West Coast Biennial 2021 - People’s Choice Award Winner
Lynn Farrar: “A Woman’s Mind”

Turtle Bay’s sixth Biennial exhibition features art in diverse media from emerging and established artists working on the West Coast. This year’s juror is LA Times Art Critic David Pagel.
Due to COVID restrictions, there will not be a Cultural Cruise opening and the art gallery is currently closed for in-person viewing, but the exhibition will be featured here on our website.

Cast your VOTE for your favorite piece to win the People's Choice Award!
Email biennial@turtlebay.org to cast your vote for People’s Choice!
Please include the name of the artist and the piece. In the event they don’t match, we will contact you.

Many of these artworks are for sale. See the price list for price and dimensions.
Artwork Price List
Please email biennial@turtlebay.org to arrange your purchase.

West Coast Biennial 2021
virtual Exhibition

2021 West Coast Biennial Awards

Best of Show – Chuck Stolarek (all three pieces)

First Prize – Richard Baltazar Quintana (all three pieces)

Second Prize – Carol Jenkins

"Light's Echo"

Third Prize – Ellen Hedfield

"Last Stop"

Honorable Mention – Melody Revnak

"Autumn Falls"

Virtual Gallery

RELATIONSHIPS Series 

“This past year in which our physical relationships have been pared down, more thought is given to what they are about. 
My interest here is a visual of the feeling of a relationship. In this particular painting, I used a tight structure with the diagonal grid and through the interaction of color told a relationship story.”

- Jizell Albright

Playful, wild gestures and an acute attention to color theory meet at the intersection of  science and emotion. Rachel intuitively paints from freedom and rest - she’s not afraid  to be raw and unmasked. These maps and prayers laid out on canvas are places to  meet with our Maker. The paint washes and scrapes with a unique freedom, building  layers to tell a story, she invites the viewer to adventure with her. To be present in heart,  body and spirit. To be fully engaged in each moment, in the same way that each wholehearted brushstroke and mark leads to the next.  

A resident of Northern California, Rachel is an abstract expressionist painter. She has  spent the past decade traveling, developing her craft, and living in cities across the U.S.  and abroad. Her work has been shown in solo and group exhibitions in Chicago, San  Diego and Northern California.

Brandin Barón is a San Francisco-based visual artist. After receiving his M.F.A from the University of California, San Diego, he has worked professionally as a fine and digital artist, graphic designer, and costume designer for theatrical productions, and design scholar. From 2006-2018, he was a Professor of Design at The University of California, Santa Cruz. 

Recent solo exhibition: Stars Hide Your Fires (Foundry Art Centre, St. Charles, MO).

He has been part of recent nationally-juried group exhibitions at Annmarie  Sculpture Garden & Arts Center (Solomons, MD); Alexandria Museum of Art  (Alexandria, LA); Arts Benicia (Benicia, CA); Attleboro Arts Museum (Attleboro,  MA); Barrett Art Center (Poughkeepsie, NY); Buckham Gallery (Flint,  MI); Cheyenne Frontier Days Old West Museum (Cheyenne, WY); De Young  Museum/FAMSF (San Francisco); Dab Art/Proyecto Galeria (Mexico City); Dallas  Metro Arts Contemporary (Plano, TX); Gallery 110 (Seattle, WA); Gearbox Gallery  (Oakland, CA); Harnett Museum of Art, University of Virginia (Richmond, VA); Idaho Falls Arts Council (Idaho Falls, ID); Kellogg University Art Gallery, California  Polytechnic University (Pomona, CA); Marietta Cobb Museum of Art (Marietta,  GA); Norman Rockwell Museum (Stockbridge, MA); Orange County Center for  Contemporary Art (Santa Ana, CA); Remarque Print Gallery (Albuquerque, NM);  The Studio Door Gallery (San Diego); Susquehanna Art Museum (Harrisburg, PA);  Texas Photographic Society, TX; Target Gallery, Torpedo Factory Art Center;  (Alexandria, VA); Verum Ultimum (Portland, OR); Viewpoint Photographic Art  Center (Sacramento, CA); among many others.

Marcia Behnke was born and raised in Los Gatos, California and in 1976 moved to Redding California to raise her family. She has painted in her favorite medium, acrylic, for over 40 years and never paints the same thing twice. She paints what she loves at the moment. She loves vibrant color and is always experimenting with new paint colors, textures, tools and techniques. Living on the Sacramento River has totally inspired her to do Pleine Air painting which is how this painting was done. Getting lost in a painting is what she loves to do and inspiring others to be creative is her goal. She Is very interested in how creating art can help children and adults in dealing with the emotional issues in life and has done a few successful projects with several subjects. She learned to paint by taking classes from people who inspired her. She is still learning to paint!

Michele Castagnetti (b. 1972, Italy) spent his formative years in Rome, studied graphic design at the Ateneo Creativo in Milan and received a Bachelor’s Degree of Fine Arts at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. A Los Angeles based multi-disciplinary artist, Castagnetti’s work has appeared in numerous exhibitions curated by notable curators and critics such as Mat Gleason, Peter Frank and The Los Angeles Times art critic David Pagel.

Jerry Cousins is a woodworker and furniture maker living in Trinity County. He moved there in  the early 1970’s, first in Hayfork and then Hyampom, where he and his wife Susan raised 2 sons.  They now live in Weaverville. Over the years Jerry has also worked for Shasta College,  Behavioral Health Services and the Human Response Network. He has been connected with  many community based activities. 

Jerry has been involved in many different aspects of woodworking – house construction,  remodeling, cabinet making and now focusing entirely on furniture. In 2004 he attended the  James Krenov’s woodworking school at College of the Redwoods, in Fort Bragg to learn the  skill of marquetry. 

