cheryl’s studio the weekend of October 13th & 14th during ARTS Obispo’s Open Studio Tour!  In the meantime, you can also see more pieces on her website.

My Favorite Tool: Flo Bartell

My favorite tool is my propane torch.  Not only is it essential in my encaustic painting process, but it warms me and offers a soothing rhythm while I work.  I relate the fire of my torch to my passion for my art especially in my new series, “On Fire.”

Flo’s Los Osos studio will be open October 13 & 14th during ARTS Obispo’s Open Studios Art Tour (see studio #84, page 21 of the Tour Catalog).

Catalogs for the event can be found throughout the county or you can download a copy.

Inspire Me! by Stuart Denker

Some of my paintings are based on 35mm Kodachrome slides taken during a 1990 trip to Greece. I completed a painting earlier this year based on my encounter with the re-assembled fragments of the sculpture from the West Pediment of the Temple of Zeus in the New Museum in Olympia. Walking in on this amazing art still stands out as one of the most inspiring happenings of the trip. Created between 472 and 456 BCE, this magnificent sculpture survived in place for about a thousand years before a succession of earthquakes brought it down and buried it.

This is the photo that the painting is based on:

Here is a screenshot of a museum catalog illustration of the surviving elements of both the East and West Pediment sculptures:

I’ve re-peopled the museum visitors, one of whom is a Greek widow walking past, paying no attention to the exhibit. The background wall color was changed in order to give the painting greater impact.

This is a photo of the finished painting:

“Wine It Was…” based on a quotation from Homer’s “Odyssey” (c 8th century BCE) wherein he poetically relates the mythic tale of a battle between the Lapiths and the Centaurs and an intervention by Apollo, the son of Zeus, this being the narrative content of the sculpture.

Be sure to stop by Stuart’s Los Osos studio both weekends of Open Studios Art Tour.  You can also see more of his work in ARTS Obispo’s Visual Artist Directory.

Inspire Me! By Shannon E.A. McNamara

Templeton Vineyard 12 x 24 oil

Although I started at a tender age drawing pencil and crayon pictures on the blank pages of my mother’s Bible, I expanded to many avenues of expression over the years, such as oil and watercolors. I am especially fond of plein air painting.  Being out there in the open air surrounded by nature is the most exciting time for me—focusing on the various elements and the challenges of bringing them to the canvas.

Moonstone Beach – 14 x 18 oil

My body of work reflects time spent in many beautiful locations here on the Central California Coast, as well as many other places in the United States and Europe.

Red Barns watercolor & Breakfast Anytime watercolor

Please visit Shannon’s website at www.seamcnamara.com or stop by her San Luis Obispo studio both weekends of ARTS Obispo’s Open Studios Art Tour.

Origins: Kim Bagwill

I’ve always love to draw and I started out copying comic books while playing at my grandmother’s house. When I was 12, I received my first oil paint set and taught myself to paint. I think my parents finally realized they had a problem when at age 13 I asked if I could paint on the unfinished cement basement wall of our brand new house. They came down and discovered I was sketching a 12′ x 8′ mural of John, Paul, George and Ringo from the Beatle’s Sgt. Pepper’s album. It took me seven months to finish, using a variety of wall paints from my parent’s hardware store, but 30 years later it’s still there.

I then went on to college and studied painting, photography and graphic design. I’ve been painting and taking photographs off and on my entire life, and supported myself with graphic and web design. I’ve always been fascinated with painting people, specifically faces. My current project is a series of portraits of school children from the 50s dressed in adult clothing. The original photograph I’m working from is a classroom-type shot of 16 children in three rows, and all are sober looking except one. I love seeing their personality in their faces and to make up stories about what they went on to do in their lives.

Paintings in process

More examples of Kim’s work can be seen on her website and be sure to stop by her Paso Robles studio both weekends of Open Studios Art Tour.

Origins: By Josephine Crawford

I have had three names: my father’s, Lisle; my first husband’s, Spinedi; and my current husband’s, Crawford.  So, I prefer to sign my paintings (if I sign them at all) simply Josephine, or even the date.

Like the paintings I make, things change from day to day. I have no favorite style or subject, and to be frank, I paint for my own amusement.

I started drawing and painting as a child of five and remember my artist father telling me “never erase.” I didn’t see him again as he died in the war, but feel his spirit in me as I paint.

My career was as a dancer, and later as a costume designer, so my paintings often reflect those themes.

I have maintained studios in San Luis Obispo, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Santa Monica. My current studio is in my house in the railroad district of San Luis Obispo.

 

My work reflects and is influenced by my environment (when I have a large space I paint big and when it’s simply the edge of my bed, small!) Music on the radio, politics, the weather, my feelings, memories and mood, all go into the work.

At the moment I feel that small things painted in my garden are the thing. They have no meaning except the wonder and uniqueness of every blade of grass, every leaf. I also love to do portraits of people, and of course, always the lines of dancers often dancing in nature.

