How often do you get invited to 34 artists’ studios to see what they make and watch demonstrations? Here, where most roads are marked private, you rarely even see how others live, so this is a double whammy of a tour.
Leading up to this fantastic annual 3-day weekend event, there are studio tour brochures in lots of downtown shops. Inside the brochure is a map and a description of each studio and how to get there. It’s all free, and you set about the tour whenever you want, stopping wherever you want, and staying at each one as long as you want.
Three years ago I decided that the boys and I would try to visit every studio on the tour that year – every year the studios on the list change a little. You have from 11 AM to 5 PM each day and it was like a full-time job that weekend – a wonderful full-time job. We saw amazing homes, interesting art, and unique ways of life. We hit almost all of them, going strong 6 hours each day.
This year we were a little more casual about it. In our 3-day island-driving jaunt we visited 14 studios. Here are some highlights of the ones we experienced, followed by individual posts of each artist’s work. What a blast it was, filled with myriad beautiful learning experiences from wonderfully generous artists…
Mary Jane Elgin – Carved Ceramics
Bruce Wilson – Thermal Oil and Wax
Sharon Ho – Optimism and Co. Ceramics
Rosemarie Altberg & Family – Paintings, Jewelry & Wood Bowls
Kim Middleton – Ravensight Studio – Oil Paintings of Birds
Barbara Bentley – Variicolor Handcrafts – Fiber Arts, Socks
Peg O’Hara – Firedog Studio – Multiple Mediums
Zackarya Leck – Forged Iron & Bronze
Michael E. Yeaman – Geology and Stone
Barbara Gourley – Oil Painting
Thomas Leonard – Pickett Spring – Blacksmith
Anusha Solayea – Twisting Whimsy Jewelry – Wearable Art
Sean Forest Roberts – Forest Ceramics
Kandis Susol – Jakuan Studio – Artist-made Paper, Wax
It doesn’t seem fair to highlight only the 14 studios we visited. This by no means reflects any superiority over the other studios; we simply couldn’t make it to all of them. And in fact, we’ve been to many of the other ones in the past and have been very impressed by them.
Here is a list of the other artists who opened their studios for the 3-day tour:
- Peter C. Fisher – Photography
- Jacqueline Kempfer – Oil, Watercolor, and Sumi Ink
- Jeanmarie Agapoff – Sumi Ink and Watercolor
- Shawna Franklin – Linoleum Block Prints, Oil, and Drawing
- Ken Brown – Wood and Stone
- Deborah Heffley Jones – Venetian Plaster and Gold Leaf
- Janet Gadallah – Porcelain Tile Art
- Peter Olesen – Silver-based Black & White Photography Prints
- Jan Rimerman – Mixed Media
- Dave Haslett – Stone Sculpture
- Todd Spalti – Sculptor: Wood, Metal, and Acrylic Paint
- Maria Root – Pottery and Tile
- Peter Carlson – Oil Painting and Found Materials
- Vanessa Julian – Acrylic Paintings, Bird Balls, Painted Boxes, and Clay Pins
- Bruce Myers – Sculpture
- James Hardman – Acrylic and Oil Paintings
- Steve and Lynn Emmes – Custom Furniture and Cabinetry
- Geoff Shilling – Weaving
- Tina Brown – Printmaking and Paper Collage
