“On The Natural”
2024 CoCA Northwest Annual

Juried by Ginny Ruffner

Opens:
First Thursday November 7, 5pm – 9pm

Catalog Release Party:
First Thursday, December 5, 5pm – 9pm

Exhibition runs November 7, 2024 – February 22, 2025

image: Hannah Newman, A Small Mountain in Your Hand
audio, stones, wall text, dim. var. 2023; courtesy of the artist  

On The Natural:
2024 CoCA Northwest Annual

(Seattle, WA) Center on Contemporary Art (CoCA) presents the latest incarnation of its storied series exploring contemporary art in the region, the Northwest Annual, a juried group exhibition presenting a wide variety of media. This year’s 25th anniversary of the Annual, CoCA is proud to announce Ginny Ruffner as juror. CoCA received nearly 60 submissions from around the Northwest that explored themes of nature, narrative, and abstraction.

In selecting 37 works by 27 artists in Washington, Oregon, and Montana, Ruffner offered the title, On the Natural. The exhibition includes a rich assortment of sculpture, collage, prints, painting, sound, and mixed media works that echo each other in surprising ways; interpretations of the botanical world are especially vibrant and abundant.

The Juror:

The Artists:

Participating artists include: Suze Woolf, anna macrae, Andrea Lawson, Lezlie Jane, Eva Skold Westerlind, Steve Jensen, Neil Berkowitz, David Berger, Hannah Salia, Joy Hagen, Renee Adams, Joy Kloman, Deb McCarroll, Nicholas Bowman, Bella Yongok Kim, Jennifer Fernandez, Tom Gormally, Susan Christensen, Mindi Katzman, Susanne Kelly, Ingrid Lahti, Madelaine Millar, Aaron Morgan, Maulsri Jha, David Julian, Jill Sahlstrom, and Hannah Newman.

Announcements of prize winners at 7pm on November 7, including $500 First Prize, $250 Second, $150 Third, and two $50 runner-ups. A catalog will be produced with remarks by Ruffner and CoCA curators and released on the final First Thursday of 2024, December 5.

Internationally recognized for her pioneering role in the glass art community, Ginny Ruffner has also expanded into public art and explored new media technology in using augmented reality. Her interest in the natural world, especially flora and gardens, anticipated the recognition of climate change in the 21st century and the need for sustainability, sequestration, and conservation.  She is the recipient of numerous awards, including The Glass Art Society's Lifetime Award in 2019.

Event:

Artists’ Presentation and Discussion
Saturday, January 25, 3pm-5pm at the gallery
12 participating artists will present their work, followed by a discussion “On The Natural” led by CoCA Curator David Francis, joined by noted art conversationalist John Boylan.

Featured Artists:

🥇 Suze Woolf

🥇 Honorable Mention (1/3)

Artist Statement:
"Fire-Adapted/Low Severity" and "Fire Pit" combine a wall-mounted painting and a floor- or pedestal-resting installation. "Fire-adapted" is a painting of a burned-at-the-base redwood which survived, in part because the species has evolved thick enough bark as a defensive strategy. But combining it with "Fire Pit," (also shown in the photo with a different burned tree painting), one that did not survive, speaks to the human element in the situation. "Fire Pit" includes charred corn cobs and barbed wire ("agriculture"), a gas pump handle, model semi-truck, model jet plane, model SUV ("transportation"), and insulators and charcoal ("energy production") the three largest carbon-emitting sectors of the US economy.

Artist Bio:
Suze Woolf’s work is about human relationships to nature. A painter, she explores a media from watercolor to paper-casting, artist books, pyrography and installation--sometimes all together. She has exhibited throughout the U. S. West but also in across the US and Canada. Her work is in public collections as well as many private ones. She has received awards from arts organizations, universities, residencies in Zion, Glacier, Capitol Reef, North Cascades and Great Basin National Parks, Grand Canyon Trust; and art colonies Banff Centre, Vermont Studio Center, Willowtail Springs, Jentel, Playa, Centrum, Mineral School, and Sitka Center for Art & Ecology.

Neil Berkowitz

Artist Statement:
My artmaking originates in layering of images, generally photographic but occasionally including printmaking, collage, or painting. This layering process reflects my sense of how we gain personal understanding by connecting the new to the known. Equally as important, layering provides a blank space to explore social and aesthetic issues and at the same time provides a range of transparency, texture, and color unattainable in most single-layered lens-based work. This path is now leading me toward more sculptural work, videos, and interactive installations. Each of which increases opportunities for engagement by adding a spatial or temporal dimension. And like “Just How Lucky…”, the video included in my submission for this show, each also can provide a stronger setting for the types of two dimension work I have been creating. Photography’s big lie is that it captures. Still, I am uncomfortable with calling my work altered or manipulated. It is intentional. Even the most straightforward snapshot is a made thing. I want my work to at least whisper to viewers that what they see was made and requires their questioning and interpretation--and that it is up to them weigh its meaning, its reliability, and how it connects with their lives.

