PUBLISHED BY THE MENDOCINO ART CENTER

MendocinoArtsSpring / Summer 2013

COMPLIMENTARY

ART AND CULTURE IN MENDOCINO COUNTY

N E W A D C O M I N G

Taste of Chocolate, Wine & AleSunday, May 26, 1:00pm – 4:00pm

MENDOCINO ART CENTER

Join us for the afternoon!fine Wine • Micro-Brewed Ales • Decadent Chocolate

Artisanal Treats • fabulous Silent AuctionAdvance Tickets: $25 ◆ Day of Event: $30

A fundraiser for theMendocino Music Festival and Mendocino Art Center

707 937-5818, ext. 10MendocinoArtCenter.org

707 937-4041mendocinomusic.org

Sponsored by Pamela Hudson Real Estate

45052 Main Street, Mendocino, CA 707 937-3132 • www.thehighlightgallery.com

For the Art Collector and the Craft Lover

GALLERY OF DECORATIVE AND FINE ARTS

Browse in our Museum Shop · Local Arts & Crafts 400 East Commercial Street, Willits, CA

Call 707-459-2736 for more information. Special tours are available by reservation.

Open Wednesday through Sunday, 10:00am–4:30pmwww.MendocinoMuseum.org

Discover unique artifacts and exhibits refl ecting our heritage. Wine History, Stagecoaches and Wagons, the racehorse Seabiscuit, the Creamery, and much more.

Mendocino County Museum

2ND ANNUAL WILLITS KINETIC CARNIVALEComing September 7 & 8, 2013 Grand Ball on September 7thCelebrate steam history with Handcar Races, a Country Fair, and Steam-Up with ROOTS OF MOTIVE POWER.

Special Exhibit through August

THE TELLING LINEIllustrations of industrial history and children’s books by David Weitzman

September exhibit on Singing the Golden State

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unique gallery shows · low-cost open studio sessions art fairs and musical concerts

world-class art classes taught by renowned instructorsexhibition opportunities

Mendocino Arts magazine

Your membership brings vital cultural programs to the community and economic opportunities to artists.

Support the Arts and give yourself the gift of art . . .

The Mendocino Art Center Needs You!

MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS AT ALL LEVELS• 10% discount on each class registration.

• 15% discount for Mendocino County members.

• Artist exhibition opportunities in the gallery.

• Artist opportunities in the gallery shop.

• Invitations to participate in Members’ Juried Exhibits.

• Discounts at 13 participating local businesses.

• Mendocino Arts magazine and event information.

• Waiver of $25 class registration fee.

• Discounted CALSTAR ($30/year, regular rate $45) and REACH ($35/year, regular rate $50) memberships.

• Special rate for Suburban Propane (up to 20% off residential propane per gallon prices).

ADDITIONAL MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS• Sustaining and Patron members are invited to special

gallery events and listed annually in Mendocino Arts.

• Annual Zacha Legacy Society member names placed in the Zacha Legacy Society gallery window.

• Permanent Legacy Society members giving $25,000 or more are listed in the gallery in perpetuity.

BUSINESS MEMBERSHIP BENEFITS• Business Partners are listed on the MAC website.

• Website Sponsors receive logo recognition on the Mendocino Art Center home page.

For details visit www.MendocinoArtCenter.org/membership.html

Individual $65 ❏

Household (maximum ❏two members) $100

Student (12+) $30 ❏

Senior (70+) $30 ❏

Sustaining $250 ❏

Patron $500 ❏

Business: Partner $150 ❏

Business: Web Site ❏Sponsor $500

Annual Zacha Legacy ❏Society: ❏ $1,000 ❏ $2,500 ❏ Other __________

YES! I want to ❏ Become a Mendocino Art Center Member ❏ Renew My Annual Membership

Name

Address

City State Zip

Phone E-mail

❏ Check (payable to Mendocino Art Center OR❏ Charge my ❏ Visa ❏ MasterCard ❏ Discover in the amount of $