Marquetry takes diverse species of wood veneers and pieces them together to form patterns,  accents, and images. Woods are chosen for their color, grain pattern, and hues. Once the wood  design or “picture” is completed it is usually integrated into a piece of furniture - but for the last  few years, in addition to furniture pieces, he has created 2-dimensional wall hangings. 

All of the wood veneers are cut in the shop to a thickness of 5/64th. Using the double-bevel  method, pieces are cut into the background to create the design or picture.  

His pieces are in several private collections and have been published in the Fine Woodworking  magazine. 

To discuss special orders Jerry can be reached at Box 94, Weaverville, 96093,  jerrycousins@gmail.com or 530 623 7165.

D.A. Davis grew up in beautiful Southern California. She started painting at the early age of 11 and her love of painting carried over into the study of fine art at the University of Southern California, where she graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts with an emphasis in painting.

D. A.’s painting style is grounded in realism. Striving to paint what she sees with accuracy is paramount to her. “I want the viewer to feel as though he is standing right where I was when I first saw the scene. It’s important for me that iconic locations, as well as more intimate scenes, convey a sense of place.”

D.A. Davis has been painting professionally for over 35 years and is an award winning artist whose work has been included in national and international shows. Her paintings are in private collections across the West.

HONORS include:

Finalist: International Artist Magazine Landscape Challenge – 2019
People’s Choice Award: North Valley Art League National Show – 2013
Honorable Mention: North Valley Art League National Show – 2013
Grand Prize: Lafayette Art and Wine Festival – 1999
Bronze Medal: Arts for the Parks International Art Competition – Grand Teton Natural History Assoc. Award of Merit - 1995
50th Anniversary Grand Teton National Monument Show – 1993

Oil Painters of America:
Paintings have been juried into the following shows:

Oil Painters of America’s Juried National Show - 2018
Western Regional Juried Exhibition of Traditional Oils - 2012
Oil Painters of America’s Juried National Show - 2011
Western Regional Juried Exhibition of Traditional Oils - 2008

North Valley Art League National Show and Competition:
Paintings have been juried into the show for the following years: 2016, 2013, 2011, 2009, 2007,
and 2004
Arts for the Parks International Art Competition (1987 – 2007):
Top 100: 2006, 1995
Top 200: 2005, 2001, 1992

Lafayette Art and Wine Festival: 1999
Professional Art Memberships:
Oil Painters of America – Associate Member

Originally from England, Susan resides in the Gold Country southeast of Sacra mento, in Jackson, CA. 

She came to the West Coast in 1977 to study for a Masters degree in Microbiology and the major part of her career was spent in scientific research. When she retired from Medtronic, in 2014, it was as a Senior Scientist in Molecular Biology. 

During her time in the USA she has traveled widely and spent an extensive time in wild places as a rock climber, mountaineer and endurance runner. Susan brings her wealth of outdoor experiences, combined with the valuable skills of patience, keen observation and attention to detail, honed by her background as a research scientist, to her rich photographic imagery. 

In her photographs she conveys the unusual, unexpected or dramatic, a viewpoint that is still unfolding and whose intention is to alert people, and maybe expand their appreciation, of a world outside their own experience. 

Although Susan has taken photographs for many years, it is only in the last 5-6 years that she has come to a deeper understanding for the process and has begun to develop it as an art form. 

Susan’s work was shown, along with two other artists, at SAM (Siskyou Arts Museum) during June/July of 2018. 
Her work has also been exhibited at the Tu olumne County Arts Alliance show, InFocus, for 2018, 2019 (3rd place award in Landscape Divi sion) and 2020 and at the NVAL (North Valley Art League) Photography Show in 2017, 2019 and 2020. In addition, her photography has been featured in articles for the online magazine, California Up date (November 2018, April 2019)

Michael Eichwald is an award-winning photographer living in Redding. While living in Europe as a young student he was exposed to the professional photography of an uncle in London and was also strongly influenced by a second uncle who was active in the academic study of art and visual aesthetics. 

For many years his film photography took a back seat to the practice of dermatology, but with retirement, he was able once again to pursue his interest in what makes one image art and another simple craft. He has actively supported the local appreciation of photography as an art form, and in recent years has been involved in the promotion, exhibition, and judging of local juried competitions. 

His primary motivation is to celebrate photographically the fortuitous beauty of our everyday surroundings and experiences. He is strongly influenced by the traditional Japanese appreciation of the subdued, the weathered – the essence of the thing -- and by what is humbly transient around and about us.

Mixed media glass artist, Lynn Farrar, was born in Shawnee, Oklahoma but grew up in  Cottonwood, California. After high school, Lynn moved back to Oklahoma and after spending 36 years there, moved back to Redding in 2015. Her first formative experience as an artist was when she was in kindergarten. Her teacher let the class experiment with watercolors and Lynn painted a beautiful rose. It was then she realized she loved art more than any other school subject. Lynn remembers feeling excited to create and curious to explore more.  

In high school and college Lynn’s, initial influences were Peter Max and Heinz  Edelmann whose artwork was featured in the 1968 animated Beatles film “Yellow  Submarine”. In her later years, she still admires artists Jackson Pollack, Frank Lloyd  Wright, Georgia O’Keeffe, Frida Kahlo, Amy Ringholtz, John Neito, Carol Beesley, Jim  Keffer, and Philadelphia mosaic artist, Isaiah Zagar. 