Artist Bio:
Seattle artist Neil Berkowitz resumed his long dormant arts practice in 2017. Since that time his work has been selected for 2 solo, 2 group, and more than 35 juried shows in 6 states. Other achievements include several residencies, a three work commission from the Othello branch of the Odessa Brown Children’s Clinic in Seattle, and a purchase by the City of Seattle for its collection. Neil studied photography at Syracuse University, followed by studio arts coursework at the New School in the early 1970s. In his revived practice Neil has been steadily increasing the media he employs and is currently a nonmatriculated student in the Digital Arts and Experimental Media department at the University of Washington in preparation for a new focus on interactive installations.

Joy Kloman

Artist Statement:
My art references the cyclical nature of our existence. My painting, "Beautiful Uncut Hair of Graves" is a nod to the poetry of Walt Whitman. The lovers embraced in dance are consumed by vines, representative of our temporary yet infinite time on earth. “Tandem” and “What is the Grass?” include patterns of foliage enveloping the figures, like peeling wallpaper, revealing a record of those who were once there. Passage of time is examined in these moments. Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself” excerpts: “A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands; How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more than he. I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven… Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the vegetation… And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves… Tenderly will I use you curling grass…”

Artist Bio:
Joy Kloman was a tenured associate professor at University of Mississippi, who supervised graduate and undergraduate painting programs. Professor Kloman also taught drawing in London. She earned her MFA from the University of Florida and BFA from Kansas City Art Institute. Joy Kloman was the recipient of a Mississippi Arts Commission Individual Artist State Grant. She has had work displayed in The Drawing Center Viewing Program & Slide Registry, NY. Kloman's work has been included in numerous nationally juried exhibits, such as the Florida Biennial, Sarasota Biennial, Boca Raton Museum of Art: All Florida, and has won a number of honors, including "First Award" in the Florida National and Masur Museum of Art: Annual. Kloman attended international artist residencies in Latvia (hosted by the Rothko Museum), Hungary, and Sardinia. Her art is in many private and public collections including, Vilaka Museum, the future Valdis Bušs Art Centre, Latvia, Balatonfüred City Hall, Hungary, Ringling Museum of Art, Gulf Coast Museum of Art, Pensacola Museum of Art, and Meridian Museum of Art. She currently resides in Hood River, Oregon.

Susan Christensen

Artist Statement:
I lived much of my life in Southeast Alaska under grindingly grey skies on an island surrounded by silvery saltwater channels. Most days, rain obscured the mountains in robes of mist. My craving for color sprang from this drab environment. The obsession with fine detail and layering seen in my images reflects the abundant overlay of trees, bushes, ferns, vines, leaves, moss, fallen branches and reflections in water found in the forests of the Pacific Northwest. Daily walks through the woods surrounding my home in Bellevue provide a never-ending color story for my work. I begin my paintings by letting my pen, dipped in India ink, wander through pools of watercolor. Then, as if lying on my back in summer fields looking up at cumulous clouds billowing overhead, images materialize from the pleasant chaos on the page. I tease out the scenes and characters appearing in my mind's eye with layers of color and line. Currently I’m painting about interbeing and deep geological time with references to origin myths of Northern European and indigenous cultures of my Southeast Alaska home. Always, my aim is to spark joy and hope in viewers’ hearts.

Artist Bio:
Born in 1952, Susan Christensen established her career as a visual artist in Southeast Alaska after completing her MFA at the University of Washington in 1994. She has exhibited widely in solo and group exhibits throughout Alaska, the Pacific Northwest and nationally. Her work is included in the permanent collections of the Alaska State Art Bank, Clausen Museum, Harbor View Medical Center Trauma Unit and numerous private collectors. Susan has been awarded several major public art commissions in Southeast Alaska and has served on the Alaska State Arts Council’s Visual Acquisitions panel. Susan is currently represented by Lynn Hanson Gallery in Seattle. She lives in Bellevue with her studio assistant dog, Sirius Star.

Jill Sahlstrom

Artist Statement:
I am seeking to continue the historical trajectory of painting by Why only paint on flat canvas? Why not paint on forms or any material? Why should paintings be flat? In 1993, I read social commentary Tom Wolf's book'The Painted Word,' and reacted to the criteria for 20th century painting to be visually flat,ie without value differentiation. Life has dimension, highs and lows. As a young painter, searching for my voice, I knew I couldn't paint with the style of Rembrandt, to achieve depth. As much as I love his vision, I need to reflect my era. I'm exploring literal depth in my paintings with literal cross hatching by overlapping painted strips.These represent the intersection of the material and spiritual , and overlapping of various cultures.

Artist Bio:
Born in Seattle as a third generation native, nature is in my DNA.I grew up camping in the sand at Ocean Shores and saw the power of the waves that left logs a mile inland following the Alaska earthquake of 1964. My childhood was spent riding ponies in the woods of what is now Big Finn Hill Park. As a teen I rotated between my mother's houses in Kirkland and my father's house in the Yupik Eskimo bush town of Bethel, Alaska. In school there I was taught to weave traditional baskets. I began college in Sitka,AK, receiving an Associate in Science and then transfered to Seattle Pacific U to graduate in 1981 with a Bachelors in Fine Arts.I also received a WA State teaching certificate and taught ELL and Art for 10 years in the Seattle Schools. I live in Snohomish,WA with my husband, 2 ponies,8 chickens and a cat.I have 2 grandchildren who live in Seattle and I so enjoy creating with them.

