Upcoming Gallery Nights

This is the time of year, when all the galleries are getting together and planning for upcoming Gallery Nights. We'll be updating this blog and our Facebook page soon with the participating galleries. But I thought you might want to mark down the dates in your calendar so you can plan on attending each month. The dates this year are: May 5th, June 2nd, July 7th, August 4th, September 1st and October 6th. Or if you can't be bothered with all that, just remember to come to downtown Whitefish on the first Thursday of the month starting in May. We'll be open from 6-9pm with refreshments and wonderful local art. We'd love for you to stop by!

Shelle Lindholm at The Walking Man Frame Shop & Gallery

Shelle Lindholm of Kalispell will be exhibiting her primitive-style wildlife acrylics on panel as a solo show tonight! Due to unforeseen circumstances, Edie Reno will not be displaying. Thursday, October 7th, 6-9PM. Refreshments served & music provided by members of the Whitefish Middle School Jazz Ensemble! For more information, please call 406-863-ARTS!

Wendy Orr - October - The Purple Pomegranate

The Purple Pomegranate, a fine craft specialty store, is featuring work by Wendy Orr during the month of October. Wendy has been offering graphics and photography services to clients nationwide for more than 25 years. Her art career has taken many twists and turns from the time she began providing graphics services in San Bernardino, CA, her home town, more than 20 years ago. While keeping up with ever-changing technologies and the location transfers required for her husband’s profession, Orr raised five children, all the while feeding her entrepreneurial spirit at her company Porr Boy Graphics, which began in 1990. There soon followed a position as a graphics instructor at Palomar College in San Marcos, CA in the late 1990s. In 2005, just after moving to the Flathead Valley, she began an additional business, Fairytale Photography, which continues to flourish with offers of fanciful images and photo settings for children.

In both her design and photography businesses, Wendy works with the human face, altering and improving upon it. Now a graphic design and photography instructor at Flathead Valley Community College, Orr became interested in ceramics when she encountered the face jugs made by David Smith, a Ceramics Instructor at the college. With David as her mentor, Wendy discovered that working with clay provided relief from her daily job of perfecting photo images for the advertising industry. Ceramics is hands on and has allowed her to explore the asymmetry that makes faces quirky and interesting. Each of her unique pieces of art is ready to amuse and delight those who appreciate the lighthearted approach she takes in her new medium. She welcomes you to enjoy her new art adventure, Mud in Montana.

Meet Wendy during Whitefish Gallery Night, Thursday, October 7th, 2010 from 6-9 PM. Their work will be displayed during the opening and throughout the month of October.

Stephen Isley Jewelry Presents Margaret Graziano

Stephen Isley is pleased to present local artist, Margaret Graziano. He will hold a receptions and exhibit her new and recent works beginning Thursday, September 2nd during the Whitefish Gallery Nights 6PM - 9PM at 241 Central Avenue.

The gallery will be showing her bronze sculptures depicting Native American children at play and a selection of Margaret's original oil on canvas paintings.

Station 8 Presents David Spangler

" I've been producing my art since my college days in the late '60's and graduate school in the early '70's. My work years include 22 years teaching art full-time not to mention years of other career diversions.

My style and choice of materials is always changing even in a given week. My favorite mediums are watercolor and acrylic painting or drawings using colored pencil or ink. My inspiration comes mainly from nature or natural objects. Often the visual image is solved in my mind during awakened moments in the middle of the night.

Currently, I manage the "Performing Arts Center" for the Whitefish School District. If you have questions or would like to visit my studio, please give me a call at 862-3528.

Thanks,
Dave Spangler

Station 8 invites you to join us this Thursday, September 2 from 6 - 9 PM to meet the artist and enjoy viewing his work. David is a most versatile artist in both subject and medium. The best way to describe his work is that he is able to find the "soul" of his subject. Color, light, line and elements of size and spatial relation are utilized to communicate so much more than the most realistically accurate renditions ever could!

He will be showing works in various mediums including watercolor, pen and ink, colored pencil, and acrylic. Most recently, David has been creating three-dimensional pieces using wood. He will be showing an example of this medium as well. David also enjoys doing commissioned pieces, including greeting card design and logo design.

We'll look forward to seeing you this Thursday. Refreshments will be served.

Andrea Brew-From the Ground Up at The Walking Man Frame Shop & Gallery

Please join us for our opening reception for Whitefish artist, Andrea Brew. From the Ground Up will feature vibrant acrylics on canvas of flowers & local landscapes. Thursday, September 2nd, 6-9PM. Refreshments & live music by Dan Dubuque! For more information, call 406-863-ARTS!

Fiber Art Group Show - The Purple Pomegranate - September

The Purple Pomegranate, a fine craft specialty store, is featuring works by three Flathead Valley fiber artists during the month of September. Carole Moseley, Sally Kimmel Glutting and Becky Pallies-Jacobsen will have a group show of a range of their fiber art including art quilts.