It was not until the year 2000, Lynn decided to focus on stained glass as a medium and took classes from stained glass artist, Patience Rhodes. Lynn was drawn to how colors reflected through light could illuminate a room. For the past 20 years, she continued to explore the many ways to stack and layer glass, then solder unique found objects within each piece. Lynn’s intent was to elevate her glass art as high-end craft, standing on its own, in the finest of galleries.  

Lynn believes that being an artist is something one is born to do, a calling you cannotignore and that once you accept, it can change the way one views the world. Lynn went on to study through practical experience, learning through trial and error, and self-learning. Through the years she has been honored to participate in several exhibits, festivals, and gallery shows.

Born and raised a Connecticut Yankee, Stacey Gregory was one of the proud few who received her BA in fine arts and art history from the University of Pennsylvania, standing alongside 2200 engineering, business, and pre-med majors. She attended Pratt Institute, studying Communication Design while working in packaging design for Donald Deskey and Associates in NYC. After two years, she headed to California where she met her husband and thus began a life crisscrossing the US while raising two daughters with a 150 lbs Newfoundland in tow. Eventually, she landed on California's Central Coast. A Connecticut Yankee flummoxed by Santa Cruz, she migrated south to her final destination; the breathtaking Monterey Peninsula. 

She is a member of Open Ground Studios in Seaside, CA and a member of the Northern California Women's Caucus for Art (NCWCA). She is active in the Monterey Peninsula arts community 

Current political and social issues fuel her conceptual artwork. Her work is observational in nature and takes a broad view approach. She references ancient history, Greek mythology, current events, scientific research, and art history to weave together facts, timelines, and often a soupçon of humor into her conceptual assemblages. She is classically trained in oil painting and graphic design and employs those techniques in her work. She often uses repurposed materials and constructs her assemblages so that the viewer can manipulate the piece. This interaction is designed to elicit a visceral response from the viewer. Besides the Renaissance painters, other artistic influences include: Alexander Calder, Maya Lin, Mark 

Bradford, Ai Wei-Wei, Yayoi Kusama, and Ruth Asawa. She has exhibited works on Russian election interference, climate change, immigration, reproductive rights, the issue of consent, "the male gaze", Big Tech and their responsibilities, and to lighten the mood, her series "KLUCKED!" features ornamental chickens imagined as pop culture icons. Her work has been exhibited throughout California, Chicago, and in numerous online exhibitions.

Belinda Hanson was born on a dairy farm in rural Minnesota. She grew up amidst her seven siblings and a slew of barnyard animals. She left the farm, but it never left her and remains as the grounding element of her contemporary work. She was expected to become a professional scientist like all her PhD brothers and sisters,  but art was her steadfast passion, and she pursued it even while earning her bachelor’s with honors in biology. She left the sciences to earn her BFA in painting and her  MFA in sculpture. Her work is made up of many disparate elements, at once direct and enigmatic, all tied to the natural world. Belinda has been living in the rugged beauty of Siskiyou County for thirty-five years. She has received grants and scholarships and has participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions. Belinda currently works at Shasta College as an art instructor and has taught at various colleges and universities since 2001. More information can be found on her website:  http://www.belindahanson.net

“Working at Shasta College, I commuted from Dunsmuir to Redding and back while wildfires raged: first the Carr Fire, then the Hirz, and finally the one that directly threatened our home, the Delta Fire. I drove through dense smoke and between flames, sighted a spot fire before it was reported, and for days witnessed buzzards feeding off animals that had fled fire to die along the highway. Once I saw a large  “wolf dog” on the west side of the southbound lanes, between the burn zone and the still-green forest, alive and looking up canyon. Another time I viewed a young bear carcass stretched across the road, and many times deer and smaller animals. The horrors of the fire linger. Black silhouettes of forest are everywhere, mountains beyond mountains of black. Many homes were lost to the flames. Some students and instructors at Shasta College are victims, along with many others. But we have survived and are holding classes, teaching, living our lives, and showing our work. My  piece, Beast, was born out of my experiences during this time.”

“There is beauty in the ordinary things that surround us – particularly the abandoned, forgotten, or  overlooked. I aim to highlight the beauty hidden in structures, equipment, and infrastructure and offer  a different perspective by emphasizing the texture and color in an abstract composition. 

I am an engineer by profession, analytical and precise. My choice of subjects reflects this to some  extent: architectural and industrial subjects in which I work out the scale, perspective, and texture of  weathered surfaces and materials – wood and stucco, brick and stone – and emphasize the color. I find  inspiration on the back roads, in small towns, and at industrial properties and construction sites, places  where these overlooked treasures are waiting to be discovered. 

I portray weathered surfaces that pop in three dimensions - peeling paint, rusty metal, weathered  concrete, broken glass – and give a depth to the painting by emphasizing highlights and deep shadows.  Working “wet-in-wet” with the watercolor pigments also produces some lovely weathered surfaces.”

Xuan has worked on mosaic for 22 years and becomes a full-time mosaic artist four years ago after working in the information technology field for over 30 years. Her mosaics aim to tell a story, to inspire, to delight the imaginary, and to heal. The inspiration for her art is mostly derived from her life journey, as well as from her perception of the external world.  Creating mosaics gives her freedom, inspiration, the motivation to create and the feeling of satisfaction when she generates something beautiful.  And, that in itself, nourishes her soul.

To capture the depth and complexity of such subjects, real or imagined, she has been able to delve into different artistic styles and techniques in her designs, such as impressionism, still life, and architecture.  She also evolves from only using ceramics to incorporating a wide variety of materials into her mosaics, such as stones, pebbles, mirrors, seashells, as well as stained, fused, vitreous or tempered glass, to pull unlikely materials into unique harmony. Xuan does her mosaic art in 2D and 3D - mosaic wall hangings and sculptures, as well as small items such as mosaic jewelry.

