Coast Highway Artists Collective

2024

July 5-28, "July 4th" parade in Point Arena, & Exhibit Reception, Friday, July 5, 3 - 7 PM, Ron Bolander, photography

August 2-25, Reception Friday, August 16, 3 to 7pm Carolyn Zeitler, Baskets, Nara Pilgrim Wood, watercolor

September 6-29, Reception Friday, Sept 6,
3-7pm, Chris Grassano, paintings, Cynthia Myers glass artist

October 4-27, Reception, Friday, Oct. 4, 3- 7pm Geraldine LiaBraaten, photography, Hitomi Jacobs, jewelry

November 1-24, Reception Friday, Nov. 1, 3 - 7pm Tempra Board, jewelry & ink drawings, David Yager, photography & ceramics

December 2-30, Hometown Holidays, opening TBA, Group Holiday Gifts show

2025

January, Clean up days, closed for the month

February 1-28, Reception Friday, Feb. 7, 3 to7 PM Carol Golden, painter and artist Neno Villamor.

March 1-30, Reception Sat. March 1, 3 to 7 pm, Bruce Jones, paintings, sculptures Doric Jemison-Ball, ceramics

April 4-27, Reception TBA, and will be coordinated with Almost Fringe Festival

May 2-30, Reception Saturday May 3,

3 to 7 PM, Elizabeth Gladstone, painting, Ryder Holmes Wilson, concrete furniture

June 6-29, Reception, Saturday, June 7, 3 to 7 pm, Sharon Nickodem, photography, collage, Donnalynn Chase, collage

July 4-27, IndependenceDay parade in Point Arena, Reception Sat.July 5 during parade, Tentative artists, Mike Connor, painting, and John Allen Cann, poet and wife Robin Cann, poet

August 2-24, Reception Saturday, August 2, 3 to 7 pm, Rozann and Rachel Grunig, Photo and Fabric Sculpture

September 5-28, Reception Saturday, Sept 6, 3 to 7 pm, Perry Hoffman, ceramics, Doug Smith, ceramics

October 3-28, Reception Friday, Oct 5, 3 to 7 pm Scott Sewell, photography, Bonnie Belt, ceramic sculpture.

November 1-26, Reception Friday, Nov. 7, 3 to 7 pm, Arlene Guerrero, mandalas, Judy Pfeiffer, paintings

December 5-28, Hometown Holidays, openingTBA

Tempra Board

I am a mostly self-trained artist working in ink, watercolor, colored pencil, and markers. I have taken two intensive classes in botanical illustration from the New York Botanical Garden’s continuing education program, and I have taken workshops with artists Mike Henderson (graphite), Andrea Allen (Chinese brush painting in sumi ink), and Kathleen Alexander (watercolor).

I am continually in awe of the micro and macro world of Mendonoma (the northern Sonoma and southern Mendocino County coast), where I live, from the smallest mushrooms and lichen peeking out of a downed redwood log, to the constantly changing land and seascape, and all our native plants, birds, and other wildlife that quietly and not so quietly go about their business, in spite of us.

My work includes ink and marker landscapes in a graphic style, with elements of psychedelic and flat design, featuring iconic locations on the northern California coast, as well as representational ink and watercolor drawings of plants, birds, and other critters.

I am also a graphic designer specializing in print layout and design. Wanting to highlight and support local and regional artists, I launched a new magazine last summer about rural California art and artists, called Mark Makers’ Quarterly, available by subscription or through various retail outlets.

www.markmakersquarterly.com

www.tempraboard.com/art-design

David Yager

I’ve been working with clay for probably half a century. When I was a kid visiting my grandparents in Oregon, I used to dig up clay, bring it home and make things out of it. I went to study business at Washington State University and took a ceramics class for fun. I realized I was spending much more time in the ceramics lab than in business classes, so I changed my major to art.

One of my early mentors was Michael Lucero, a nationally renowned New York-based ceramics artist, whose work has been featured in the Smithsonian. I was lucky enough to study under Michael at California State University, Chico, as well as under Jack Windsor, who started the CSUC ceramics program and was a master glaze scientist.