Carole learned to sew as a teenager from her Mother, an expert seamstress. She originally started traditional quilting which then led her to discover the wonderful world of art quilts. She was overwhelmed and soon became hooked on the textures, shapes and color that could be achieved through the use of many different materials, dyes, paints, threads, and surface stitching that create new dimensions in art. Trying her hand at every form of textile art and surface design led her on an exciting adventure and has provided her with the life-long learning process associated with all artistry.

Sally’s adventures as a Quilt Artist began more than 25 years ago when her children were babies. She loved the traditional designs with piecing, appliqué and the quilting then, and her art continues to reflect her mastery of these skills while expressing an ongoing appreciation of nature as well as the importance of expressing beliefs using fabric, design, color, and texture. Taking big pieces of fabric and cutting them into little pieces to create something new is always starts an exciting adventure for Sally. She skillfully combines quilting tradition with an extensive contemporary palette of fibers, photographs, paint, beads and designs from nature to create both large and small fascinating art quilts, each with its own charm and character.

Becky began her textile adventure many years ago in garment construction, evolving into quilt creation and fiber exploration. On her journey she collected fabrics, textures, fibers and beads that eventually began to combine the beauty of tradition with her unique flair for the obscure. Each piece she creates is like a pearl in the sense that it has been years in the making with collections of fabric scraps, pieces of thread, and broken beads one day manifesting into a single work of art. She builds her pieces around color and texture... Color speaks to the soul, while texture holds the movement and tells each fibers story.

Meet Carole, Sally and Becky during Whitefish Gallery Night, Thursday, September 2nd, 2010 from 6-9 PM. Their work will be displayed during the opening and throughout the month of September.

Justin Anthony-Mixed Media Sculpture

Please join us Thursday, August 5th, 6-9PM, for a display of Missoula artist, Justin Anthony's mixed media sculpture. Functional lights, weather vanes, trophies & "toys" are all part of the plethora of sculpture that Anthony has to offer! Join us for fine art & refreshments!!

Station 8 presents Cortni King

Artist Biography - Cortni Janelle King

Encouraged and inspired by her family Cortni King started her endeavor to communicate visually at the ripe age of four, some say even earlier if you include avante garde expressionism in split peas and squash. This innate drive to create continued to inspire her throughout her educational career receiving her BFA from Arizona State University in 1993. She then vacillated between accepting a position as a high school art educator in Yuma, Arizona or to continue on at ASU for a masters degree in sculpture. She opted to take the teaching position and began working on her masters in secondary education with an emphasis in art through Northern Arizona University, which she completed in 1996 while teaching art and ceramics at Vista High School. Continuing her passion for the arts and arts education Cortni became an active member of the Arizona Art Education Association, even winning an award as secondary art teacher of the year in 2000, and started teaching evening art history courses for the local community college in addition to her daytime duties as a high school art specialist. All of this did not impede her desire to continue to create, show and sell her own work. In 2005, along with a group of other local artists, she began an artist cooperative establishing collaboration with the municipal art center for space and advertising. In addition to her involvement with the artist co-op, Cortni also showed her work in a variety of juried exhibitions throughout the state, bid private commissions and completed collaborative public art pieces for the municipality of Yuma. In 2008, after a twenty plus year hiatus, Cortni made the leap of faith to leave Arizona and return to Flathead where she and her extended family hail from. Cortni is one of those oddities that can claim both maternal and paternal roots in the valley dating back to the turn of the century. In Arizona she left behind a vibrant artist community, several public art works as well as large scale private murals, and throngs of students inspired by her passion. Cortni currently lives and works in West Glacier, which she loves, and although inspired by the beauty of the place she lives you will not find an elk among her subjects. She loves the patina of aged metals, weathered wood and worked canvas and often incorporates these surfaces into her work. Although she loves color and the tactile experience of the brush, she also loves to construct and often incorporates the two into her non-traditional wall pieces. As a privately commissioned muralist, Cortni specializes in children’s murals creating inviting, vibrant spaces for youth, quite different from her studio
work.
A full portfolio of her work is available for viewing by contacting Cortni at 406-260-6532 or via email at vh_king@hotmail.com. She would like to thank Station 8 and Betsy Paugh for providing her the opportunity to share her studio work with the public.

Pam Houston - August - The Purple Pomegranate

The Purple Pomegranate, a fine craft specialty store, is featuring work by Ulm painter, Pam Houston during the month of August. Houston, a native Montanan, paints her world with transparent watercolor and oils and acrylics. Interested in the creative arts from an early age, she honed her skills in a wide variety of mediums at the Kansas City Art Institute. For seven years Pam threw pots as a trade, but gave up the clay and wheel for the paintbrush.

Since then, Pam has experimented with watercolors, acrylics, pastels, and oils. "I really like to draw; I hope that my love of drawing shows up in my paintings. Usually the subject itself dictates the medium. Oil is easier to use outside, gives me more time, and I can get some nice textures with it." Currently I am having a lot of fun with acrylics. Drawing from her experiences living and growing up in Montana, Pam's paintings celebrate her passions, lifestyle, and environment. Pam says “I like to paint people, people doing things, working and playing.”