Xuan’s art work has been received numerous awards and was selected for the Mosaic Arts International exhibitions in San Diego and Houston in 2009 and 2014.  Her work also was featured in three mosaic books, two magazines, and two Coffee Table Books of Orthopaedics in Art.

Since "Xuan" is pronounced "Swan" in English, the mosaics she creates carry the hand-made swan logo that represents her signature.  

Website:  www.swanmosaic.com                                              
Email    :  myxuanho@gmail.com
Cell       :  650.868.5937

“Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.” Rumi

I am deeply stirred by something unpredictable about wild terrain. It is also why I am drawn to abstract painting. Each splash of paint calls for a new response, every shape or line creates a different problem that must be solved. An abstract painting grows into itself and cannot be known ahead of time. Even after I’ve finished a painting, I usually have no idea how I did it: it is a call and response, moment by moment, that can never be replicated, (though I have unsuccessfully tried).
It is the unexpected that delights: a wildflower pushing up through decaying leaves, an accidental smear that leaves a beautiful mark on my canvas. These are gifts—if I anticipate them I’m often frustrated. In my painting process I’m most interested in the mark I did not try to make. It is usually a happy accident that pulls the painting in a direction I want to follow. It is only then that I am able to use the discernment honed through practice to build a composition that incorporates both the quiet expanse and riotous energy of the wilderness I love.
My work has been shown throughout the West Coast and collected nationally.

www.CarolJenkinsArt.com
Instagram: @CarolJenkinsStudio
Email: carol_jenkins@sbcglobal.net

I have worked with photography nearly my entire life, certainly since discovering  the joys of working in the darkroom while attending Central Valley High School.  

The question I always ask myself about photographs is simple, but not always  obvious: What else does it say? My favorite photographs allow for layers of  questioning and delight. As for this specific image, there is a wealth of detail that  gives a strong sense of place as well as a certain sense of familiarity. Call it  planned serendipity, a deliberate combination of exposures in the camera, put  together somewhat by chance. Planning and execution is a fine way to start a  project, but happenstance really adds an element that lifts the heart. There is an  Impressionist texture linking this digital process to the past. As busy and  distracted as the day can be, this image embodies both peace and movement.  

Recent Juried Exhibitions:  

A Community of Artists Ten Year Retrospective - Blitzer Gallery, Santa Cruz, CA  Form + Content Gallery - Minneapolis, MN  
Open Studio Art Tour - Santa Cruz, CA  

If you are interested in purchasing this work, please contact me at:  holgatim@gmail.com // (831)462-4382 

“I've worked in wood for most of my life. I was a self-employed carpenter and cabinet maker but continued my love of working with wood in retirement. I have taken several courses through the fine woodworking program at College of the Redwoods, Fort Bragg.  

I do fine furniture and lathe work and have had pieces in local shows and galleries. I enjoy the challenge of getting inspiration from different sources then figuring out how to manufacture the piece. This particular piece took several years of thinking about before I attempted making it.”

The world is full of interesting subjects for photography, and I enjoy exploring everywhere with a camera, but I always return to nature as a favorite starting point to express myself. It’s a challenge to see beyond the obvious scene and to make a photograph of the natural world that creates a mood or elicits emotion. While purely documenting the landscape is a worthy endeavor, my approach, more often than not, is to abstract or interpret the landscape in the way I see it, while keeping the final photograph believable in a natural sense. Nature is fabulous in its own right, and I feel no need to create a fantasy world.  

When I’m not out in the world photographing, I work as a hydrogeologist,  interpreting the natural world in a different way. I’ve lived in northern California all my life, most of it in Shasta County. Photography has been part of my life for the last ten years.

“My current work consists of ornate compositions that use a pattern-based topographical matrix to portray ideas about land and our natural world. I use fabric, fur, flock, glitter, glass eyes, and more to construct images that are simultaneously ordered, in disarray, realistic and abstract. The tapestry-like format is dense, haphazard, sometimes tangled, and bursting with energy. Seemingly chaotic and lacking of floor-plan, the terrain is teeming with activity, and like our natural world, one pocket of activity finds connection and entwines into the next. 

I'm interested in conjoining imagery from our natural world with manmade materials or constructed nature. When building an artwork, the nature-based imagery is sometimes transformed until it is almost abstracted. Combining patterns found in the natural environment with abstracted shape and form, my focus is on the delicate, minute, natural systems that are often unnoticed or unseen.”

THE GARDEN UNIVERSE 

It all stems from a personal curiosity about nature, our connection to it, and a fascination with its immense power. I watch the current of a stream—the ripples, patterns, the innate navigation of water unfailingly maneuvering obstacles—and remember this flow as a process to emulate in my own work. With faith and intrigue, I continue to question: what lies just around the bend of unknown nature’s terrain? 

My daily, up-close encounter with nature is the fifty-foot journey through our family garden,  from my home to the studio. The garden becomes a metaphor for the universe. I also mine many other sources for inspiration, including Indian miniatures, Persian rugs, biology, fractals. 

GUIDED BY PATTERNS 

I’m interested in micro and macro perspectives to convey the bold and delicate forms that exist in the mysterious realms that surround us. The images are meant to transport viewers across abstracted land and sky, illuminating a path to the deep, dark recesses of our universe.  

The science of fractals and patterns of chaos are particularly important to my work. Fractals are complex geometric figures made up of patterns that repeat—each time on a smaller scale, and each smaller version is a “self-similar”  form. While at first glance fractals might appear as a tangled disorder, there is an inherent structured composition embedded into this dynamic system. They basically tell the story of the wild transformations in nature that are taking place on a daily basis, giving order to a chaotic world of energy and change. 

