Shawn Gould:

The Art of Getting Lost

March 30 through May 19

The Art of Getting Lost is the result of Shawn Gould’s multiple trips to the Punta Gorda Lighthouse on the remote stretch of coastal wilderness called the Lost Coast. This new body of work is due in large part to Gould receiving a Victor Thomas Jacoby Award from the Humboldt Area Foundation in 2021. It was the spark that he needed to return to a subject he began to explore decades ago. The Lost Coast Trail and Punta Gorda Lighthouse caught his interest on his first camping trip in 2002 and he has returned a number of times since. Over the years he had created a few paintings based on these trips, but inevitably got pulled away by other projects and commitments. Despite this, he always hoped to go back and continue what he had started. Who travels to an abandoned lighthouse in search of enlightenment you might ask? An artist who had to get lost to find new inspiration.


Joan Gold:

About Color

May 4 through June 23

Color has been Joan Gold’s focus from the beginning and collaging paint and paper bring her vision to life. Painting on paper, printing her own designs; juxtaposing colors, adjusting hues, lighter or darker, saturated, or muted, complex, or simple — these are the decisions that occupy her process. In response, the world of care and responsibility and the news of the day fall away. Images of the Holocaust that Gold saw as a child have haunted has life, along with the many horrors past and present that we know of, so she goes to her studio to make something about this beautiful world and her good life. The joy she finds in painting, using patterns, textures and stripes, and the pleasure of working with color brings her balance, serenity, and peace.

 


Peter Holbrook:

Small Works

May 25 through July 7

Peter Holbrook’s (1940-2016) landscapes and riverscapes capture mountains, valleys, and bodies of water with intricate detail as seen through his lens. Known for his contemporary landscape paintings of the Southwest as well as California, this selection of small paintings illustrates his strong relationship with the natural world. In an artist statement Peter wrote: "I'm interested in the question of what exactly it is that makes certain places endlessly fascinating to look at. There are no formulas, but scale (large against small) and clarity are often factors. The quality of the secondary (bounced) light that occurs where there are immense polished vertical surfaces to catch it makes some places extraordinary. Rhythmic repetition of shapes gives power and integrity to a composition, so I look for that and often find it in the shadow patterns of erosion (earth and water). I also look for the effects of vast distance on strong color (fire and air). Mostly I just try and be open and receptive to many visual possibilities, and I am often surprised by what shows up. I want the process of painting to surprise and challenge me."


Carly Slade:

Rat Race

June 29 through August 18

Carly Slade grew up in "Big sky" Alberta, Canada. Her work is influenced by her blue-collar roots and plagued by a concern for the precarious nature of the working class. Using a mix of materials (most often including clay, embroidery, and building supplies), Slade creates dioramas of real places in an unreal perspective. She received her MFA from San Jose State University and her BFA from the Alberta University of the Arts. Slade is currently an Assistant Professor and Area Head at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt.

Rat Race is an interactive exhibition where viewers are encouraged to pick up a remote controller and drive one of three RC Ceramic pick-up trucks around an 18' slot-car style racetrack. However, just like in the real world, this Rat Race has no finish line and some trucks are at a disadvantage. The trucks carry in their bed bits of ceramic scrap metal and American monuments that they have collected in hopes of building a better life for themselves and their families.

 


Aldaron Laird:

Wigi: A Photographic Exploration

July 13 through September 1

As an environmental planner and photographer, Aldaron Laird has been very fortunate to be able to explore and study Humboldt Bay (Wigi), his home, and the ancestral home to the Wiyot people. While creating a historical atlas of Humboldt Bay, Laird learned of the profound changes to Wigi that have occurred over the last 170-plus years. After documenting these historical changes to Wigi, he was given an opportunity to map Wigi’s present day shoreline and assess its vulnerability to sea level rise. He spent two years field verifying the shoreline mapping as he traversed the 102-mile shoreline perimeter by kayak or on foot. He continues to explore areas of Wigi seldom seen or visited by the public and has been fortunate to experience magical moments of light, atmospheric phenomena, beautiful landscape compositions, and birds everywhere! This exhibition shares his photographs from his recently published book and through these images he hopes people will come to appreciate the beauty that is Wigi.