My stoneware is a white, fine-grained clay that is both lightweight and strong, with properties similar to porcelain. I like to make functional pieces—things that are beautiful but that people can use. I choose to work in high fire, which is more expensive and more difficult, but results in highly durable pieces.

In the last few years I’ve been honing my signature “swirly” pieces that use many colorful glazes that have only recently become available at high temperatures, and which characterize much of my current work. In 2022, I began embellishing my signature on the bottom of my large bowls, adding Sea Ranch scenes like our signature sheep and cypress hedgerows. These became popular, so now I’m painting such scenes on the inside of bowls as well.

Shop local for wonderful gifts at reasonable prices to please your family and friends for the coming winter Holidays. We have unique, special art treasures at our CHAC gallery, created by our local artisans working in a wide range of media, including jewelry, paintings, prints, collage, photography, ceramics, sculpture, textiles, apparel, and much more.

To make your shopping experience more pleasurable, we will have live music performed by two special bands,:

Jim and Sharon Lieberman, Bard of a Feather (12-2 pm) (Note : poster should read 12 - 2 pm also)

Todd and Charlene Orenick, Black Sugar Rose (4 pm -6 pm) (Note poster should read 4 pm - 6pm also)

Some of the new work by our member artists and guest artists crafted especially for our holiday show includes:

James Docker, woodworker

Perry Hoffman, ceramic, photographs and more

Emma Hurley, clothing, ceramics and more

Carol Williams, statues & beaded jewelry

Elizabeth Solomon, toys, books and more

Deborah Threlkel, Abalone Queen Jewelry

Natalie LaBeau, hand sewing goods

Cindy Morey, photography and trees

The members of the Coast Highway Art Collective welcome the community to an opening reception on Friday, Oct. 4 from 3 to 7pm. Featured artists for the month of October are Geraldine LiaBraaten, photography and Hitomi Jacobs, jewelry. Meet the artists during the opening reception, browse all the beautiful art work by collective members and start that holiday shopping early. The show will run from Oct. 4 through Oct. 27 during regular gallery hours.

LiaBraaten - For Geraldine it’s all about color. “Color is my life, LiaBraaten declares. “If I lived on the island of the colorblind I would just fade away to nothing. My house is a riot of color: turquoise kitchen, red couch, fuchsia duvet, yellow pillows. And don’t get me started on my wardrobe: there’s a reason my nickname is “Flamboya.” This year marks LiaBraaten’s golden anniversary as a photographer. She says she’s done it all: media assignments of newsworthy events, stock photography, outdoor art fairs, gallery exhibits and nonprofit fundraisers.

Through it all, her style has remained consistent: She likes color, diagonals, pattern and oddness. Over time she’s gotten closer and closer to her subjects, evolving from large panoramas to small semi-abstracts. The element of surprise, plus recognition and discovery are part of what she wants to give the viewer: from “What the heck IS that?” to “Aha!” LiaBraaten says she doesn’t do darkroom work or image manipulation, not out of any purist mindset but because she has no patience with technology, nor interest in changing the images. “What I saw through the viewfinder is what you get in the image,” she says.

Jacobs - Hitomi was born and raised in Japan, studying Textile and Fashion design in Tokyo. Jacobs started two fashion lines in Shizuoka - "Les Robes" and "Jellybeans", sold in stores and boutiques. In 1996 she moved to California, and while continuing her fashion/clothing work, she became interested in jewelry design. After taking courses from several organizations, she joined The Marin Jewelers Guild, and began by attending fine arts festivals in the West, eventually expanding to events in London, New York, Tokyo and Osaka. Jacob's style includes an innovative use of oxidized silver, and a variety of unusual pearls. She works with gold gemstones, as well. Her work has been described as ''Organic " and "Unique.” She is excited to share her work will be featured in Sonoma Magazine's Holiday Issue this Year.

This September, the Coast Highway Art Collective opens its doors to the birds, the bees and all forms of ocean life. Collective member Chris Grassano (Painting) and guest artist Kristin Coddington-Gordon (clay sculptures) will exhibit their nature-themed works from Sept. 6 through Sept. 29. An opening reception is on Friday, Sept. 6 from 3 to 7pm. and everyone is welcome.