Come and see the large variety of work I have and be surprised both weekends of the ARTS Obispo’s Open Studios Art Tour. I look forward to meeting you.

You can also see more of Josephine’s pieces in ARTS Obispo’s Visual Artist Directory.

Origins: Dr. C Hite

Origins of the Rag Kabuki

I am a lifetime, environmentally-challenged artist, who works out of my garden sculpture studio in Los Osos, California.

Parades, pageantry, funeral rituals and dreams have long been an influence on my artwork since living in the south of Taiwan as a little girl. My evolution as an artist has its origins in my self-image as the “Rag Kabuki,” a mysterious character, burdened and bundled, making progress by dragging it all forward with me.  I see a common thread of beauty in all things and repurpose, reprocess and recycle as an art form lifestyle.

I have created earth installations since a tot and found-object sculpture since four years of age.  I got well into inventing and creating in kindergarten and grade school when my father, recognizing my interest, gave me permission to use any tool in his crib (as long as I put them back). My mother had long supplied me with drawing paper, paints, pastels, color-pencils and a piano, to keep me occupied.  By the time I had unlimited access to piano lessons, real tools and building supplies, Mother was making inquiries of the butcher who supplied rolls of butcher paper for my epic drawings. I quickly used up the paper rolls, creating a series of individual film-cell drawings, which I then rolled through the back of a card board box theatre.  I read, taught myself to write at 4 years, and was soon composing poems, songs, and piano compositions.  My mother only told me I was a “gifted” child in the last year.  I define “gifted” as having an enthusiasm for life and keen interest in exploring and experimenting. Why some people don’t have this curiosity, don’t nurture it or are not themselves nurtured, I will never know why.

My working studio, #99 on this year’s ARTS Obispo Open Studio Art Tour, is a celebration of my enthusiasm for life during this year of the Dragon and end of the Mayan Calendar.  Installations of silk fans, giant nude paper-dolls, and ornate, repurposed “coolie” hats transform the garden and otherwise serious nature of my monumental ceramic sculpture work will be on display.

I reached the point where I don’t have to have all the answers, I only have to work towards a solution, intuitively.  If I cannot visualize or think of a conclusion for a large work, I will dream it.

Origins: Kira Fluer Olshefski

So where do I begin?  What is the origin of my art?  My earliest memory of being labeled an artist was in the third grade.  My teacher and her aide were standing over my shoulder singing praises of my work and saying,  “What a little artist she is!”  So what was this fabulous masterpiece?  It was a drawing of a penguin in a winter scarf, of course.  What a wonderful feeling being acknowledge for my art.  Those adorable penguins will melt people’s hearts every time.

I moved beyond winter-accessorized penguins when I took art class in high school. During the summers, I took Chinese brush painting classes.  The instructors I had were true inspirations to me. When it came time to apply for college, I seriously wanted to major in art.  Unfortunately, I was a victim of “teen-aged fuzzy brain and scattered thoughts syndrome.” I had no clue of how to put a portfolio together and didn’t realize the deadline for college applications was only a week away. Since I didn’t have a portfolio, I did manage to complete my applications and be accepted to Cal Poly majoring in Biological Sciences (a.k.a. second choice major). Okay, so the art thing had to be put on hold, but I did have elective units!  Between labs of botany, bio chemistry, zoology and physics, I took a variety of art classes.

After college, I went into the teaching field, sharing my knowledge of the sciences and art with elementary students.  My students and I took many walking field trips with drawing materials.  I ruled my class with a white board marker.  I used art as a way to positively manage the classroom.  The students knew that if they were attentive and working diligently during lessons, then they would be treated to an ongoing whiteboard cartoon of my last name caricature, “The Old Chef that Skis (Olshefski).”  Thanks to the students good behavior the old chef had many adventures escaping sharks, entering the Olympics, extreme sports, and much more. I have encountered students from my early years of teaching who still remember my whiteboard artwork and field trips.

My teaching years ended with a pink slip due to a lack of school funding.  Now what do I do?  While figuring out what I was going to do next, I began taking oil painting lessons with Atascadero artist, Tracy Di Vita.  Tracy is an artist that I have admired for many years.  My family and I were regulars at her Open Art Studio. With her inspiration, I learned the medium of oil paint.  It only took 30 years, but now I can say I have a portfolio!  I have travelled full circle back to my original passion of art.  For 25 years teaching was my identity.  Now I don’t have to introduce myself anymore as a laid off teacher; I can call myself an artist.  My work is in Morro Bay at the Gallery at Marina Square, and now will be available at Open Art Studio Tour 2012.

Kira’s studio information can be found in the Open Studios Art Tour catalog, studio #27, page 10.  Need a catalog?  They can be found online and throughout the county.   In Atascadero they can be picked up at The ARTery and the Atascadero Chamber of Commerce.