Account # Exp. Date

Authorized Signature

I am also interested in: ❏ Volunteering ❏ Sponsoring an exhibit ❏ Bequests, living trusts, memorials, building fund or the MAC Endowment fund

Mendocino Art CenterP.O. Box 765, Mendocino, CA 95460 707-937-5818, ext. 10 • 800-653-3328, ext. 10

Spring/Summer 2013 3

Editorial: From Our Board President . . . . . . . . . 5

Sunshine Taylor: artist/dancer . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Nick Schwartz and the Flynn Creek Pottery . . . . . . 8

Walt Rush: Waiting for the Wings . . . . . . . . . . 10

Mendocino Open Paint Out: a plein air festival . . . . . 12

Coloratura Soprano Marja Liisa Kay . . . . . . . . . 14

Meet MAC’s Instructors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Mendocino Coast Garden Tour . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Summer Classes at the Mendocino Art Center . . . . . . 24

On Exhibit at the Mendocino Art Center . . . . . . . . 26

Mendocino & Lake County Gallery Guide . . . . . . . 30

Glass Artist Kale Haschak . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Mendocino & Lake County Restaurant Guide . . . . . . 38

Gallery of Artists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Events Calendar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Poetry: Henrietta Bensussen . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Table of Contents Published by the Mendocino Art Center

Vol. XLIV, No. 1, May 2013

Mendocino Arts promotes the arts by offering space to artists, writers, craftspeople and performers and by providing information on arts and entertainment in Mendocino County. Submissions of unso-licited non-fi ction articles, photographs or artwork for consideration in Mendocino Arts must include a SASE or we cannot be responsible for their return. We welcome announcements of upcoming events to be included as space permits.

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FAMILY HANDS

A gallery of unique furnishings for your home!

Lighting • Art Rugs • Furniture

Gifts from around the globe

Corner of Franklin and Redwood, Fort Bragg

707 961-0236

• Discover

• Decorate

• Design

Over 50 Juried ArtistsPaintings • Photography • Glass Works Ceramics • Jewelry • Sculpture • Wood

Textiles • Garden Art

ILive Music Both Days • Festive Food & Drink

FREE ADMISSION

54rd Annual

Summer Arts & Crafts FairSaturday & Sunday, July 13 & 14

10am–5pm

MENDOCINO ART CENTER45200 Little Lake Street at Kasten Street, Mendocino

707 937-5818 • 800 653-3328 • MendocinoArtCenter.org

Clockwise from top left: Cynthia Myers, Wendy Newell, Jima Abbott, Valerie Adams

Spring/Summer 2013 5

PUBLISHERMendocino Art Center

ASSOCIATE PUBLISHERMike McDonald

EDITORPeggy Templer

ART DIRECTION / GRAPHIC PRODUCTIONElizabeth Petersen, RevUp Creative Media

SALESCOAST: Steven P. Worthen – 707 964-2480,

707 813-7669INLAND: Jill Schmuckley – 707 391-8057

ANDERSON VALLEY: Liz Petersen - 707 964-2965GALLERY Of ARTISTS ADS: David Russell – 707 513-6015

SPRING/SUMMER DISTRIBUTION – 17,000fALL 2013/WINTER 2014 DEADLINE – July 15, 2013

MENDOCINO ART CENTER STAffEXECUTIVE DIRECTOR: Lindsay ShieldsCOMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR: Mike McDonaldEDUCATION DIRECTOR: Karen BowersGALLERY DIRECTOR: Megan SmithymanBOOKKEEPER: Virginia NeiraREGISTRAR/CASHIER: Marja KayPROGRAM COORDINATORS: Ceramics — Nick Schwartz fiber Arts — Nancy Collins fine Art — Arlene Reiss Jewelry — Nancy Gardner Sculpture — Keith MiddlesworthfACILITIES: Gabe Arreguin

MENDOCINO ART CENTER BOARD Of DIRECTORSPRESIDENT: Liliana CunhaVICE PRESIDENT: Patrick KellerTREASURER: John CornacchiaSECRETARY: Dale Moyer

MENDOCINO ART CENTER45200 Little Lake Street • P.O. Box 765

Mendocino, CA 95460707 937-5818 • 800 653-3328

fAX: 707 937-4625register@mendocinoartcenter.org

www.MendocinoArtCenter.org

Mendocino Art Center Mission Statement:The mission of the Mendocino Art Center is to be a vital cultural resource, providing a broad range of the highest quality educational and exhibition opportunities in the arts to all people.

founded by Bill Zacha in 1959 as a nonprofit organization to support, foster, advance and promote artistic aware-ness and participation.