🥇 Anna Macrae

🥇 Honorable Mention (1/3)

Artist Statement:
My intention with my art making is to take everyday fragments of detritus from our apparently average lives to build meaningful objects of curiously. I build 2 and 3 dimensional constructions that honor our shared human experiences as I search for connections through memories and relatable everyday mundane happenings. I generate work in response to the materials that I use together with the techniques and processes that I have developed. I am interested in the physicality of materials, their embedded history and narratives together with textures surfaces. My work is grounded in a process based art making approach. Play and exploration in the use of found objects and everyday nonprecious unconventional materials are a constant in my practice. I attempt to push boundaries with the materials that I use, and discover combinations of high and low grade making mediums Creating highly textural surfaces, my work morphs between 2 and 3 dimensional sculptural constructions. There is a continual interplay from complexity to simplicity, as I seek to find a balance at the point where potential chaos and excess is somewhat harnessed.

Artist Bio:
I am a British born artist living in Seattle since 2001. I consider myself a lifelong artist, and from an early age I surrounded myself with art making. My mother and grandmother were both artists, their skills were often put to use in a more practical and domestic environment. Their approach to life instilled in me creative possibilities in everyday objects and situations. I am a mixed medium artist, and follow an intuitive path throughout my art practice. I work in paint, found objects and recycled materials creating 2 and 3 dimensional paintings, sculptural forms and installations As a working artist, I have regular studio practice; I am represented by the SAM Gallery and Shift Gallery in Seattle and a member of the Northwest Designer Craftsmen. I also curate some 20 exhibitions a year, for Era Living, to bring a variety of rotating quality arts exhibitions to their retirement communities.

David Berger

Artist Statement:
how the leaf falls from the tree why the bird flies north the bend of her hand while laughing

I recently went to Chicago area to see the cicada mass emergence. Cicadas are large insects with coral-red eyes and golden wings. They fly like lurching dirigibles from one tree or shrub to the next, searching for mates. They make an often deafening chorus, paying no attention to the houses and humans all around them. Prior to emergence they live in solitary burrows, sucking nutrients from fine tree roots. Every 17 years they ascend to the surface and emerge like curious angels for a brief reproductive bacchanalia, then die. The eggs hatch after a few weeks and tiny larvae drop to the ground. Pesticides and development disturb their habitats and do them in, but their peculiar life cycle perseveres. Nature.

smooth in my hand the stone’s long journey

Artist Bio:
David Berger is a Seattle-based artist born in Valley Stream, NY in 1953. He exhibits at the Yuan Ru Art Center located just outside of Bellevue, WA. David works in both representational and abstract idioms, using acrylic on canvas and ink on paper. David loves the immediacy of brush and ink, and the play between the natural world and artistic exploration. A collector once said of his work, it elevates the spiritual feeling in the house. After graduating Yale University majoring in art and philosophy, David became director of a Pioneer Square art gallery and founded a radio theater troupe, the Emergency Comedy Team. Later he became art critic at The Seattle Times, and then executive director of the Kruckeberg Botanic Garden Foundation based in Shoreline, WA. David is also an author whose books include "Razor Clams: Buried Treasure of the Pacific Northwest" (University of Washington Press), an example of his multi-faceted engagement with nature. His haiku poetry has been featured in many journals and books, for example "The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku 2021."

Deb McCarroll

Artist Statement:
When I was a child a rainstorm was an event. My mother and I would stand in the doorway, watching the New Mexico desert transform. I’d breathe that earthy perfume and watch as the water collected, miraculously, into shiny pools. I never lost that feeling of rain as transformative and when I moved to Seattle the rain eventually became part of my painting practice. Acrylic paint uniquely lends itself to this rain collaboration. The pigment dries quickly, acting as a conduit for drops and rivulets to leave their mark. When rain is allowed to collect on a painted surface, the planned and accidental merge to form a beautiful juxtaposition of human exertion and the simple, natural process of water falling from the sky. It is an immersive, consuming way to work. The world in which we live can be noisy, jarring, overwhelming. These works are, for me, sacred. They are a shelter from that constant storm. A quiet place to hide and listen to the rain.

Artist Bio:
Originally from rural New Mexico, Deb McCarroll has used unconventional techniques to achieve emotional depth in her work for more than three decades. McCarroll currently works out of her studio in Seattle, WA and her work is featured in numerous private collections, including multiple works in the Seattle Paramount Hotel’s permanent collection. She was a feature in the Curators Pick within the Spring 2023 issue of the international arts magazine, Women United. She was the featured cover artist in Still Point Quarterly’s 2018 ‘Four Freedoms’ limited-edition book. She was cover artist for 2015 Stone Voices arts magazine and she was awarded ‘Best Painting’ in the Still Point Art Gallery’s juried competition, ‘Earth Water Fire Air: Our World’. In 2024 McCarroll was accepted for representation at Gallery 401 in Camas, WA. She was feature exhibition artist at Attic Gallery in February of 2023. In 2013 and in 2022 McCarroll was accepted to Schack Art Center’s juried competition ‘Art of the Garden’. She has exhibited at Ironstone Winery Gallery in Murphys, CA and at Welcome Road Winery in Seattle, WA, and in 2023 she accepted a residency from Welcome Road Winery in Portugal where she produced a series works on paper.