Chris Grassano expresses the connection between winged creatures and the flowers they rely on. “Birds, bees and butterflies take sustenance from a flower’s nectar and in return helps that flower pass on its genes to the next generation,” notes Granssano. “I am inspired by the beauty of the physical world and I endeavor to capture the unique vitality of the many creatures and plants that live here.” Her goal is to blend realism, imagination, emotion, and design in communicating a personal vision that touches the universal.

Chris received her BA in Fine Art from Montclair State College in New Jersey. She has worked in a variety of mediums, including acrylics, oils, glass mosaics, copper relief and pen and ink. In San Francisco, she earned a BFA in Illustration from Academy of Art University. During her time there she was introduced to the work of Robert Bateman, a preeminent nature artist. This helped inspire her to further explore the natural world in her painting. For over 30 years Grassano has been celebrating the natural environments of Northern California in her work. She says she finds her daily life made more human through interaction with the flora and fauna of this place.

Kristen Coddington-Gordon (What now Ceramics) uses her background in scientific illustration and natural history in her clay sculptures. It is her love of animals and the space and time to explore and create without instructions or influences which she believes is critical to evolving into one’s own creative self. As a naturalist. A conservationist and environmentalist, her passions are intertwined in her life and work. Her great hope is that her art stirs an emotion in people that inspires them to do what they can-to save the whales, be mindful of the path they tread on this earth, and to responsibly steward the resources that we all share.

Gallery Info The Coast Highway Art Collective is located at 284 Main St., Point Arena, the little red building with the big yellow sun, located next to the Redwood Coast Credit Union. Summer hours are Thursday through Sunday, 11 am to 4 pm. Visit the website at www.coast-highway-artists.com for information about the collective’s artists, upcoming events and how to join. To find out more about becoming a member of the Collective, contact Ling-Yen Jones at 707-884-9153 or via the website above.

Interviews with Painter Nara Pilgrim Wood and Basket Maker Carolyn Zeitler at the Aug. 2024 opening reception for their new art exhibit at the Coast Highway Artists Collective, Point Arena, CA. Nara's art features the rugged beauty of the northern California coastal environment, as well as encompassing the tranquil beauty of south pacific settings and Japanese ikebana. Carolyn's beautiful basketry designs, honed on more than forty years at her creative art, and featuring some striking traditional as well as free-form basketry, employing both pine needles and special patina-coated copper material.

Nara Pilgrim Wood

The places of my childhood did not have television or radio. There was no internet, no social media. Sometimes there was electricity only a few hours a day. What I did have was family and friends, nature and life. The coral reef-encircled, lavender-hued lagoons of my early years were exploded with life. My youth was filled with fortune, my childhood was magical.

I remember these times as a prolonged and deep experience of happiness. My art is imbued with my love of the natural world observing it, feeling it, painting it. The island beaches and lagoons, the redwood groves of my youth were places that invited deep contemplation. Places such as these were abundant with life and spirit. They were sacred spaces.
My home is now in the coastal mountains of Northern California. The forests of my youth have burned, and the land is parched. The landscape bears scars everywhere I look. In the South Pacific much of the coral reef is bleached and lifeless. It is hard to look at the devastation, but impossible not to see it. Nevertheless, I have no movement to contribute a brushstroke to mourning the loss. My intention is to paint equanimity, balance, and vitality. What is beautiful should always be remembered and served. And I have found that a painting can invite that same deep contemplation, that same thoughtlessness that the forests, mountains, and oceans offer.

Watercolor has been my primary medium for the last 25 years. I am drawn to color. I saturate the paper with paint, and apply multiple layers to create bright, rich, and strong colors. I also apply gold leaf to many of my paintings. The gold reflects light beautifully, accentuates forms, and adds brightness to the watercolor. I draw inspiration from the masters of Japanese painting and woodblock printing, and from the Japanese art aesthetic altogether. Most of all I am inspired and moved by the heart feeling of being, the feeling of the mystery, the living of happiness. That is what I invoke as I paint.