COVER IMAGE: John Hewitt, Noyo, 22" x 30", watercolor

MendocinoArtsART AND CULTURE IN MENDOCINO COUNTY

From Our Board President…As usual, the Art Center is a beehive of activity. Right now the buzz is all about the rebuilding of our administration offices, which is scheduled for completion about the time you receive this magazine. Then we begin the process of all the finish work: painting, carpeting, built-ins and furniture, all to be completed before summer classes start. Wow! Check the Web site for the date of the ribbon cutting.

In February we held our first MAC Academy Awards fundraiser and presented the first MACA (Mendocino Art Center Award) to Marge Stewart, former board member, jewelry and fine art coordinator, graphic artist, and staff person extraordinaire. Congratulations, Marge, and thank you for your many contributions to the Art Center.

We are proud to announce the resumption of the Mendocino Art Center Sunday Afternoon Concert Series. Dr. Marja Liisa Kay, mastermind and coordinator, invites us to join her on the first Sunday of every month for an adventure in the world of music. Enjoy everything from classical to contemporary, vocal jazz to strings to piano. Dr. Kay is an extraordinary contemporary vocalist, musicologist, and Art Center Registrar. Please come by and meet her in the business office when you register for a class, renew your membership or buy event tickets.

Our summer calendar of events begins on Memorial Day weekend with the second annual A Taste of Chocolate, Wine and Ale followed by the Mendocino Coast Garden Tour, the Summer Arts & Crafts Fair, and ending in September with the first Mendocino Art Center Open Paint Out. The Paint Out promises to be a most exciting event, with eight celebrity artist judges participating in this week-long plein air festival. Join us, and experience for yourselves the magical quality of light that we enjoy in one of the most beautiful coastal environments in the world.

Information and applications for all our events and classes are avail-able on our Web site at: www.MendocinoArtCenter.org. Please come by; we’d love to see you!

~ Liliana Cunha, Board President

SPRING/SUMMER 2013

Chuck BushStephen DedolaJanis Porter

Nick SchwartzLucia Zacha

c c o r d i n g t oSunshine Taylor’s

biography, she began painting in watercolor in 1981, while living in northern Vermont. A native Californian, Sunshine returned to her home state in 1989. Aft er 20 years of creating watercolors, she has now added a new direction and is working in acrylics, which are pro-viding her with a brilliant avenue for her love of color.

Sunshine created the 1998 poster for Art in the Gardens, the 2005 “Winesong!” poster, as well as the Mendocino Art Center’s 2006 “Mendocino Coast Garden Tour” poster.

She lives in a magical little compound in Caspar – her home and studio are adjacent to Caspar Gardens – a healing kind of place. I love spending time in Sunshine’s studio. It’s fi lled with light. Her paintings, both complete and in-process, are every-where, family pictures abound and are tucked into little nooks and crannies, and there’s an especially comfy, cozy chair, just right for this interviewer.

Sunshine grew up in North Hollywood, graduated from North Hollywood High School, and attended Santa Monica Junior College.

Sunshine moved here in 1989 with her first husband. Now married for 13 years to Glenn Rude (they met in a dance class, of course), Sunshine is

busy not only with her art but also with swing dancing. She refers to her husband and dance partner as “fabulous and enthusiastic. We are avid Lindy Hoppers! It’s like living my childhood all over again!” And she continues painting through all of it.