I respond to these natural wonderments and I’m charmed and fascinated by nature’s intrinsic capacity to create and reproduce patterns. I use a wealth of media to create the work, which for me forms an environment or mini-ecosystem; elements circulate to and from one to another like a functioning unit. 

I am a California based fine art photographer, travel story writer, watercolor artist, and part-time kids cooking class instructor, who also loves to cook and eat! 

Born in Köln, Germany I moved back and forth between Germany and the United States several times, living in Philadelphia, then Frankfurt, then on the Monterey Peninsula, and all over the San Francisco Bay Area. 

Working in 35-mm with a couple of old workhorse Nikomat ELs (dropped many a time and then some) and with Plus-X Film (what’s film?), the first portfolio I completed was of farmers and craftsmen in the rural German area of Haunetal, inspired by the photography of August Sander. It was shown at the San Francisco Art Institute in 1980, where I received my B.F.A. degree. 

After raising two sons driving a taxi in the urban jungle of San Francisco for over 30 years (with numerous temp-jobs in between), I was happy to have a little time to take up my camera once again to photograph nature and to write. The city streets had worn me out. In 2006-2007 I switched completely from analog to digital photography, taking a few courses at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. Although the tactile part of negatives and contact sheet were fun, I am delighted not to have to inhale darkroom fumes anymore. 

The portfolios titled California and Southwest (some of those images are scans from slides -- if you still remember slides) were created concurrently with my courses I was taking at the Academy of Art University. 

In the early summer of 2007 I was blessed to visit my youngest son Patrick in Venezuela where he was teaching/cooking at the time. I was very grateful for this opportunity to travel to a country and to a continent I had only dreamed of seeing. Landscape photography has been my passion for decades and the opportunity to visit this unique, exotic country was just thrilling, a God-given once in a lifetime opportunity. Venezuela was supposed to have an abundance of natural beauty, and indeed there was no shortage of it. From the Andes shrouded in fog to the National Park splendor of Los Roques, the aqua-colored sea, bright bougainvillea, the crazy urban mess of Caracas, it was breathtaking. The selection of images I chose for this portfolio, represents my interpretation of the beauty of Venezuela. 

2010 is dedicated to, and in memory of my parents Günther & Marga Leue.
2011 and 2012 are further explorations of nature in California, Oregon, and Washington. 
2014 marked my 40th year in California, and this portfolio of images is primarily of my adopted home state. 
2016 is a portfolio of the four seasons in various locations in the Western United States, with a few from the continent tossed in. 

New for 2020: a nature and botanical portfolio focusing on the delicate and subtle, as well as some dramatic black & white imagery - a lost art, yet so beautiful. This portfolio is dedicated to my dear departed friend Gary who shared my love of music and photography, and Chef Patrick Conner for his culinary inspiration. 

Thanks be to God, for letting me capture first on film, and then on sensor, a little sliver of our beautiful world he created. To him be the glory. 

Lynnae Mäki is a painter and photographer residing in Los Angeles, California. Her work combines surrealism and portraiture, bridging humanity with the intangible nature of the human soul. Her hope is that her work becomes a source of connectivity and inspiration to her viewers. Lynnae currently works as a teacher and youth mentor, implementing art as a means for her students to explore creativity and find healing through artistic expression.

Sandy studied art in the early 60's when abstract expressionism was at its height. The movement and freedom this form of painting expressed has stayed with Sandy throughout her art career. 
Sandy has shown her work in the Bay Area and North State where she lives in Douglas City, CA with her husband Paul. She was awarded best of show at the 2015 Highland Art Center Juried Show in Weaverville. Her work has also been shown at two previous Turtle Bay West Coast Biennial Juried Art Exhibitions. Sandy was educated in art at San Jose State University.

The painting "Untamed" expresses itself in bold shapes and color. Movement and layers of texture fill the canvas.

Education 

1979 
University of Oregon, Eugene, OR, Bachelor of Science, Biology 

1980 
Shasta College, Redding, CA, Associate of Arts, Art 

1983 
Boston University, Boston, MA, Master of Science, Physical Therapy 

1989 
University of California, Davis, CA, Certificate in Graphic Design 

Additional Coursework: Biologic Illustration, University of California Berkeley Extension (1981); Scientific Illustration, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University (1983); assorted coursework at University of California, Davis and College of the Siskiyous, Weed, CA; various workshops and private instruction in drawing, painting, color theory, printmaking and traditional letterpress methods. 

Solo and Featured Exhibitions 

2020 
Siskiyou Arts Museum, Dunsmuir, CA, "Suspending Time" (with Eric Blomberg & Richard Fox) 

2018 
Gallery Sixteen, Great Falls, MT, "Skin & Bones" (with Karen Pratt) 
Siskiyou Arts Museum, Dunsmuir, CA, "Wild & Still" (with Susan Edwards and Rae Ferguson) 

2016 
Siskiyou Arts Museum, Dunsmuir, CA, "Bones" (with Cathy Valentine) 

2013
Weed Library, Weed, CA, early work (solo) 
Dogwood Diner, Dunsmuir, CA, "Dogs at the Dogwood" (solo) 

Selected Group Exhibitions 

2021 
Turtle Bay Exploration Park, Redding, CA, "Sixth West Coast Biennial Exhibition" (juried) 

2018 
Liberty Arts Gallery, Yreka, CA, "Relative Pairings: An Exploration of Artful Relationships" (juried) 
Bend Art Center, Bend, OR, "Small Prints '18: 2nd Biennial National Juried Print Exhibition" 

