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Marta Alonso Canillar

Visual Arts: Murals, Painting

I was born in Spain but have made my home in California since 1991. As a young girl growing up in Spain in the seventies and eighties I was never encouraged to pursue a career in the arts so my artistic inclinations were put in the background as something I did on occasion, never a priority. I am an emerging artist with no formal academic training in the arts. Nevertheless, art has always been an important focus in my life. Over the years, I have taken occasional classes either in Junior Colleges or private studios in photography and ceramics. In 2014, I took oil painting lessons for the first time, from Cynda Valle in Willits, and soon after I got a commission to do a large painting at Mariposa Market portraying a collage look of rural Mendocino. A year later, the newly built hospital in Willits commissioned me to do another painting of the same scale. This time, it depicted a more representational look of their kitchen garden. Early on, portraiture became a favorite of mine and got a few commissions, some of which are in San Diego and Spain. I have been working very “diligently” over the past 3 years to produce a body of work ready to show at some venue. I started the year 2018 presenting three paintings at the Mendocino Art Center, in Mendocino, for their juried exhibit and took Best-in-Show for one of them. I had an exhibit in Willits at the Brickhouse Coffee for the months of February, March and April of 2018 and am currently showing at Edgewater Gallery in Fort Bragg. This year too, I am going to venture into doing Murals in Fort Bragg for the newly established Mural Project and have already lined up a commission for that. Working with Cynda Valle was a reawakening experience. Not only did she teach me the technicalities of oil painting but has encouraged me to look at my art as part of my self, and extension of my being, allowing me to understand that there are no wrongs in the process of making art, helping me to discard those insecurities and replacing them with confidence, as a woman and an artist.

Laura Fogg

Visual Arts: Textiles, Visual Arts Instructor

I have lived and worked in Mendocino County my entire adult life. After raising my three children I finally found the time to do art seriously. Since then I have won numerous awards in quilt and museum shows across the country and have been published in national quilt magazines and several books on art quilting. My work was also featured in the HBO documentary, “Until the Violence Stops,” which dealt with exposing and preventing violence against women around the world. I was also honored to win the Art Champion award in Mendocino County. I currently teach art quilting classes and retreats across the western US. I am open to any quilt guild, fabric store or group of individuals who want to put a class together. My current work has primarily moved from landscapes and “pretty pictures” to social, environmental and political commentary. I have discovered that through my art I have a voice, which is of primary importance to me at this time.

Sunny Franson

Literary Arts; Visual Arts: Painting; author, publisher, digital formatting including photos,

Sunny Franson Currently I live on a small walnut acreage where you feel connected to earth and surroundings. With degrees in wildlife biology and cultural anthropology, minors in language and music, and graduate work in ethnomusicology, I tend to see ecosystems, because that’s how nature works. This planet has so much beauty and intelligence, the scale is infinite and inspiration is a given. Adaptation, oil, 24x18x0.5, ©sfranson, $1300 Like everyone I continue to evolve as a person, for me in ecology, art, and writing. Time is a precious commodity as it is for everyone, and sometimes life and its pitfalls overtake you. Then you have to choose priorities carefully. It’s vital to remain committed because after all it’s your lifetime. Chicken society is part of The Secret Lives of Chickens or Tales from the Chickenyard and Beyond. My dad called the book he wrote when in his late 80’s Second Age. He had hoped to see it formatted and published, and it was an honor to do that for him. Dark Water is about healing from posttraumatic stress by Opal Rose. Reflections: A Modest Collection of Short Stories includes stories that are complete fiction although some include ecology. Every experience becomes a teacher and every painting, book, or woodland pool adds to that, but most of all, they underscore the importance of humility. Best not to put your moments off. Once they’re past, they’re gone forever. Never forget to be grateful and to share. Contact: sunny@pacific.net Webpages at pixels.com: https://pixels.com/profiles/sunny-franson/shop www.rootlets.com Web Gallery Representation: Personal http://www.rootlets.com Artists for Conservation Foundation http://gallery.artistsforconservation.org/artists/1334 Fine Art America https://pixels.com/artists/sunny+franson Professional Affiliations, Art Current member: Artists for Conservation http://www.artistsforconservation.org Current member: Oil Painters of America http://oilpaintersofamerica.com Current member: Lake County Arts Council http://lakearts.org/default.htm Current member: Gualala Arts Council http://gualalaarts.org Current member: Arts Council of Mendocino County http://www.artrsmendocino.org Art Exhibits, Galleries Main Street Gallery, 325 Main St, Lakeport, CA 707.263.6658, www.lakearts.org Dolphin, 39225 Hwy 1, Gualala, CA 95445 707.884.3896, http://gualalaarts.org/dolphin-gallery Gualala Arts, 46501 Old State Highway, Gualala, CA 95445 707.884.1138, http://www.gualalaarts.org Art Center, Corner Gallery, 201 South State St, Ukiah, CA 95482 707.462.1400, http://www.artcenterukiah.org Author, Publisher Books and ebooks are available online and at brick and mortar stores. More information and links are at http://www.rootlets.com The Secret Lives of Chickens by Sunny Franson www.rootlets.com/chickens/chickens.html Second Age, by Carl Franson www.rootlets.com/secondage/secondage.html Dark Water: Healing from Stress after Trauma, by Opal Rose www.darkwaterrippling.com Reflections, by Sunny Franson www.rootlets.com/reflections/reflections.html

