November 26, 2010 Friday

The 2010 Bolinas & Stinson Open Studios

“The hills of West Marin are alive with starving artists.”

Back in September, my surf buddy and good friend, Jim Ellis, had mentioned that he was going show his sculptures in the Bolinas & Stinson Open Studios the weekend after Thanksgiving (see the September 1st Part 2 entry). The past couple of weeks I had seen posters in Bolinas, Stinson and Mill Valley advertising the Open Studios put on by the Coastal Marin Artists. It was a big deal. Twenty-six local artists in their studios to meet, greet, chat and sell their art. So I had to check it out.

Jim has lived and surfed in Stinson Beach all his life. A retired carpenter, he has taken up sculpting of ocean life: sharks, fish, seals, whales, abalone, etc., and he has become well known among the local artists as one of the good ones. Two artist friends, Steve Lewis and Susie Allen de Baker invited Jim to join them at Steve’s studio in Bolinas. Today was Jim’s first public showing where he would be there to chat with the public and he was nervous about it. But after the first few people Jim opened up. All it took was to ask him about how he did each piece. He loved talking technique.

The above photo is one of his wood sculpted sharks. Each piece takes him hundreds of hours of labor. He figures he would be lucky to get minimum wage for any of them.

“Jim how did you get such realistic looking teeth on that shark over there?” This one had teeth that went bent, twisted and some broken off.

“Dentures!” He went on to explain that this one was not a carving but rather was a fiberglass resin compound poured into a mold. For the teeth he did the same thing dentists do for crowns and false teeth, he stuck the shark’s teeth in a small pan of plaster of Paris.

“If you have a mold of this shark, you could crank out several of them.”

“Not really. You see I had to make a series of nine molds, mouth, head, tail, fins, body, etc. I would have to pour each piece, put the pieces together, fit them, smooth them off to make it one piece and then paint it.”

A small shark had washed up onto the beach at Stinson one morning. Jim grabbed it and stuck it in a freezer for a few months. Then with the shark frozen solid he made the nine molds and the dentures, poured in the fiberglass mixture and then spent countless hours putting them all together. Believe me you cannot tell where one piece connects to another.

Jim gave me some recommendations for some of his favorite artists, others that specialize in ocean themes. I spent the rest of the day visiting, chatting with and taking photos of five other artists and their works. I saw seven out of the twenty-six artists, took pictures of six of them, blew the whole day and had a great time. Click on the link below to view my photos. I have pictures for:

Schehera Van Dyk – hand painted ceramics. Incredible detail and bright colors on plates and vases.

Jim Ellis – sculpture of sharks, fish, birds, one whale and seals.

Susie Allen de Baker – Marin hills and coastline acrylic landscapes. Susie has lived and painted in Marin all of her life. She comes from an artist family and has had to fortune to work with some of Marin’s best artists.

Steve Lewis – stone sculpture. Steve carves whale flukes out of granite. It must take him forever to do these pieces. Beautiful, highly polished carvings set in huge blocks of stone.

Jon Francis – Stinson Beach painter of classic cars, beach scenes and old California houses and buildings. Being a graduate of UC Santa Barbara, one building I recognized right away, the old classic Alhambra movie theater on State Street in downtown Santa Barbara.

Michael Knowlton – Stinson painter of beach scenes and other weird stuff. His studio had a ton of large paintings leaning up against the walls. Paintings of the Parkside Snack Bar, stacks of classic old cars in a junkyard, colorful view of the tube of a wave and clowns driving an old convertible. He had a few large paintings of palm trees on fire. As he put it, he painted them after the Los Angeles Rodney King riots where rampaging youths set the palm trees on fire. Several of Michael’s pieces are currently on display at the Parkside Café.


Bolinas & Stinson Open Studio Photos