2017 
North Valley Art League Small Painting Show, Redding, CA (juried) (Awards) 
Turtle Bay Exploration Park, Redding, CA, "Fourth West Coast Biennial Exhibition" (juried) 
Siskiyou Arts Museum, Dunsmuir, CA, "Scenes of Siskiyou County" (juried) 
Siskiyou Artists Association 60th Annual Show, Mt. Shasta, CA (Special Merit: Best Abstract; Awards in painting, drawing & printmaking)  

2016 
Liberty Arts Gallery, Yreka, CA," The Muse" (Invitational in cooperation with Siskiyou County Historical Museum 
Liberty Arts Gallery, Yreka, CA, “Impressions" (juried/printmaking) 
Siskiyou Artists Association 59th Annual Show, Mt. Shasta, CA (Awards: painting & printmaking) 
Siskiyou Arts Museum, Dunsmuir, CA, "Home" (juried) 

2015 
Liberty Arts, Yreka, CA, "West Meets East" (juried) 
Liberty Arts Gallery, Yreka, CA, "A Show of Hands" (juried) 

2014 
North Valley Art League Small Painting Show, Redding, CA (juried) 
Siskiyou Arts Museum, Dunsmuir, CA "Originals: Mt. Shasta Printmakers Collective" (Invitational) 

2013 
Liberty Arts Gallery, Yreka, CA, "Manipulated Light" (juried) 

2012 
Liberty Arts Gallery, Yreka, CA, Living Show (juried) 
Siskiyou Artists Association 550h Annual Show, Mt. Shasta, CA (Best of Show; Awards in drawing, painting & printmaking) 

2011 
Liberty Arts Gallery, Yreka, CA, "Demonstrating the Mastery of Value" (juried) 
North Valley Art League, Redding, CA, "Small Painting Show" (juried) 
Siskiyou Artist Association 54" Annual Show, Mt. Shasta, CA (Award, printmaking) 

Artist Contact Information 

7040 North Old Stage Road, Weed, CA 96094 
jenpen@finestplanet.com 

Sheila Preston-Ford is Northern California artist, children's book illustrator, and an elementary art teacher. She enjoys sharing her creativity and inspiring the next generation through her teaching and volunteering. Sheila's watercolors have been displayed in many shows and private collections throughout California, Nevada and Oregon. Her newest works consist of many different mediums exploring new techniques and ideas. Her work in reclaimed assemblage has been the most diverse and meaningful to her. She collaborated with local artists through Art From The Ashes (AFTA) Seeds of Regrowth using items salvaged from the Carr Fire that ravaged Whiskeytown Lake and West  Redding to create art from the destruction and hopefully inspire hope,  healing, and awareness. Sheila created several three-dimensional pieces of art from the reclaimed rubble and donated some to the Seeds of Regrowth relief effort. The limitations of the materials were challenging, yet the fragile fragments stretched her exploration and creativity bringing forth something not from her and not from the fire, but something new and different. The creative synergy of artist and materials can be seen in her aluminum  assemblage, “Pleasant Landing.” The inspiration piece was given to her by a coworker. Cupped in her hands like a tender baby bird, she revealed the melted metal remains. It had such an intriguing shape, with its meandering drips and curves. This heart-shaped form set the theme and drew other melted pieces of metal and glass to it until the artist saw a clear scene. It was not a scene of what was lost at Whiskeytown Lake nor what remained.  To the artist, these pieces assembled and painted depict a scene of a  renewed landscape flourishing and thriving with an osprey lighting upon its treed roost. The piece conveys a longing to see healing and encourages that there is hope and renewal on the horizon.

Professional outdoor photographer Melody Revnak is a native Californian  who has lived and worked for much of her adult life in both California and  Hawaii, she currently makes her home in Redding. Her love of her two  homes is reflected in her images that seek to capture the awesome beauty  of the islands as well as the majestic landscapes that make California a photographic wonderland. Having received her formal training in  traditional photography from a leading San Francisco-based photographer, Melody applied her talents to become an award-winning outdoor photographer whose images can be found in homes, offices, and  publications around the world. Her photographic artistic style is best known  for its attention to composition detail, her recognition and use of natural  lighting and delicate post-production skill.  

Beyond her commercial success, Melody loves to share her knowledge with  her friends and customers and takes great pleasure in conducting  workshops to help both novice and aspiring professionals learn the  fundamentals of digital photography in an age of rapidly advancing  technology. Above all, Melody appreciates the friendships that she has  made with her students and customers. Their notes of friendship and  appreciation are her biggest source of inspiration. 

Rochelle Capps Rupp is a Northern California native, born sixth of 11 children to a family that values  authenticity, exploration, and individualistic thought. She graduated with a Bachelor's degree from  Brigham Young University where she studied sociology, Spanish, and classical voice. After serving as a  missionary in the Washington D.C. area, she met and married her husband, Nick. Together they have  spent the last decade exploring the terrain of partnership, homeschooling their five bodacious children,  and reaching towards self-sufficiency through their menagerie of 2 goats, 4 rabbits, 17 chickens, a  German Shepherd, and any number of cats.  

Rochelle believes deeply that self-education should be a joyful, lifelong process. She enjoys clothing  design, animal husbandry, ballroom dance, and road trips. Angel Dave is her first attempt at portraiture.

I have lived in the North state for the last 40 years. After attending UC  Berkeley in the 70’s I accepted a job at a private residential school in French  Gulch. During this time I became very interested in photography. I took classes  and attended photography retreats. I have had the opportunity to travel and do  photography all throughout Europe, Canada and the United States. In the past I  have had photographs shown at the North Valley Art League, the West Coast  Biennial and the AAUW Home Tour Art Shows.  