My intimacy with the natural world has always been spontaneous and immediate. My painting is a ceremony of restoration and renewal. It’s not longing for the past or the future. It is always a celebration of the beautiful. I want every painting that I do to be pregnant with life, full of happiness. So, I paint what I love, what my vision is.

Carolyn Zeitler

I made my first basket in 1979, having learnt from a woman who learned pine needle basketry as a Camp Fire Girl, in Illinois, in the 1920’s. That summer, I started working as a fire lookout for the US Forest Service in Big Sur and began what has become a life-long pursuit of pine needle basketry using the native California Coulter pine needles that grow in the Ventana Mountains of the Los Padres.

After over 40 years of making baskets exclusively with pine needles, I needed a challenge that would take me beyond what I already knew to create new shapes and new designs. Working with copper is a delightful contrast to the texture of the pine needles it is hard yet soft, it can be smooth or textured, it can hammered and cut giving shape to a form that the pine needles can follow and emphasize. I want the result to reflect a sense of awe and beauty of the materials without revealing the effort that it took to create it.

“Creativity is the residue of time wasted.” Albert Einstein

The members of the Coast Highway Art Collective in Point Arena are excited to host an opening reception for local wildlife photographer, Ron Bolander on Friday, July 5 from 3 to 7 pm. The community is invited to enjoy the art, meet the artist and learn more about the Collective.

Bolander is a retired commercial photographer who specialized in photographing products, people, food, architecture and artworks. He’s been living on the Redwood Coast for thirty years, photographing the scenic beauty, but says it took him a while to realize there was also an abundance of varied wildlife. He is currently concentrating his lens on photographing everything from insects to river otters, birds, including hawks and eagles, to large mammals. Bolander says “Sometimes we forget that these animals have a unique and colorful beauty, making images of these creatures, I believe, enhances awareness of our surroundings.”

In its 13th year, the Collective currently has 25 members whose works range from jewelry, painting, textiles, photography, ceramics, mixed media and more. Guest artists are usually featured monthly and bring a wide range of art mediums to compliment the member’s works. Housed in historic building in downtown Point Arena, guests to the gallery are welcomed by well-loved garden filled with garden art, sunshine and a bench to socialize and catch up with the latest news.>>>> The Coast Highway Art Collective is located at 284 Main St., Point Arena, the little red building with the big yellow sun, located next to the Redwood Coast Credit Union. Summer hours are Thursday through Sunday, 11 am to 4 pm.

To find out more about becoming a member of the Collective, or to schedule a Sunday visit, contact Ling-Yen Jones at 707-884-9153, or click the "About" page navigation button above and use the message form there to contact us.

David Brix discusses his stunning photographs on exhibit at the CHAC gallery in Point Arena, CA. His destinations range from Death Valley, weather carved rock formations in the southwestern U.S., fishing harbors in the Pacific and Atlantic, and spectacular astrological effects over majestic geologic features. Peter Bailey exhibits his graceful, Celtic themed jewelry in silver and gold, with a few pieces electro-painted with niobium, a silver gray metal element, deposited in shades of azure blue. The Celtic knot designs of his rings feature continuous interlaced cords, signifying the unbroken or everlasting love. The complete exhibit will be shown throughout June, 2024.

PETER BAILEY - Peter began creating jewelry fresh out of college. Armed with degrees in Psychology, Art and Music, Peter began to make fabricated jewelry sculptures with heat & imagination. Gold & silver sheet, wire, electricity & rare earth elements are transformed into one of a kind works which capture the artists' desire to reflect glimpses of nature in his work.

"I fabricate, pierce and texture my gold and silver and add conflict-free diamonds, pearl, rare and hard to get Persian tourmaline, Sri Lankan sapphire, Australian opal to create one-of-a-kind jewelry and very limited amount of repeat production. I design all my pieces on paper then fabricate or wax carve, and finish with a wide range of techniques: piercing, overlay, inlay, forging, anodizing and riveting. I apply electricity to create the colorful metal niobium as a background on the earrings

"I pride myself on doing unique and timeless designs that are inspired by the natural beauty of our world. The earrings come in either sterling silver, gold, or 22 karat vermeil. All of my jewelry is designed and produced by me in my home studio. My earrings are fabricated out of silver or gold with raised accents soldered on top as an overlay.

