Take your pick
Artwork of all kinds on offer at Toledo’s First Weekend
On the first weekend of every month, the small industrial town of Toledo celebrates its vibrant arts community in a citywide event at local galleries and studios. First Weekend is an opportunity for the public to connect and talk to their local artisans, inviting art lovers to enjoy a weekend filled with beauty.
This month’s First weekend celebration will take place on Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 5 and 6, at galleries and studios throughout town.
The weekend includes the opening of the annual “Promise” holiday show at the Yaquina River Museum of Art. This annual exhibit celebrates works of art from Latin America as well as art from Eastern and Western Europe that showcases the beauty of the holidays. Included with artworks from all over the world are works of iconography from US- and European-based creators, both antique and modern. One of the many eye-catching features of the show is “Village Life in Colombia,” painted by Juan B Toro in 1975.
Judy Ross Gibbons bought the painting in the ’70s in Bogota, Colombia, at the annual benefit art show hosted by St. Alban’s Episcopal Church for patients hospitalized with Hansen’s Disease (more commonly known as leprosy). She never met the artist. Looking at this painting, one gets the sense of a South American Grandma Moses-style piece as Toro depicts figures ranging in size from giant to miniature going about their business in an active village.
The Yaquina River Museum of Art is located at 151 NE Alder Street and will be open from noon to 4 pm both days of First weekend. For more information, go to www.yaquinarivermuseumofart.org.
Across the street, the Signature Gallery of the late Michael Gibbons will be featuring “Wistful Interlude,” a grandiose piece in its sheer scale, at nearly five by six feet, that features a vast field of poppies as Russian Old Believers tend to the field.
Gibbons, who died in 2020, once recounted how he came across the scene while painting on location alongside fellow artist Richard Robertson in the flower fields of the Willamette Valley.
“After lunch and noting the straight up bleached, shadow-less effects of the noonday sun, we decided to do some exploring to see what else was blooming,” Gibbons said. “A few minutes later after bouncing through [a] field in clouds and dust brought us into a field of California poppies. By far, the best part was the discovery of Russian Old Believer women who were hand weeding the poppies.”
“Wistful Interlude” is a meditative piece, leading the viewer’s eye from the women working in the field off into the sea of gold poppies to the sentinel-like barn in the distance.
Michael Gibbons’ Signature Gallery is open from noon to 4 pm both days, located at 140 NE Alder Street.
On Main Street, Crow’s Nest Gallery & Studio will feature the works of more than 15 artists. The gallery space, run by assemblage artist Janet Runger, always features new and exciting works for viewers to see. Painter Veta Bakhtina’s work is shown prominently in the gallery and is a feast for the eyes. Her detailed pieces bring viewers along a journey, making them feel as though they have stepped into a fairytale.
Alongside pieces by Runger and Bakhtina, the gallery features artists including Alice Haga, fused glass; Val Bolen, tile and ceramic pieces; Paula Teplitz, sculptural jellyfish mobiles; Jeff Gibford, digitally manipulated photographs; Tish Epperson, watercolors; Sylvia Hosie, wildlife photography; and Susan Jones, woven fiber jellyfish. Crow’s Nest Gallery & Studio is located at 305 N. Main Street, open from 10 am to 5 pm on Saturday and Sunday.
• Gibbons will offer an informal talk about “Village Life in Colombia” on Saturday, Dec. 3, at 1:30 pm at the School House Exhibit space. All are invited to join her and encouraged to join in the discussion time. Holiday refreshments will be served by the Friends of the Yaquina River Museum of Art.