Diza Hope

Visual Arts: Murals, Painting, Works on paper

Diza Hope is a Northern California painter working in oil, acrylic and pencil. She studied at California College of the Arts and draws inspiration mostly from natural forms. Lately she has been interested in investigating the architecture, rigidity and beauty of animal skulls juxtaposed against the delicate, undulating and graceful shapes found in flower petals. Besides the formal interest; the distillation of the skull becomes a symbol of our universality and basic oneness, being that we are all made of the same carbon, calcium and stardust and the flower, a symbol of our impermanence, but also the beauty we all have the capacity to create and share. Color plays an important role in her painting process as well and she enjoys pushing the boundaries between harmony and discord through her use of it.

Happy/L.A. Hyder

Performing Arts: Spoken Word; Visual Arts: Mixed Media, Photography

I am celebrating 48 years of making images. My desire to photograph began in the 1950s as I became aware of the power of photographic imagery (although I wouldn’t have been able to articulate it at the time) through the Life magazines that came through our door weekly. A self-taught photographer, I count Margaret Bourke-White, W. Eugene Smith, and the myriad other pictorialists in Life’s pages, as my mentors. Shortly after moving to San Francisco in 1969 and two days after using a friend’s 35mm camera, I had my own Nikkormat with a 105mm (portrait) lens. At a camera store, I learned about film and how to load the camera. I joined the SF Photo Center, and, following their two-hour fundamentals in developing and printing class, was let loose in a darkroom. Within two years, I began working with a Hasselblad medium format camera (the negative is 2 ¼” square and there are 12 shots to a roll of film) with a 150mm lens (equivalent to the 105mm) and had my own darkroom. I grew to love the square format and credit the twelve shots per roll of film with the honing of my style of shooting – I spend much time setting up my shot, using my negative as a painter would her canvas, in order to print full frame. I walk away without shooting if my framing cannot achieve what first attracted me to look through the lens. I still credit those Life photographers for helping me hone my visual perspective. While the Hasselblad remains my most cherished tool, in 2009 I was dragged kicking and screaming into the digital age. I find the lightweight digital cameras I’ve been using feed my creativity. Able to carry one at all times, I am able to capture those images that earlier would only be captured in my mind since the heft of the Hasselblad meant I would only carry my camera when I was focused on photographing. With digital, I am also enjoying, and getting very interesting results, working with movement to produce abstract images. I also work with mixed-media assemblage, most often using my own images within the piece. Although taking more images using a digital format, I retain the habit of setting up shots with precision and printing my images full frame, and continue to retain a strict sensibility when choosing what to print. I also use an Epson 1400 printer and the immediacy of these digital tools is truly a wonder to my years of working in film, first in a darkroom during my 22 years working in b&w, and, with a switch to color exclusively in 1997, in having film developed and working with a professional printer.

