Though it may not always seem like it, when you look out of the window, summer is on its way to the Pacific Northwest. And, to celebrate that, we’ve decided to dedicate a blog to artworks which are filled with the feeling of summer; be it light, topic, location or simply the feel of the work itself.
We’re delighted to have this opportunity to showcase many of our fantastic artists and we hope that you enjoy this blog!
David McBride
We start with a piece by David McBride. David paints a wide range of styles, but he produces many works which are painted either fully or partly en plein air. This gives these pieces exceptional color and feel, putting you in the place where he stood. He has won a range of awards from the Oregon Society of Artists and his works have hung in the Oregon Governor’s Mansion and Pittock Mansion.
Judy Phipps
Judy says that she considers herself to be extremely fortunate. Not only is she blessed with the drive to toil at the best job in the world, she gets to do it in one of the most fantastic spots anywhere: the lush Williamette Valley of Oregon. Whether working in oils, pastels or bronze, her art is infused by the beauty of her location. RSG is fortunate enough to hold a range of her elegant oil paintings of flowers and vegetables.
Sidonie Caron
‘Secluded Beach’ by Sidonie Caron is filled with the rich light and color that comes from painting on the coast in the summertime. One of the most-established artists in Portland, Sidonie is filled with a restless creativity and energy, creating a richly varied body of work, ranging from landscapes and urban scenes to Judaica and abstractions.
Susan McKinnon
Born in Portland, OR, Susan’s abstractions are filled with color and energy. Many of her works have the palette that gives them the feel of summer and this particularly well-named piece is an excellent example of that. Painted using acrylics on large-scale canvases, her works have proven to be popular with both businesses and individual clients.
Don Bishop
An artist who loves to paint outside, spring and summer often finds Don Bishop outdoors, creating plein air pieces. As well as his abstracts, RSG has a fantastic collection of Don’s paintings which take the sun as their focus, of which this is a particularly striking example. His works can be found in collections all across the country, though his style is deeply-rooted in West Coast Impressionism, which he uses to beautiful effect.
Susan Trueblood Stuart
Susan has been creating art for more than 60 years. This resident of Salem has been part of RSG for many years, though this is the only piece of her work that we currently have available. Showing a beach scene at Neskowin, it conjures up the feeling of the sun and stormy weather which is such a feature of the Oregon coast, particularly in the north of the state.
Ken Klos
A member of RSG since 2011, Ken is an artist and architect, who has also worked as a teacher, soldier, truck driver, forest fire fighter and more. Surely one of the most varied careers of any of our artists! He’s inspired to paint open areas and in the outdoors, from Sauvie Island and the Columbia River Gorge, to the beautiful garden captured here.
Paul Zegers
Paul is a fine artist who use impressionistic and sometimes expressionistic techniques with oil on canvas to portray the depth and richness of this landscape. His works at RSG are a mix of scenes of urban Portland and his natural landscapes, which capture views of rivers, mountains and, as shown here, the Oregon coast.
Sharon Engel
Light is the heart of Sharon Engel’s paintings. The warm sunlight creates an atmosphere in which the viewer may feel pleasure, wanting to participate in the scene. She paints on location in the impressionistic tradition using oil, acrylic or watercolor, giving her works the essence of place, light and feeling. She has a deep love of gardens and they frequently appear at the heart of her works.
Gary Anderson
Gary is a widely-recognized artist of the Pacific Northwest. A painter with decades of experience, his vivid landscape paintings are taken from nature. He says that though “these images might be unnoticed glimpses in the natural world… they are visual memories not forgotten.” Through the abstraction of the works, one gets a profound feeling of the place and time which he is capturing.
Rich Bergeman
An Oregonian since 1976, Rich deeply enjoys a romance with the iconic, the serene, and the patina of things past their prime. For the past couple of decades he’s been investigating and interpreting local histories of the Northwest through photographs of what’s been left behind. Recently, much of his work has been created using infrared imagery, giving his photographs a powerful and original feeling.
Candace Primack
Candace Primack creates her abstract works by following her intuition. The process is one of being focused and meditative, creating pieces that blend together color, form, depth and texture in a complimentary way. “Satisfying”, she says, “the need to communicate bold energy as well as quiet reflection.”
Angelita Surmon
We complete the blog with a work by Angelita Surmon, appropriately entitled ‘Summer Turns to Fall’. Inevitably, the summer must end, but let’s not think about that too much at the moment. Enjoy the season whilst it lasts; especially making sure to enjoy the warm, dappled sunlight, which the artist so beautifully captures in this perfect example of her work.