"In much of my work I use the colorful metal niobium as a background, which accentuates and emphasizes the design. Niobium is termed a “reactive metal” because it has a peculiar property of reacting to electricity. When I vary the electrical current passing through the metal, I can get a range of very brilliant colors. Hence, the simple strength of the design is brought to life from the unique use of color. I feel what makes my jewelry unique is the way I combine my own metalwork designs with the electrically-painted metal niobium. When I run the electricity through the bristles of a nylon brush, I can distribute the electricity where and in whatever pattern that inspires me. Since the amount of current corresponds with the color on the niobium, I can control the color range I want to work in. In essence, I am combining metal fabrication with painting (in metal).

"I have been selling my work at various art shows and galleries all over the United States for the past 40 years."

DAVID BRIX - I have always enjoyed taking photographs ever since college so many years ago when I bought my first camera, a Nikon FM film SLR. A lot has changed in photography over the years. Cameras have gone from film to digital, lenses have gotten better and sharper, and post-processing has gone from dodging and burning in the dark room to adjusting hue and saturation on the computer. What has not changed for me along the way is the pleasure I get in taking a photograph and bringing it to life, and the satisfaction I get in capturing the awe and beauty I find in the world.

In the beginning, it was party pics and class assignments for Deva Hyman's photography class. Soon though, I was shooting 4x5 landscapes à la Ansel Adams and Edward Weston, and developing prints in my bathroom at night. Later, I assisted studio and architectural photographers before striking out on my own.

In addition to photography, my career path has included working in industrial design as well as digital imaging (i.e., digital and graphic illustration, retouching, and pre-press). In 2006, I decided to pursue another kind of imaging as a diagnostic medical sonographer which has allowed me to help others, as well as afford to travel and further embrace my creative passions.XXXX These days, I am blessed and thrilled to more deeply explore the beauty that our natural environment has to offer, pursuing my passion for shooting landscapes, nightscapes, and travel images, as well as more abstract images. I hope that you enjoy my photographs as much as I have enjoyed creating them!

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Coast Highway Artists

Gallery at 284 Main St., Point Arena, CA 95468 - 707-882-3616

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MONTHLY ARTISTS' RECEPTIONS

SPECIAL EXHIBITS

MULTI-MEDIA ART

CHAC Gallery Schedule

Gallery Hours are Thursday through Sunday, 11 AM till 4 PM. Call us to confirm Sunday openings

november exhibit, color bombs and icons, at chac gallery, point arena, ca

on sale at gallery - Mark Maker's Quarterly - Logo of Tempra's new art magazine

David Yager in his studio

Holidays shopping at chac gallery, point arena

video of october exhibit reception,
photography & jewelry,

October exhibit at chac gallery, point arena

video of SEPTEMBER exhibit reception, with CHRIS GRASSANO & KRISTEN CODDINGTON GORDON

September exhibit at chac gallery, point arena

Life on land and sea artists

CG - Bees and Poppies

CG - Bumble Bee and Thistle

CG - Hummingbird Moth and Thistle

KCG - Sperm Whale Ceramic

KCG - Humpback Whale Ceramic

KCG - Insect Ceramic

video of august exhibit reception, with nara pilgrim wood & carolyn zeitler,

pine needles & paint - nara pilgrim wood, paintings, & carolyn zeitler, basketry
exhibit Aug. 2-25, Reception - aug. 16, 3 - 7 pm

july exhibit - photography by Ron Bolander

video of July exhibit reception, with Ron bolander, photographer

video of the opening reception for david brix, photographer, and peter bailey, Jeweler, an exhibit held in point arena, ca 6/1/2024,

June exhibit - Peter Bailey, jewelry
& David L. Brix, photography

CHAC ARTISTS EXHIBIT AT LOCAL COFFEE HOUSE, THE WHITE CAP IN ANCHOR BAY, DURING MONTHS OF MAY AND JUNE

Special promotion!