Mindi Katzman

Artist Statement:
What sparks a body of work? For me, the natural world has always been an inspiration and a theme. I have worked closely and tightly, abstractly and loosely. At one point, close observation of flowers brought me great pleasure. I did about 100 of these 5"x7" small encaustic paintings. I have used oil, encaustic, pencil, and pastel. No medium is safe from my curiosity. Metal is my sculptural choice and even the 6’ whimsical dinosaurs that I made a few years ago sport flower petals for their skin. Currently my point of departure is mycelium, realized in large pastel drawings. From transcendent to mundane, my work is another point of view.

Artist Bio:
Mindi obtained a BA in Drawing and Printmaking at the University of South Florida, Tampa, FL. in 1976. She had a 10 week residency at Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine, and another one at the Banff Art Center in Alberta, Canada. After Banff the west coast beckoned, and she moved to Seattle in 1988 where she has pursued painting, sculpting, and life as an artist. Landscape and travel have most often been her point of departure. More of her work can be seen on line and she can be contacted at: mindikatzman.com mindi@mindikatzman.com

Hannah Newman

Artist Statement:
My work connects viewers with the community of atoms, materials and ecosystems that exist around, alongside, and within us. As humans, we are complex communities of cells, minerals, bacteria, and chemicals that operate in a mysterious state of mutuality. By creating assemblies of rocks, minerals, research, digital technology, language, sound, and sculpture, I materialize the living and nonliving networks and interdependencies that are crucial to our existence, yet frequently escape our notice. This idea is reflected in A Small Mountain in Your Hand, an immersive audio experience that invites participants to journey deep into the interior of a small pebble. By expanding the materiality, experiences, and potentials of a stone, new awareness and connections are forged between humans and the nonliving world. Previous sculptural and installation works have explored the interconnections between natural landscapes, digital technologies, and the human body to create new ecosystems of coexistence and care.

Artist Bio:
Hannah Newman is an interdisciplinary artist mining rocks, information technologies, sculpture, and language for their poetic possibilities. She has exhibited with Oregon Contemporary in Portland, OR, SOIL Gallery in Seattle WA, Well Well Projects in Portland, OR, Carnation Contemporary in Portland, OR, The Wrong New Digital Art Biennale online, Columbia Center for the Arts in Hood River, OR, Outback Arthouse in Los Angeles, CA, The Yards Gallery in Chicago, Il, and Neon Heater/ Real Tinsel in Milwaukee, WI. Her work has received press from Chicago’s New City Art blog, the Duplex Gallery blog series and the Boston Globe, and her work has been supported the the Regional Arts and Culture Council and Portland State University. Newman received a Master of Fine Arts from Oregon College of Art and Craft and a B.S in Ceramics and Fine Arts with a minor in Art History from Indiana Wesleyan University. She is a co-founder of the artist collective, WAVE Contemporary, and a former member of Carnation Contemporary. Newman currently lives and works in Portland, OR.

Andrea Lawson

Artist Statement:
A microcosm of beauty, thriving through community, Symbiotica is a metaphor for community and forming relationships for a better world.My Intaglio print series Symbiotica refers to the symbiotic relationship between algae and fungus which form lichen. Neither plant nor animal, lichen are a unique life form that live on clean air. These magical beings photosynthesize and fix nitrogen from the air, making them harbingers of our environment, acting as guides, who warn us about the health of our planet. Lichen provide food and housing material for other forest species. My etchings are drawn on copper plates and etched in ferric chloride. I’ve been experimenting with other non-toxic techniques using household ingredients like coffee, sand paper, sugar, and snack chip bags to create textures.I experiment with inking and combine monotype with etching to create one of a kind prints. Often, I purposely let the edges of my plates corrode creating an organic edge.

Artist Bio:
Andrea grew up in Los Angeles, watching the smog creep over the hills and valleys. After many adventures she arrived in the Northwest where nature has informed her work. Andrea recently moved from the water’s edge to the forest. This transition has changed the focus of her paintings and etchings from light glinting on water, to the minutiae of the forest floor. Her awards include: King County Arts Commission, Art Port Townsend and Helena Rubenstein Foundation. Lawson’s Public Art, Brain Beauty, Beauty Brain is installed in the Camano Island Library. Andrea’s artistic practice engages with gestural energy and layers of paint to create visual stories of nature, joy, rebirth, the solstice, mystery and memory. She received her MFA from Parsons New School of Design, NYC and BA from UC Santa Cruz. Her awards include: The King County Arts Commission, Port Townsend Arts Commission, Cape Cod Art Association, and a Helena Rubenstein Foundation grant. Lawson has exhibited nationally and internationally. Collections of her art include Ronnebaeksholm Arts & Culture Centre, Denmark, the Cape Museum of Fine Art, Dennis, MA, and Jefferson Museum of Art and History, Port Townsend, WA. As the Key City Public Theatre 2020 Colab artist, she created Visions in Motion 2020, a multi-media collaborative performance of art, dance and theatre. Her public art installation Brain Beauty, Beauty Brain can be found at the Camano Island Sno-Isle Library. Andrea paints in her woodland studio, Marrowstone Island, Washington.

