If yarn’t too busy…
Toledo’s First Weekends can provide a sneak peek into a working artist’s life, a first look at a previously unseen piece of art and occasionally, an invitation into a working studio normally closed to the public.
This coming weekend, Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 4 and 5, the Toledo Arts District is featuring a knitting open house from Murray Wool Goods.
An array of yarn, including exclusive holiday colorways, will be available for purchase. Knitters are invited to sit for a while and work on a project in this beautifully restored former studio of Michael Gibbons, located in the 1887 Old Church Studio at 199 NE 1st Street. For more information go to MurrayWoolGoods.com.
Next door, the Yaquina River Museum of Art continues its annual holiday show in the 1887 School House Building.
The show, “Promise” features 24 icons ranging in age from the 19th Century to current works by local iconographers Bobby Love and Paul Gerrit Bannon.
Love worked primarily as a tattoo artist until 2008, when he was granted the opportunity to live and study art as a monk in a Benedictine monastery. During the years that followed, he focused his attention on the theology and sacred geometry of Byzantine iconography and was also strongly influenced by the Beuronese School of Art. After his departure from the cloister in 2018, he relocated to the Oregon Coast, where his primary focus has been statue restoration and Orthodox Christian iconography.
Love will give a public talk about icons at 1 pm on Sunday, Dec. 5, in the School House, with light refreshments served.
Bannon, a Greek Orthodox monk and iconographer, lives and works in Toledo. The show includes four icons that were commissioned by St. Anne Orthodox Church in Corvallis and will later be installed in a new Orthodox church in the Newport area.
Bannon will give a public talk about icons in the School House at 1 pm, on Sunday, Jan. 2, with light refreshments served.
The School House also features copies of “Painting in Nature,” chronicling the life of Michael Gibbons (1943-2020), a well-known artist who worked plein air most of his life.
The book features a stunning collection of more than 160 of the late artist’s works, alongside revelations about Gibbons’ career by his friends and professional associates as well as his personal writings.
The Yaquina River Museum of Art is located at 151 NE Alder Street, and is open from noon to 4 pm Friday through Sunday. “Promise” will be on display at the Museum through Jan. 23. For more information, go to yaquinarivermuseumofart.org
Gibbons’ work is also on display at Michael Gibbons’ Signature Gallery, in the 1927 Old Vicarage next to the Episcopal Church.
This month’s featured piece is “View of the Sevren at Deerhurst,” an oil on canvas painted in 1983 on the Sudeley Castle grounds in England. On a trip to Winchcombe, Michael met the owners of the castle and was given carte-blanche to paint anywhere on the grounds so he did just that.
Michael Gibbons’ Signature Gallery is located at 140 NE Alder Street, and is open noon to 4 pm, Friday through Sunday. For more information or to make an appointment, email michaelgibbonsart@charter.net or call 541-336-2797.
Just down the street, Ivan Kelly Studio & Gallery will be featuring “Spruce, Fern, Queen Anne’s Lace and Purple Daisy on Otter Crest,” a striking plein air painting of a coastal meadow with the pacific stretching off into the clear blue sky.
“I came upon this lovely combination on a clear warm fall day on the Otter Crest Loop,” Kelly said. “Set against the Pacific, it has everything a wildflower garden could want: warm sunlight, color and contrast.”
Kelly has been a Signature Member of the American Society of Marine Artists since 2000.
Ivan Kelly Studio-Gallery is located at 207 East Graham Street and will be open from 11 am to 5 pm on Saturday and noon to 5 pm on Sunday. For more information, go to ivankelly.com.
Celebrating the holidays down on Main Street, Crow’s Nest Gallery & Studio artists will be displaying the works of 15 artists. Tish Epperson’s fairytale watercolor works stand out along the walls of the Crow’s Nest in saturated color. Also featured are the works of Alice Haga, Val Bolen, Paula Teplitz, Jeff Gibford, Veta Bahktina and the founder of the studio, Janet Runger.
Crow’s Nest Gallery & Studio is located at 305 N. Main Street and will be open Saturday and Sunday from 10 am to 5 pm.