Pam lives with her husband on the Missouri River near Ulm, MT, a small farming community next to Great Falls. Here, they enjoy canoeing, gardening, hunting, and fishing. Between the beautiful location on the river and the amount of outdoor activity available just outside the front door, Pam is never without subject matter.

Meet Pam during Whitefish Gallery Night, Thursday, August 5th, 2010 from 6-9 PM. Pam’s work will be displayed during the opening and throughout the month of August.

Bird's Eye View at Stumptown Art Studio from Aug 5 - Sept 1

Stumptown Art Studio is featuring artists Carolyn Churchouse and Kristie Caratelli in Bird's Eye View, a collaborative show of their work. Opening reception is on August 5 during the regular First Thursday Gallery Nights from 6-9 p.m. Bird's Eye View is on display through September 1, 2010.

Carolyn Churchouse, primarily a clay artist, combines some of her work for this show with other materials to create, unusual, whimsical pieces. She draws on past times in her life for inspiration, and this time, is traveling back to 1972. That year was a turning point in her life that took her from childhood dreams to adult realities and to the realization that music would be her muse. Her pieces have a free-flowing rhythm.

Trees, funny ladies and of course birds have found their way onto Krisitie Caratelli's canvas once again. She finds liberation in not being confined to one medium when working and uses text mixed with found objects, paint and recycled paper. Inspiration for this show came from a feeling of transformation when birds take flight.

In the heart of Whitefish is the non-profit community art center Stumptown Art Studio. It was founded in 1995 to offer art opportunities for all ages and art interests including: classes, workshops, camps, art parties, an artists' co-operative, painting pottery and glass fusing in the Ceramics Annex, art gifts, retail art supplies and exhibits.

Exhibits hosted at Stumptown Art Studio feature guest artists, group displays, student work, new works and provide exhibition space for emerging artists. The public is invited to stop by and enjoy this year's 2010 First Thursday Gallery Nights season between 6 and 9 p.m. during the opening receptions or for a month following anytime during regular open hours.

Florence O'Neal and Danielle Taylor will be the featured artists/photographers for the July 1st WF Gallery Nights at Crush Wine Bar, with music by Kyle Dean. Stop in for wine and beer specials, along with food by John's Angels at Crush.

Marie Hausauer-The Random Musings of a Hermit

Please join The Walking Man Frame Shop & Gallery for a showing of mixed media & acrylics by Whitefish artist, Marie Hausauer. The Random Musings of a Hermit will exhibit a variety of Marie's work-each exposing a window to the artist's perception of different personal experiences, as well as providing commentary to some broader events affecting our every day lives. Marie's artwork is edgy figurative with a splash of surrealism. Live music with Jay DiPaola & refreshments served. Thursday, July 1st, 6-9PM. For more information, call 406-863-ARTS.

Wade Nelson - July - The Purple Pomegranate

The Purple Pomegranate, a fine craft specialty store, is featuring work by Thompson Falls painter, R. Wade Nelson during the month of July. Nelson, a retired high school art teacher is working to become a painter. He has been retired almost 2 years and his work is taking an interesting direction. His paintings in the series, Sunday in the Park, are all painted with acrylic latex on post-consumer paper and cardboard (house paint on recycled paper and cardboard).

Sunday in the Park series was inspired by a drive through Glacier National Park late last summer. Considered by many to be the “crown jewel” of the Park system, Wade feels we are lucky to call it “our back yard”. Wade has tried through this series to present an object and image that is at once sacred and profane. He tries to honor the value placed on the park while working in a direct fashion with humble material. Wade feels that there are common threads between the extraordinary and the ordinary. He works in a way to capture an impression of place, time and atmosphere. He wants the viewer to share the experience with him of a Sunday in the park.

Meet Wade during Whitefish Gallery Night, Thursday, July 1st, 2010 from 6-9 PM. Wade’s work will be displayed during the opening and throughout the month of July.

Station 8 presents Tayler Johnson

Station 8 is very pleased to host Whitefish native, Tayler Johnson, as their featured artist for the month of July. You will be surprised by Tayler's work, simply because the level expertise and variety ,of both subject and medium, contrasts sharply with her age! Tayler, a recent graduate of Whitefish High School, describes herself as "passionate about art" and that is putting it mildly. From her earliest memories, she has been responding to the beauty of the Flathead Valley through drawing and painting. She enjoys all aspects of working with the mediums oil, acrylic, watercolor and gauche, her favorite being oil. When she is not painting or drawing, she spends her time partaking in a wide variety of outdoor activities, including camping, rock climbing, swimming, fishing, slack lining, folfing golfing, hiking and water skiing. Having recently earned her scuba diving certification, Tayler has added exploring underwater environments to her list of activities. It is highly likely that this new direction will influence her art as well.
Tayler will be attending FVCC in the Fall as her first step towards expanding her artistic abilities and subsequent career options. In a year or two, she plans to attend an accredited art school with her goal being to explore the world of graphic design. She is committed to developing her acquired skills into a career she will love for the rest of her life.
Please join us, July 1st, 6-9 PM, to meet Tayler and view her work. Her passion is contagious!
Station 8 will be serving refreshments. Amazing Crepes will be open as well.