What led Sunshine to become an artist? In her early 20s, Sunshine received a set of watercolors as a gift , and she’s been painting ever since. “Living in Vermont, there

was lots of time in the winter, so I would paint and paint and paint. I started sell-ing my paintings early on and joined a local painting group.” Sunshine con-tinues, “I’ve always wanted to express myself. I started drawing rainbows, little things, then started with watercolors.” Although she has studied with a num-ber of noted artists, including Robert Burridge and Bob Rhoades, she is pri-marily self-taught.

Although Sunshine has gone from watercolors to acrylics, she still loves both. “I go back and forth, and have separate work tables for each.” And these days, she loves the combina-tion of watercolor with acrylic ink

By Debbie L. Holmer

Luscious, 7.5" x 5.5", acrylic.

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Greeting the Sun, 14" x 11", acrylic.

Sunshine Taylor . . . artist / dancer

Photo: Larry R. Wagner.

backgrounds. “With the inks I can get the depth of color, combining them both and adding textures at times. I get most excited about that.”

Her paintings dance; you can actually see the move-ment of the fl ower or leaf or whatever it is she has painted. Her paintings are happy and joyful, just like the artist who paints them. Her colors are brilliant – again, just like Sunshine! Her inspiration comes from “Life! Th at’s what it’s all about.”

Th e body of Sunshine’s work has always been about personal exploration, and she is constantly trying some-thing new. Both her watercolors and acrylics are well received in this community and elsewhere. Sunshine’s work is represented by the Prentice Gallery in Mendocino and the Mendocino Art Center. Her work is also widely collected on both the East and West Coast, Canada, and

Europe.What does Sunshine recommend for the young artist

starting out? “Just do whatever is in your soul and get it out; whether it’s on paper, cardboard, canvas, express it, and don’t let anyone hold you back.”

In her spare time — oh, that’s right; she doesn’t have any spare time! However, when she’s not painting, she’s practicing dance steps, or gardening, especially in the summer. Sunshine also loves to travel.

What does Sunshine want viewers to see when they look at her work? “I want them to feel good and see the beauty in the world and how that comes through to me and out through my paint brush. Th e best that I can do is put positive energy into this world. I want to give people the gift I’ve been given of creativity and create paintings that make not only me feel good, but others also. And the same goes for dancing; when I look around the room and see people with smiles on their faces. Th ere is a lot of good in the world. It’s an amazing, beautiful place.”

What’s Sunshine’s idea of perfect happiness? “Dancing all night long with my husband, Glenn – especially at the Sacramento Jazz Festival over Memorial Day weekend. We’ve been doing that festival for 11 or 12 years. However, anything that Glenn and I do is perfect happiness to me.”

Sunshine Taylor has managed to combine her pas-sions for art and dancing into a marvelous mix, making life joyful not only for her but for all of us who have the privilege of seeing her art work or watching her perform a new dance step.

Visit Sunshine's blog at sunshinetaylorgallery.blogspot.com

Spring/Summer 2013 7

Waiting for the Honeymooners, 14" x 20", watercolor. Photo: Larry R. Wagner.

Above it All, 7" x 9, watercolor and acrylic ink.

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Nick Schwartz was a disaff ected Manhattan teenager, “uninspired and depressed,” when he fortuitously crossed paths with an art teacher who took him to see a fi lm of two clay artists doing a wood fi ring. Nick’s whole life changed at that moment, and ever since he has been on “a path of bliss,” guided by “one great mentor aft er another.” Nick received a Special Talent Scholarship to attend Eckerd College in Florida, and while there was invited to Japan to be a woodfi ring apprentice. Nick says, “I witnessed many people discovering the seduction of the wood-fi re process, some of whom were brought to tears by the metaphors of the fi re and how they related to their own lives. Th ere is something inherently human about gathering around a fi re, bellies full, feeling the warmth and comfort, playing music and talking to one another.” (Clay Times, Summer, 2011)

On the recommendation of instructor/mentor Brian Ransom, Nick came to the Mendocino Coast in 1999, opening the Red Room Gallery across the street from Mendosa’s Market. He also received a grant to build a wood kiln in Albion. Not long aft er, he established Flynn Creek