I am very attracted to that natural beauty of the North state. I love to go on  long walks on our many trails and photograph all the wonders I see.

Raised in the American Midwest in what was once known as The German Triangle, Josef Wilhelm "Jupp" Soetebier's work explores what effect his Deutsch heritage, ancestral family, and the mythology of his peoples have had on memory and the way he perceives and goes about the world. 

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“Jupp Soetebier calls his work an examination of "personal archaeology and  the genesis of memory while revealing some of my identity." His abstract sculpted surfaces expose a complex, multi-layered journey. The layers are composed of wood, fibers, and acrylic paint that are hand-sculpted across a  visual plane, melding discovery into tactile and emotive experiences.”

- Marian Jansen op de Haar, Curator from "Status Stratified" Solo Exhibition Acumen Gallery - Napa, California 2019 

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“(His work) seems to be part of a larger landscape, something vast, and yet something intimate -- disturbing and unsettling -- and yet beautiful and thought-provoking in the same way.”

- Prof. David Reif, Distinguished Prof Emeritus, University of Wyoming from NOOBAA Exhibition 3 Square Gallery - Ft. Collins, Colorado 2020 

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Mr. Soetebier received his Master of Fine Arts in Painting from the University of Florida in  1988 and taught drawing at the New World School of the Arts in Miami. He was an original member of the South Florida Art Center and later worked as a decorative painter in New York City. He currently maintains a studio and lives in Northern California with his  spouse and Leonberger dogs.

I was born and raised in Southern California. Where I grew up in Los Angeles the hills were undeveloped and there were lots of places for us kids to explore. My family also spent a lot of time camping in the surrounding mountains. After college, I started working for the government and my cousin and I started backpacking in the Sierras, Fifty years ago I moved to Redding as a Civil Engineer still working for the government and began backpacking and hiking in the surrounding area. Initially these trips were for fishing but I would carry along a camera. Over time I fished less and less until I just carried my camera. My work reflects my fasciation with details found in beautiful patterns, colors, lighting, textures and shapes found in nature.

The isolation expected of us during the pandemic has made me even more appreciative of my  time exploring Oregon's natural environment. I'm not alone walking through these forests. Text  from Stanley Kunitz's poem "The Layers," has taken on special meaning: "I have walked  through many lives, some of them my own." My painting in this exhibition, "Layers of the Fall,"  is an expression of the lives and layers I've walked through.  

My education includes a BFA (art) from UNC-Chapel Hill, an MA (art history) from the University  of Georgia, and a graduate degree in library science from UNC. My art history thesis explored  the theory of Stanley William Hayter, the Surrealist artist with whom Jackson Pollock studied.  Hayter believed that automatism revealed past lives, a space of the imagination.  

After many years as an art librarian, I retired in 2019 with my last job at the University of  Oregon. I have since spent more time as an artist. My recent work has been recognized in  these juried exhibits: Mayor’s Art Show, Eugene, Oregon, 2015; Eugene Biennial, 2016, 2018,  Mayor’s Choice Award; West Coast Biennial, 2017, 2019. 

I often employ automatism in my creative process. I often use a pottery shaping tool which  allows me to create with some spontaneity the gestures that I like to see. Present in the  painting is its process of its becoming. The final work provides an opportunity for viewers to  walk through another life or even their own.

I moved to Redding from the Bay Area in 1973 and my husband and I raised 4 girls. In 1998, I began my artist's life as a student of Barbara Enochian and was a part of her group, known as The Downstairs Painters. 

I also studied printmaking under John Harper at Shasta College for 4 years. I continue to incorporate some of the mark-making elements, which I used then, in my acrylic work today. 

The images in my current work are inspired by the colors. textures, and patterns existing in nature, and are usually inspired by my walks and hikes here in the North State. I try to capture the essence of being out in the natural world. 

EXHIBITIONS & AWARDS: 

2002-2006 North State Annual Fine Art Competition: 
Best Of Show 2006

2002-2006 NVAL Small Painting Show: 
Award of Excellence 2002 
Second Place 2003

2003-2008 Shasta College Annual Student Art Competition
Award in Printmaking, 2007

Turtle Bay Arboretum Poster Contest
Winning Design, 2003

NVAL Miniature Show
Award of Merit, 2004 

I live in Redding with my husband, where we raised a family of five children. Like many, I always wanted to learn to paint. My life was very busy with work and family. My friend and I thought , when we retire… we will learn to paint. A coworker passed away a month before retirement. This changed my thinking. I thought, what if, for whatever reason, retirement doesn’t happen? So my friend and I started with watercolor. We didn’t know what we were doing, we just went and bought a bunch of supplies, made a lot of mistakes, and taught ourselves to paint. I branched out from watercolor to acrylic to oils. I have found each medium to be absolutely fascinating.

Suburban Primitive art came about from my interest in primitive art, combined with the  knowledge that man has not changed genetically in any major way in the last sixty  thousand years coupled with my feeling that the problems of being human probably  have changed little as well. My general belief is that life in the suburbs is as exciting and  as interesting as anywhere else. People are people and most problems seem to be not  only universal but timeless as well. Historically art movements have mostly developed in  major cities because of the interaction and exchange of ideas between artists. With the  rise of the internet, I feel that this advantage has largely evaporated. Quality art can and  will develop anywhere, cities, suburbs or country. Much of my work is autobiographical  in nature with some recurring themes such as...flux, (change), containment and a sense  of mystery, wondering what it's all about. The work combines both primitive images  along with images from the modern suburban experience. In the last few years my work  has been primarily done in gouache or graphite. The gouache dries quickly and enables  me to build up color layers and the pencil is fast and convenient. Most of my paintings  average 11”x14” making the work both portable and intimate. 