Hannah Salia

Artist Statement:
The Cascadian forests of the West Coast are the deepest source of my artistic inspiration. The way that light plays through this immense, wild garden of trees and seas illuminates my inner experience and has catalyzed my creative explorations for most of my life. Through my painting process, I make new discoveries about these landscapes, revealed in the interplay between color and light on the trees and the spaces above and below. My current work is focused on exploring the intricate symbiosis between the trees, the life forms of the forest floor, and our deep human need to find spiritual renewal in nature. To explore these interconnections, I am currently working with a variety of materials, including acrylics, oils, and mixed media to build layered imagery with all its metaphoric complexity. The joy that comes from this creative experience completes the original journey for me and becomes the inspiration for further explorations.

Artist Bio:
Hannah Salia is a visual artist with a love for the expressive quality of paint in all its forms. Born and raised in New Jersey, she received her BA in Art from Oberlin College in Ohio and an MA in Education from Antioch University in Seattle. After a decade in New York City as a painter and videographer during the early part of her career, she found her true home in the wild beauty of the Pacific Northwest, inspired by the forests and seas of the region. Her work can be found in numerous collections throughout the Pacific Northwest, and she shows regularly in local venues, galleries, and the Maryhill Museum. Her recent book, “Illumination” showcases her poetry and paintings, and the Seattle Times recently featured her painting “Blessing” to spotlight the power and beauty of our regional trees.

Nicholas Bowman

Artist Statement:
In my art, I seek to capture moments of emotion and authenticity, drawing from my own experiences and observations. I am drawn to the interplay of bright, bold colors and the contrast they create, often exploring themes of shape, form, and geometric abstraction. While my style may shift between cubist, abstract, and expressionist influences, my work consistently evokes a sense of surrealism, inviting viewers into a world where reality and imagination collide.

Artist Bio:
Originally from Columbus, Ohio, and now working in Portland, Oregon, I am an artist driven by a love for creativity and expression. After studying graphic design and exploring various creative forms, including photography, writing, and digital artwork, I found my passion and inspiration in painting in 2022. Using acrylic and oil, my artistic endeavors are guided by a simple yet powerful aspiration: to create emotionally moving pieces that resonate with the world around me and connect deeply with viewers. Through art I explore themes regarding identity, mental health, and how we relate to the spaces we reside in.

Susanne Kelly

Artist Statement:
“Nature” is an ambiguous word. Nature as in the natural world or as in inherent personality and qualities. My paintings have a purposefully ambiguous bent. Sweeping vistas and skies paired with figures exhibiting their own natures. The people populating my paintings are mainly female presenting. They are slyly content, oft communicating with animals and sometimes sporting black eyes or tails. Their nature is as elusive and changeable as is the natural world.

Artist Bio:
Susanne was born in Seattle in 1966. She graduated with a BFA from the University of Washington in 1993. She has exhibited in various group shows in and around town, was a member, briefly, of Gallery 110 artist collective. After a stint of teaching color and composition Susanne spent ten years, preceding his death, as studio assistant for her father, painter Michael Dailey. She continues to work in his old studio, which he built the year she was born. Her work is featured as album cover art on independent releases both national and international.

Lezlie Jane

Artist Statement:
My art making is inspired by my interest in visually interpreting, in abstract form, science and nature. I consider it a method of magical communication. Art is a universal and ancient language that we all can speak. With non-objective paintings, I invite metaphorical interpretations unique to myself and to the viewer. My personal revelations are influenced by my interest in the mysteries of the natural world and philosophy. I approach each canvas as an adventure. My desire is to trigger a path within myself and within the viewer to another way of seeing. What we find under the surface of everyday thoughts may enchant our present moment I enjoy painting what I cannot see. By letting go of identifiable images I seek to reveal new perceptions of the world. This journey into the unknown nourishes my dedication as an artist. Making art is my superpower. It feeds my soul.

Artist Bio:
For many years Lezlie Jane created public/private sculptures and waterfront parks. These projects focused on the natural world and history. Hundreds of people and multiple agencies supported Lezlie’s vision for site-specific, environmental, artistic projects. She incorporated a kaleidoscope of materials and skills to bring her ideas to reality. When handling heavy tools took their physical toll, Lezlie turned to painting. As a painter, the natural world and its amazing mysteries blossomed as an influence in her art. Her paintings are shown in 4 NW galleries Lezlie Jane has a BA from Western University as the 2nd Antioch graduating class, a Certificate in Project Management from the UW, and is a Graduate Gemologist. Extended training includes courses from Stanford University, RISD, MoMA, Seattle Artist League, Esalen Institute, Gage Academy, Pratt Fine Arts Center, and Pilchuck Glass. She has studied and/or shown in 3 foreign countries and in 8 US states. Lezlie Jane’s work has been featured in 11 books and many news articles. Born 1949, Lezlie is a West Seattle native, painting in her White Center studio.