Rhoda Teplow

Visual Arts: Jewelry

Jewelry studio is open by appointment by calling 707 964 2787. After graduating from the University of California in Berkeley, Teplow taught French at Saratoga High School before entering the Peace Corps. She was assigned to teach in Togo, West Africa. In her village of Lama Kara she became acquainted with African trade beads which were actually millefiori beads that had been brought from the island of Murano in the Venetian Lagoon of Italy. Her first necklace consisted of those glass beads. Returning to California she accepted a job teaching at the Summerhill School on Road 409 in Caspar. That house was used in the movie, “Over Board.” She began to teach the dances she had learned in West Africa and formed a dance company named “Ivory”. For 10 years Teplow was the founder and director of the acclaimed Mendocino Dance Series bringing dance companies from around the world to Cotton Auditorium. After her years of producing, she was asked to be the agent for La Tania, the world-class Flamenco dancer. She later promoted the jazz singer Scotty Wright and booked jazz acts into the Ocean Club at the Hill House. In the 1990s she began teaching all subjects at Coastal Adult School for the Fort Bragg Unified School District. Rhoda shows her jewelry at many Mendocino County Art Fairs and the Artists’ Collective of Elk, the Dolphin Gallery, and the Gualala Art Center. Her body of work incorporates her own porcelain beads, brass from the Ashanti tribe, recycled glass beads from the Krobo tribe in Ghana, and pendants from Katmandu, Nepal.

Catherine Vibert

Visual Arts: Photography

I’m an artist with a camera and a commercial photography business. I specialize in working with people to reveal their stories and capture imagery that promotes them and their work. While I’ve been a picture taker since I was 8, when I began using a digital camera in 2008 I excelled in skill and technical ability at a rapid rate due to an unstoppable addiction to learning my craft. That’s when I became a picture maker. I mentored with master photographers and took classes online and pretty much lived and breathed photography 24/7 in order to gain the technical skill and control to be able to pretty much realize any vision I wanted using my camera, lighting gear and sometimes Photoshop. Once I got past the technical stuff, it was time to figure out what I wanted to shoot. My love of working with people and of learning who they are leant me to choosing lifestyle and portraiture as a focus for my work. I specialize in telling people’s stories through dynamic and vivid imagery. Whether winemakers, artisans, executives or the lone wolf running a business from their cabin on the coast, everyone has a story. I reveal those stories through lifestyle photography and portraiture. My work is all about visualizing together with my subjects and playing together to make the images they need to promote themselves, their work and their brand. People use these images for websites, brochures, magazine and jury submissions, social media, and anywhere someone would need to be represented professionally and artfully. My college degree via Sonoma State University is in music and vocal performance. I have worked in the arts throughout my career as a performer, audio technician and through self expression in various artistic media. I chose to pursue photography after working many years as a sound designer and audio editor. My ears were not able to hear intricate tones anymore and I needed a different career path and had always been passionate as a photography hobbiest, so it was a natural choice. I worked as a journalist for a local newspaper near Asheville, NC, writing exposés and in depth articles with accompanying photos about local community members. I went freelance as a photographer in 2011 and after trying and failing to maintain interest in many genres, I found that commercial photography specializing in people, portraits, and what people do (lifestyle) was my passion — and I am very passionate about what I do and how it can help others reach their goals. I also enjoy and pursue landscape and still life photography when I don’t have my lens pointed at a person. As an educator, I teach Photoshop and Digital Photography, most recently at the Miami Ad School in San Francisco. I offer occasional workshops in basic photography and simple art captures and am available for one on one lessons.

Barbara Ware

Visual Arts: Mixed Media, Painting

I came to Potter Valley in 1973 and live quite remotely near the Eel River. My garden, the natural beauty of Mendocino County, and the plants and animals that surround me give me the majority of my inspiration. I work primarily with watercolor and acrylics and love experimenting with mixed media. I’m in love with my experience with color as I paint, the mingling and mixing of colors on the page. And I love the total engagement that absorbs my full concentration in the process of painting. It’s transforming!

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