Pottery in Comptche. Flynn Creek Pottery developed simultane-ously with one of Nick’s other interests, the Flynn Creek Circus. His partner at the time was a classically trained trapeze artist who wanted to establish a circus. Th ey invited circus performers to come to the property in Comptche to train. Nick served as Technical Director, trapeze artist, strongman and sharp-shooter! Th ey began making reusable ceramic cups and bowls to sell at circus performances, thereby eliminating much of the trash usually associated with concession stands. Th e pottery was a big hit and “always sold out,” so Nick began building a ceramics facility to produce them. Th us Flynn Creek Pottery was born, which is the embodiment of his passion for woodfi ring and for the strong sense of community engendered in that technique. Flynn Creek Pottery now boasts a residency and visiting artist program, provides studios and housing in a com-munal setting, and facilitates research into atmospheric kiln fi ring processes.

By Peggy TemplerRight: Commemorative Jug, 16" x 8" x 8",

anagama-fi red porcelain.

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The centerpiece of Flynn Creek Pottery is a large ana-gama kiln. Nick explains that an anagama is a Japanese style kiln which uses firewood as both a fuel source and a surface treatment technique, creating an aesthetic all its own. An anagama firing is a long, slow process, requir-ing 7 to 10 days, 24 hours a day to complete, ample time to foster that sense of community so important to Nick’s vision of the artistic process.

Nick says of the results from an anagama firing, “I consider the finished product a result of everything that occurred at the kiln site during the firing. In other words, the finished product resonates deeply with the human spirit, and speaks of tectonic forces and our relationship with the natural world as well as with each other. For me, firing the anagama is a celebration of that which makes us human, and a testimony to our capacity to work together to accomplish great goals.” (Clay Times)

Nick makes two different lines of pottery. One is wood fired, func-tional ware such as jugs, mugs, and bowls priced to sell or trade locally. The other line is for serious collectors, museums and galleries. These pieces consist primarily of sculptural vessels, monumental vessels and pots reserved for cer-emonial use, such as a formal tea ceremony. These pieces are pro-duced in the anagama kiln and

are unglazed (enhanced only by what the anagama kiln firing process produces). Nick shows his work at TRAX Gallery in Berkeley, and Prentice Gallery locally. In May he is part of a four-person exhibit at TRAX also featuring Judith Duff, Jack Troy, and John Dix.

Nick has a long association with the Mendocino Art Center. His mentors had told him about MAC and he sought it out immediately upon his arrival on the north coast, introducing himself to Ceramics Director Kent Rothman. He rolled up his sleeves and went to work at once, helping to rebuild and refurbish all of MAC’s kilns, and providing materials and supplies along with other much needed improvements. He also began teaching ceramics workshops at MAC in 2003, which he continues to do. In 2009, Nick joined the MAC Board of Directors. Today, Nick is also serving as the Coordinator of the Ceramics Department, which he calls a “labor of love.” Nick says, “The Ceramics program at MAC is doing better than ever now. We even have a satellite intensive workshop scheduled that is a pairing of MAC and Flynn Creek Pottery.” As a teacher, he encourages his students to “embrace serendipity and irregularity – and accept not being able to totally control the process. It is the process, not the artist, that determines the final result. We’re just along for the ride.”

Nick is married to ceramist Jessica Rae Thompson, a collaboration he describes as a “creative union.” Jessica is a pro-fessor of ceramics at the College of the Redwoods. Together, Nick and Jessica and friends are try-ing to make Mendocino County a vital ceramics community, and are exploring all avenues to accomplish that. “We’re well on the way,” Nick says. “Word spreads fast.” One thing they hope to eventually create is a vocational program for produc-tion potters. Nick says enthusias-tically, “Ceramics is very strong on the Mendocino Coast and it’s exciting to be a part of it.”

For more information on Nick Schwartz and Flynn Creek Pottery, visit flynncreekpottery.com

Nick with his wife, Jessica Rae Thompson.

Bottle, 16" x 6" x 6", anagama-fired porcelain.