🏆 Joy Hagen

🏆 Juror Top Pick (1/3)

Artist Statement:
We have altered landscapes and crafted environments as we see fit. Dollar signs cloud our vision of what is beautiful and necessary. We dredge up sea beds to create islands and artificial archipelagos “where waterfront living meets Arabian splendor.” We create treaties for dumping garbage in our oceans. Mt. Everest is a human traffic jam. Our forests are being razed, some to the point of extinction – for trees and animals. Even our ocean forests – mangroves, kelp, sea grass and the rainforests of the seas: our coral reefs. We pollute the soils, the seas and the air, and now we’re off to “conquer” outer space. How out of balance with nature do we have to be before we realize we are destroying the very thing we need to survive? The forests and woodlands of the Pacific Northwest are my solace and sanctuary. My art is a song of praise and a call for stewardship. I create “assembled landscapes” using encaustic medium, reclaimed wood and papers, fabrics, wayside plant materials and the detritus of prior works. Each piece speaks to remembered moments and becomes a storytelling element as I contemplate loss, devastation and erosion versus perseverance, fertility and new growth.

Artist Bio:
Born in 1951, in South Dakota, Kirkland artist, Joy Hagen, spent the first five years of her life in the jungle on Basilan Island, Philippines. “My father was forester. He taught me to love trees. My mother was a teacher and an accomplished and frugal do-it-yourselfer. She taught me to be creative, making do with what was at hand.” Hagen has been an art maker, adventurer and traveler ever since. Hagen began her fine art career in 2000, after 10 years as a decorative painter. Graduating from the Artist Trust Edge Program at Centrum in 2009, Hagen then managed EAFA Gallery at Seattle Design Center until 2012, and is currently their Grants Manager. In 2011, she founded Studio 103 in Seattle. She organized and curated “Slash & Burn,” a collaborative project that exhibited at Kirkland Arts Center, Sammamish City Hall, Green River College and Seattle City Hall. She has exhibited at Occidental Park, Frye Art Museum, Seattle Art Museum, Whatcom Museum, Shunpike Storefronts, Bothell City Hall, “On the Fence” in Edmonds, and at Seattle Art Fair. Her work is in the permanent collections of Kenmore, Kent and Seattle and Swedish Medical Group in Edmonds, Everett and Redmond.

🏆 Bella Yongok Kim

🏆 Juror Top Pick (1/3)

Artist Statement:
Watching the women in my family sew inspired my passion for machine sewing. With limited resources, I learned to utilize recyclable materials early on. Now, after 50 years, I'm working to minimize resource consumption amidst the challenges of global warming. So, I appreciate discarded fabric scraps and packaging because of their unique colors and textures. Daily, I collect, cut, wash, and dry plastics, sorting them by color and texture in preparation for transforming them into artworks. Inspired by Korean Jogakbo tradition of resourceful fabric reuse, I have integrated its patterns and spirit into my art as a designer. As a Korean American, my artistic vision blends traditional Korean culture with other diverse cultural elements. Finding joy in transforming ordinary materials into meaningful art, I hope to inspire others to recognize the artistic potential of recycling and to reconsider their consumption habits while dreaming of sustainable art.

Artist Bio:
Bella Yongok Kim, a mixed media and fiber artist based in Gig Harbor, WA, blends Korean textile traditions, especially Jogakbo, with environmental consciousness in her work. Her art explores themes of identity, migration, and sustainability, focusing on caring for everyday materials to envision a more sustainable future. After earning her MFA and BFA in Fiber Art and Design from Ewha Womans University in Seoul, Bella became an active member of the Korean Craft Council and a fiber artist group. Her work has been widely exhibited, including at the Bainbridge Island Art Museum, Whatcom Art Museum, and Northwest Quilt and Fiber Art Museum. Bella’s pieces are also part of the Burke Museum's collection. She has received numerous accolades, including the Artist Trust GAP Award (2023), Southwest Merit Award (2023), and People’s Choice Award at Bainbridge Arts & Crafts (2021). Notably, she earned the National Special Art Award at the 1990 Korean Craft and Art Competition. In 2024, she presented a 24-foot installation at the Bainbridge Island Museum and won Best of Show at the 22nd Peninsula Art Show. Bella also received the Artistic Achievement Award from the Korean American Coalition.

Ingrid Lahti

Artist Statement:
My multidisciplinary body of work ranges from public artworks and participatory installations to sculpture, printmaking, video and neon. My work invites viewers to participate in it through multiple senses, rather than vision alone. Architect and theorist Juhani Pallasmaa argues in The Eyes of the Skin (2005) for the full engagement of all our senses in art and architecture. “A walk through a forest is invigorating and healing due to the constant interaction of all the sense modalities.” Such engagement is the unifying goal of my work. I have a background in biology and molecular biology; I want my artworks to influence attitudes towards science, the environment, consumption, as well as to promote awareness of the incipient perils to our future if we stay the current course. When possible I repurpose found materials and employ simple techniques, focusing viewers on concept and meaning rather than technique. to date, I have researched and based artworks on coral reefs, butterfly fight, birdsong, water patterns, imagery of galaxies, Covid-19 viruses, and lichens. Current artworks that I am submitting to this exhibition are concerned with Covid 19 viruses and lichens of the Pacific NW. I maintain a studio in Seattle’s Pioneer Square district.

