Art exhibit celebrates the Columbia River
Thursday, May 5, 2005 8:41 AM PDT
By Tom Paulu
Printable version
E-mail this articlePlenty of organizations are holding special events to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
An obvious link to the past -- and one that still inspires artists -- is the Columbia River.
The Longview Public Library's last art exhibit of the season includes the works of 18 visual artists who focus on the river.
"Roll On, Columbia: Canvassing a River" opens Friday and continues through May 25 in the library's Koth Gallery. It will include about 40 works altogether.
"We thought it might be fitting to just concentrate on the Columbia River as the connection from the present to the past," said Hans Schaufus, who coordinated the exhibit.
Most of the works are riverscapes or representations of life along the river. But one artist, John Gibson, did portraits of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. "That really does give it a commemorative aspect," Schaufus said.
He's excited about the work, which includes several nationally known artists. "The quality of the artwork is about as good as it gets in our region."
The artists included are:
-- Sandy Baltazar, a commercial photographer who lives at Silver Lake.
-- Robert Bernstein, a Portland professional photographer who specializes in nautical subjects.
-- Martha Boentgen, a retired Lower Columbia College art instructor who been painting Columbia River subjects over her lifetime.
-- John Gibson, a Cathlamet resident who does Van Gogh-style acrylic landscapes of the Cathlamet/Skamokawa subjects.
-- Karen Leback, a Broadway Gallery member who lives in Winlock.
-- Joe MacKenzie, a Longview resident who often seeks patterns and symmetry in his color photography.
-- Dennis McLean, who does meticulous pen-and-ink of working boats.
-- David Lee Myers of Astoria, a former LCC instructor who does black-and-white and color photographs.
-- Sharon Pedersen, a Longview artist who does detailed pen-and-ink/watercolors of rustic compositions. She was recognized as the library's Featured Artist for 2005.
-- Roland Richards of Longview, who works with wire sculpture but will submit two watercolors for this show.
-- Hans Schaufus, a black-and-white photographer who learned from his German uncle, who was a photojournalist during World War II.
-- Leda Spingath, a former Castle Rock resident who now lives in Stayton, Ore. She does watercolors.
-- Noel Thomas of Astoria, a member of the prestigious American Watercolor Society. He also does painstaking miniatures with his wife, Pat.
-- Judy Van der Maten of Skamokawa, a Broadway Gallery member who teaches photography at LCC.
-- Bill Wagner of Astoria, a Daily News photographer who loves doing shots of the "Life on the Columbia."
-- Hank Weber of Vancouver, who works mainly in watercolor gouache. He's had three shows at the Longview Library.
-- Eric Wiegardt of Ocean Park, a nationally known watercolorist and member of the American Watercolor Society .
-- Marie Wise. The public affairs manager for the Port of Longview lives in a Kalama house with a river view, plenty of inspiration for her watercolors.
Donna Mcdaniel wrote on Feb 22, 2008 4:48 AM:
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