Category: Past Events

On December 3, Valley Arts Group President Gwen Callahan led a contingent of VAG members on a tour of two galleries in White Rock, BC.  The group spent a lovely afternoon viewing wood carvings, fabric art, ceramics and paintings in oils, watercolors, and acrylics by Arnold Mikelson at the Mind and Matter Art Gallery and then visited the festive Christmas Open House at the White Rock Gallery, where many of the exhibiting artists happily shared their ideas and thoughts about producing the art they had on display.  Attendees were greeted and welcomed by a formal doorman and enjoyed complimentary wine and fine food bites while perusing the exhibits.  The VAG group enjoyed time to discuss all they had seen while savoring dinner in a local restaurant before returning home.  Many thanks to Gwen for arranging and facilitating this holiday trip!

Another fun afternoon with the Valley Arts Group! Instructors Alice, Christine and Gwen organized a workshop on the art of Zentangle. Gwen guided us through the process step-by-step. Participants included members Gwen, Alice, Reka, Penny, Beryl and Robbie, plus guests Brenda and Diana.

If you would like to create your own Zentangle artwork, check out the book One Zentangle A Day by Beckah Krahula. It is available through the Whatcom County Library.

Thank you Virginia for organizing our first Plein Air session for this year! We found a nice spot to settle in on AM Beach. Here are a few photos of the scenery and the artists hard at work.

Stephanie Strong guided us through a fun silk painting class this afternoon. Participants included Gwen, Alice, Danila, Roz and Robbie.

Silk painting is a lot like working with watercolor, but special dyes are used instead of paint. The basic steps are to stretch a piece of silk on a frame, draw a design on the silk using a “resist”, paint with the dyes in the areas defined by the resist, dry with a hairdryer, paint on “dyeset”, dry again, remove silk from frame, rinse, pat dry, and then iron completely dry.

Here are our results (some still in progress):

Back by popular demand, Gwen held another “Watercolor Batik” workshop on Tuesday, April 25th. Participating members included Beryl, Danila, Karen D., Karen M., Robbie and Roz.

Watercolor Batik is a process of layering watercolors and wax on rice paper. The “fun-scary” part comes after you are done applying the wax and paint. You crumple or accordion pleat your paper, lay it flat, and apply a wash to the cracks in the wax. After another layer of wax, you press the painting between newspaper using an iron.

First, an example of Gwen’s beautiful watercolor batik paintings.

Below, a few examples of artwork produced in the workshops.

What a great turnout for the VAG Open House at the Barn!  Lots of folks in attendance throughout the afternoon to enjoy our exhibit and take the opportunity to meet the Sudden Valley artists behind the pieces on display.  It was a wonderful show of support from our community!

Valley Arts Group members are invited to attend Images of Resilience: Chicana/o Art and its Mexican Roots, at the Whatcom Museum’s Lightcatcher Building on March 30, 2017.  The exhibition explores the development of Chicana/o art, from its beginnings in Mexican art of the early 1900s, to the Chicana/o movement of the 1960s and ’70s, to its relevance today.  Available for viewing upstairs will be The Katrina Decade: Images of an Altered City, a photo exhibition featuring the haunting black-and-white images of New Orleans based photographer David G. Spielman.

The docent led tour will begin at 1:30 PM.  The Artifacts Cafe and Wine Bar will be open for lunch for those wishing to meet before the tour.  Sign-up sheets will be available at the March 11 open house.

VAG President Gwen Callahan hosted a fun “Watercolor Batik” how-to workshop at her home in Sudden Valley on Wednesday, January 25. Members attending, including Beryl Adams, Penny Bamford, Carol McMillan, Karen Peter, Stephanie Strong, and Rèka Zoltàn, spent a delightful afternoon playing with new art techniques and went home with a newly created batik piece.

Gwen, Alice, Christine, Danila and Robbie enjoyed a fun and informative tour at the Lightcatcher Museum today with our docent, Mike DeAngelo. It was an amazing show, especially considering the amount of work each artist went through to install their work for a short three month exhibition. The photos don’t do it justice.