Artist Bio:
Ingrid Lahti, born April 7, 1943, Houston, TX. My parents were Finnish immigrants. My family moved frequently for father’s work; I grew up all over the States. Degrees: Reed College, (BA, Biology, 1965), Cornish College of the Arts (BFA, Sculpture, 1983),and UW (MFA, Sculpture, 1990). Awards: 4Culture Art Projects Award, 2016 & 2013; Seattle CityArtist Projects Grant, 2016; Seattle Artists Program Grant, SAC, 1997; CoCA Artist’s Project Room Grant, Seattle, 1996; Betty Bowen Memorial Award, Seattle Art Museum,1993. Curator, 2009 ArtSparks Westlake Park Public Art Initiative. Public Artworks: Cairns, 2003, Tacoma’s Convention Center Station, Sound Transit Light Rail; Les Gove Community Campus, 2005,City of Auburn, WA; Chandelier, 2005, NorthWest Film Forum, Seattle. Exhibitions: 2024 Covid Icons and Lichen Studies, Tashiro Kaplan Studio Corridor Gallery, Seattle. 2024 Urban Garage: An Artistic Assembly, (in conjunction with Seattle Art Fair, 2024). 2021 Four Covid variants, Studio 106, ArtSpaceKaplan, Seattle. 2020 20/20 VISION: CoCA 2020 Members’ Show, Seattle. 2020 OCCCA @ 40 Online Exhibition, Orange County Center for Contemporary Art, Santa Ana, CA. occca.org/2020-06.html 2019 Motherland: 2019, CoCA Members Show, Seattle. Little Treasures, MIVAL, Mercer Island, WA 2018 Rippling Water, Greta Hackett Outdoor Sculpture Gallery, M.I., WA.

🥇 Eva Skold Westerlind

🥇 Honorable Mention (1/3)

Artist Statement:
Eva Sköld Westerlind, fine art photographer For the last several years the focus of Eva’s art has been on creating close-up nature scenes. She has been photographing melting snow forms and capturing floating leaves and water surface reflections in lakes and streams with an underwater camera. Her lens is often directed to the less documented expressions of our changing environment, photographing details of natural forms in their cycle of decay and renewal. The natural settings that she has investigated and photographed recently are the Salish Sea beaches and tide pools particularly during low tide. “I am enchanted by the natural forms and colors that are revealed when the tide leaves marine algae and sea creatures in pools and on beaches. While I enjoy photographing these natural forms, I also see changes and pollution and, therefore, at the same time, I fear what we are doing to Mother Earth.”

Artist Bio:
Eva Sköld Westerlind is a fine art photographer living and working in Seattle. Born (1942) and raised in Sweden, she is a graduate of the University of Stockholm in Sweden and the Photographic Center Northwest in Seattle. Sköld Westerlind’s photographs have been exhibited in the Northwest at G. Gibson Gallery, Center on Contemporary Art, Whatcom Museum, Tacoma Art Museum, Kirkland Art Center, Seattle Art Museum Rental Gallery, and Chase Gallery in Washington State, at Hoffman Gallery in Portland, Oregon, as well as in Washington D.C., Texas, California, Illinois, Idaho, New Mexico and Sweden. Her photographs are included in public and corporate collections in the Seattle area at Harborview Medical Center, Seattle Public Utilities, King County Arts Collection, Microsoft Corporation, University of Washington Medical Center, City of Tacoma, in addition to Museum of New Mexico, Santa Fe, and Houston Museum of Fine Arts in Texas as well as in Sweden at Jämtlands Läns Landsting and Kalmar Läns Landsting. She was represented by G. Gibson Gallery, Seattle, for fifteen years and was twice awarded the Artist Trust GAP Award. Her work has been published in several magazines, such as Harper’s Magazine and Pinhole Journal.

Jennifer Fernandez

Artist Statement:
Prior to becoming a professional artist I taught philosophy. During that time I explored 'relationality' — the philosophical concept of how beings are connected. I examined questions to make sense of the relationship between self and other such as: Who am I and how am I connected to you, if at all? How is my existence bound to yours? Surprisingly, or perhaps unsurprisingly, my art work explores these same questions. My studio practice is heavily process oriented. Rather than beginning with a meaning for a piece, I allow my curiosity to build naturally over the life of the work. This process is deeply relational. In curating a space for the materials take shape, I cultivate a practice of listening and intuitive communication. While the viewer may see something in my work it does not mean I necessarily intended it. The interpretation of the work is natural and co-creative. I may put the pieces together but they respond through the lens of their own experience. The strangeness of the landscape daring them to embrace feelings of apprehension and curiosity.

Artist Bio:
Jennifer Fernandez (b. 1978, Miami, Florida) is a multidisciplinary Cuban-American artist based in Seattle, Washington. She is the recipient of the Edwin T. Pratt Scholarship, a grantee of the City of Seattle's Office of Arts & Culture, and has been the Featured Artist at the Frye Art Museum Store. Her work has been exhibited nationally.