I have been shown in more than 40 solo exhibitions as well as over two hundred group  shows. My work has been published in several magazines and books and my biography  is in Who’s Who in American Art. I hold an MFA in painting from the University of  Kansas and a MA in painting from CMSU. I am represented by the Mahlstedt Gallery in  New Rochelle, New York. I live with my wife and two children in the Sacramento area of  California, where I teach and produce art for a living. I hope my work touches the viewer  in some way, thought, emotion or memory and makes the journey of life just a bit better. 

I was born in Kansas City, Missouri, to parents who owned a small business in the interior design  industry. Having a cultural activist for a grandmother, I took classes at the Nelson Atkins Museum  from a very early age, and then studied portrait painting with one of Kansas City’s muralists, Daniel  MacMorris, when I was twelve. The rest of my formal education in the arts took place early as well,  at the University of Kansas in two sequential summer art programs, in addition to a summer spent  studying art history in Rome, Florence, and Paris via a student program, The Foreign Study League.  In addition, I spent a great deal of my free time at the Nelson Atkins Museum, which has a world class Asian collection and which has had a strong, subconscious impact on my style.  

I departed from formal art study in college, graduating from Wellesley College in English and Biology in 1974 and then obtaining an M.S. in Biology from the University of Massachusetts,  Amherst. Moving to California from Massachusetts, I decided the sciences weren’t where my heart  lay, and I ended up loving the carpentry I learned in order to build the passive solar house that my  husband and I live in. My love of carpentry rekindled my love of art. Because we didn’t have anything left in the budget for art after we completed our home, I began to make art for our walls.  In addition, I expressed some of my artistic ideas through carpentry. For example, I designed and  hand-built a 112 sq ft hexagonal structure with a cupola on the ridge above our house (which, sadly,  burned down in the Carr Fire).  

In addition to carpentry, classes that I took in stained and leaded glass have informed some of my  work. I’ve been incorporating natural elements into stained glass installations such as stones,  branches, and agate slabs. Even though I decided working in the sciences wasn’t what I wanted to  do professionally, my enjoyment of problem-solving comprises a large part of what I enjoy about  assemblage. I like to tackle new and unique projects and ideas, which requires that I figure out tools,  construction, adhesives, and fasteners.  

A few years ago, I began to explore my love of paper, which is partly related to my love of books  and literature, as well as my love of color, and I began making collage in addition to assemblage. 

My first solo show, “ArcheoIndustrial,” took place at Trilogy Architecture in Redding, CA in 2010.  I’ve also exhibited in two 2-person shows at the North Valley Art League of Redding and The  Mainstreet Gallery in Weaverville in 2018. My work has been accepted to the 2015 and 2017 West  Coast Biennials (once for assemblage, once for collage), and I’ve shown my work at Redding City  Hall, The O Street Gallery in Redding, digitally and internationally at The ArtisTTable , in juried  shows through the North Valley Art League, and in private and corporate collections in Washington,  DC, Sonoma, CA, Portland, OR, San Diego, CA, Columbus, GA, and England. 

From 2005 – 2011, I co-published and designed The Hot Air Quarterly, a literary magazine that  featured hand-tipped photographs of artwork by painters, photographers, and sculptors on the  cover, including the work of Brian Lanker, Alonzo Davis, and Joe Draegert. 

In 2007, I produced a multi-media project that involved a novel (that I had written) in which one of  the protagonists was a scientist and the other an artist. The Last Good Fairy was published as a fine 

collectible by the late, great Stinehour Press of Vermont and awarded a New England Book Show  Award for excellence in book design. The book possessed custom end-leaves bearing images of four  found object artworks that were hidden in four different parts of the country and a bookmark with  clues on how to find the artwork. Three of the artworks have been claimed; the fate of the fourth is  unknown. 

Community efforts have involved a holiday treasure hunt, fabricating and then hanging twelve  found-object ornaments in the trees and bushes of Lema Park in Redding (with permission of the  McConnell Foundation). A blog I maintained at the time notified the public that the ornaments had  been hung and that anyone who wanted to hunt for one could do so and take it home. I  participated in one year’s “Creek Art,” in which artists used materials obtained from annual clean ups of creeks to create artworks; they were then on display at Redding City Hall, the Redding Public  Library, and Turtle Bay. In 2018, I participated in the exhibit “Artcyled,” at Turtle Bay, in a group  pop-up show of artists who worked with recycled and salvaged materials. In 2019, I made and  donated work to “Art from the Ashes,” a show to benefit restoration efforts at Whiskeytown Park. 

My work is primarily abstract or highly stylized. I’m fascinated with the emotional impact of  abstract art throughout millennia of human civilization, and the power of shape, line, and position to  create emotional responses. I create to engage viewers, to get them to conjure their own narratives  about what they’re seeing, to relate it to their own experience and yearnings. And I create to tap into  the joy, grief, mysterious visual impulses, and restless fascination with human aesthetics and  emotions that I feel.

Born and raised in Oakland, Oliver Wilson is an experimental painter and  woodworker. He earned a BFA in Craft from Oregon College of Art and Craft in  2016. 

Through his work, Wilson connects the seemingly unrelated in an attempt to  communicate his personal trains of thought to others. The goal is not to explain or  impart his meaning, but to make a playful art piece that morphs into whatever  the viewer sees in it - correlations to be lost in translation. He incorporates many  types of visual media to force a strange, haphazard cohesion of paint, tactile  texture, familiar objects, and photographic material. Wilson’s work aims to  further the game of association and extrospection within the audience.