Guy Joy:

Joy: Celebrating Human Connection

July 6 through August 25

By the process of an individual viewer’s personal responses to his images, Guy Joy's acrylic paintings invite you to perceive and enjoy the richness of differences and similarities among us, focusing your awareness on the rewarding aspects of our interconnections and interdependencies, to perhaps rediscover what we genuinely value about ourselves and each other.

 


Fungus and Fire: A Glass Mushroom Experience

by John Gibbons 

September 4 through October 27

Fungus and Fire is a collection of larger-than-life hand-blown glass mushrooms. Fire plays a key role in glass making and is often seen as a destructive force, but it can also be a powerful tool for creation. In Gibbons' hands, fire is used to transform molten glass into beautiful and unique fungal specimens. The combination of glass and fire is symbolic in the duality of nature. Fire is both destructive and creative, while glass is a fragile and delicate material, both incredibly strong. Gibbons' mushroom sculptures capture this duality perfectly. The sculptures are both beautiful and fragile, just like the mushrooms that inspired them.


Lida Penkova:

Living in Different Worlds and Painting Them

September 7 through October 27

Lida Penkova has lived and travelled in different countries for most of her life, immersing herself in various cultures, their customs, celebrations, and ceremonies. When she started painting, these cultural themes became the focal point of her work, especially themes related to Mexico where she lived and worked for many years. It was during the pandemic that she began to paint a series of work about her granddaughter’s visits to California, which culminated in a book of those adventures. Some of these paintings will be featured in this exhibition along with work from her new adventures after relocating to Colorado.


Junque Arte Competition & Exhibition

Sponsored by Recology Humboldt

Fall 2024

Designed to celebrate artistic creativity on the North Coast, and heighten the awareness of renewable resources in the art making process, each artwork in this juried exhibition is made from 100% recycled materials…reclaimed, reused, recovered, secondhand, salvaged, anything un-new!


Eliseo Casiano:

How to Draw Fire

November 2 through December 15

Eliseo Casiano is a painter focused on portraiture and personal narrative. He is interested in color, light and pattern to create a spectrum of potentialities that reflect a cultural aesthetic centered in his lived experience. Casiano reconfigures family photographs and oral histories into heavily saturated and adorned paintings with free associations and indefinite resolution.

In his upcoming exhibition titled "How to Draw Fire" at the Morris Graves Museum of Art, Casiano has redirected his painting practice from personal symbolism to drawing inspiration from the vibrant landscapes and inhabitants of Humboldt County. His latest paintings capture the interplay of light and darkness over the land during twilight, dawn, and dusk. Alongside these scenic compositions, Casiano is creating a series of portraits that showcase the intriguing individuals he has encountered in the region.


Eliseo earned his Bachelor in Fine Arts degree in painting from East Central University in Ada, Oklahoma, and his Master in Fine Arts degree from Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, LA. His paintings have been shown widely across the United States, including at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, Historic Arkansas Museum, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, and the Vermont Studio Center. He is an Assistant Professor in Art + Film at Cal Poly Humboldt in Arcata, CA. 

 


Ronald Walker:

Musings from the Suburbs

November 2 through December 15

Ronald Walker works in a style he calls "Suburban Primitive” which combines his interest in the origins and functions of art along with life in the suburbs. For Walker, the draw of art lies not in the depiction of physical reality but rather the representation of my emotional, psychological and intellectual reactions to the environment in which he lives. He sees painting as visual thinking--a way of making sense, finding connections and organizing the seemingly incongruent thoughts that bounce around within his head. Ultimately, he holds the belief that all things, within our existence, are somehow tied together and his task, as an artist, is to find and explore these ties. Ron is a retired art educator with a MA in painting from the University of Central Missouri as well as a MFA degree from the University of Kansas.