The Bainbridge Island community is fortunate to have many exhibition spaces: large, small and intimate, informal, in town and off the beaten path, and “occasional” spaces. I plan to visit them and highlight a show, an artist, exhibiting at one of the First Friday Art Walk openings finding some gem to point people to. Space only allows for one brief highlight a month, but over time I hope to cover many artists exhibiting in many different spaces.
This month I would like to point out a group show offering a great diversity of style and focus at Island Gallery on Winslow Way. It is the annual “Printmakers Show,” featuring nine artists from Bainbridge and Seattle, who work in the “monotype” format of printmaking. The variety runs from solid to ethereal landscapes, to abstracts with mark making and patterns, to figurative work.
I am particularly taken with the work of Kathryn Lesh, a Bainbridge Island artist. Lesh’s monotype prints are figurative depictions of people with whom she has an emotional connection. That said, they are less portraits and more the essence of those connections – a glancing acknowledgment. They evoke a moment, a mood, mingled with tension between light and space. Lesh has a background in black-and-white photography, as well as in drawing and printmaking with the enigmatic Nathan Oliveira (sculptor/painter/printmaker) in California. Oliveira introduced Lesh to monotype printmaking, and she reconnected with that form locally in workshops
offered in Wendy Orville’s Bainbridge studio.
The beauty of the show is the pairings of prints on view. The ethereal landscapes of Renee Jameson play beautifully off the atmosphere of Lesh’s figurative prints. The land-sea-air prints of Maryann Kirby play wonderfully off Jameson’s atmospheric works. And so it goes. Curator Susan Swannick Nun has pulled
together an exciting show one could linger in a while before reentering our bustling town.
Recently, Bill has enjoyed exhibiting in several international art biennial exhibitions. Of the three in which he has participated, he won Third Place for Sculpture from the European Confederation of Art Critics in the Chianciamo Biennale, at the Chianciano Art Museum in Italy in 2011, and First Place in Applied Arts in the London Biennale of 2013. In 2013 alone, he will have participated in eight exhibitions: from London to a two-person exhibition near home. In addition, Bill was asked to be a representative for CCAC’s exhibition celebrating 100 years of the Metals Department, and a mix of group shows in New York City, Miami, Seattle and Las Vegas. Currently, after a five-year planning process, he is just about to begin work on a twelve-foot tall, ten-foot wide Equatorial Bowstring Style Sundial project for the Battle Point Astronomical Association on Bainbridge Island to be installed in the spring of 2014.
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Thank you for an excellent article, particularly your insightful review of Kathryn Lesh’s work. There is a pensive, almost haunting quality to her images.
Thank you for an excellent article, particularly your insightful review of Kathryn Lesh’s work. There is a pensive, almost haunting quality to her images.
View lessKathryn's work looks incredible. Thank you for bringing the Printmakers Show to our attention. This is now a "must see" for me!
Kathryn's work looks incredible. Thank you for bringing the Printmakers Show to our attention. This is now a "must see" for me!
View less