Maulsri Jha

Artist Statement:
Madhubani painting is an art form practiced in a remote region of eastern India. This art form was traditionally practiced by female family members who used a variety of media for these paintings including their own fingers, twigs, brushes, nib-pens, and matchsticks. The paintings are characterized by their eye-catching geometrical patterns, repetitive use of lines and hatchings, and depict ancient Indian deities and natural scenes. Usually in these paintings, generally, no space is left empty, the gaps are filled by images flowers, animals, birds, and even geometric designs. These paintings use two- dimensional imagery, and were traditionally done on freshly plastered mud walls and floors of huts, but now they are also done on cloth, handmade paper and canvas. This art form has remained confined to a compact geographical area and the skills have been passed on through centuries, with the content and the style largely remaining the same. Thus, Madhubani painting has received GI (Geographical Indication) status.

Artist Bio:
Maulsri Jha was born in New Delhi, India and spent the first two decades of her life there. She has undergraduate degree in architecture from India and a graduate degree in urban planning from Germany. At present, she is pursuing a doctorate degree in urban planning from Portland State University, Oregon and works full time as an urban planner in Bellevue. Growing up, she was always interested in visual arts and always kept herself busy exploring and experiencing different art forms. She lives in Seattle with her husband and is a mom to a 1 year-old.

Madelaine Millar

Artist Statement:
My artistic journey has been a journey back to my own nature as an intuitive, feeling animal, after decades spent trying to repress and rationalize my way into fulfillment. As I see it, the process itself is the art, and the physical works are remnants demonstrating the quality of my creative process. I am inseparable from the world around me, and so a consistently high-quality artistic process requires of me a consistently high-quality relationship with the divine, natural, living world of which I am a microcosm. I paint best as I live best: from deep in my own body, experiencing natural creative intuition, accepting my impulses without judgment, without attempting to rationalize them or even consciously understand them in the moment, are the works most capable of creating a second art moment. I have also found the works created in this way tend to be the ones most capable of creating a second art moment: the one during which the viewer finds something in their own nature reflected back in the work before them, and the world around them. It is that moment of natural connection that is the living art; the rest, I believe, is artifact.

Artist Bio:
Madelaine Millar was born and raised in Missoula, Montana, and spent five years in Boston, Massachusetts studying journalism. She rediscovered her love of visual art during the pandemic, and began to identify her unique voice when an overlapping bad breakup, unexpected move, major job change, and serious surgical procedure made for a deeply strange 2022. She is now a part-time digital nomad, artist, and freelance writer. Madelaine has previously exhibited work with a variety of institutions including the Holter Museum; Northeastern University’s Center for Spirituality, Dialogue, and Service; the Chicago Fine Art Salon; the Mosesian Center for the Arts; Open Door Curation; and the Zootown Arts Community Center; and contributed art to publications including Pensive: A Global Journal of Spirituality and the Arts; Pinky Thinker Press; and Saving Daylight Magazine. More of her work can be found at soupinthewoods.com or at @soup.in.the.woods.art on Instagram.

Steve Jensen

Artist Statement:
For me, the image of the boat is meant to symbolize a voyage or journey, perhaps it is the voyage to the other side, or the journey into the unknown. My family is from Norway. My father was a fisherman. My grandfather was also a fisherman. My other grandfather, a boat builder. I personally feel had I inherited my father or grandfathers fishing boat, that right now it is easier to make a living as an artist than a fisherman. For me, this is a very sad commentary on the state of our marine environment. Upon the death of my parents, I made a boat for their ashes and buried them at sea, something like a contemporary Viking funeral. I also made a boat for my best friend and former partner of 24 years, again burying them at sea. These deaths were extremely tragic. My best friend died of AIDS, my father committed suicide, my mother fell apart emotionally and physically and my former partner from alcoholism. What I am attempting to do is to take something that was personally extremely painful and turn it into something beautiful.

Artist Bio:
Steve Jensen has been a working artist for over 45 years. His current body of work, “VOYAGER” are boats that are meant to symbolize a voyage or journey, perhaps it is the voyage to the other side, or the journey into the unknown. Steve comes from a long tradition of Scandinavian fisherman and boat builders. He grew up on and around his father and grandfather’s fishing boats in the Seattle shipyards. Steve has has solo exhibitions in 30 museums or art centers including The Morris Graves Museum, 30 public art projects including The National Nordic Museum, and received 10 awards including The National Endowment for the Arts. His work was featured by Channel 9 “Art as Voyage” Steve Jensen’s Nordic Heritage and Amazon Prime, “The Story of Art in America” episode 10.

Renee Adams

Artist Statement:
My work investigates the complex relationships humans have cultivated with the natural world. The inherently unique beauty of plants and their singular identities make them perfect stand-ins for the human form. Like us, they set roots, claim territory and struggle for resources. By sculpting symbolic and species-specific references to botanical organisms, I orchestrate surprise encounters and implausible scenarios that examine our interactions with plants or mirror our experiences with each other. My most recent body of work draws heavily from my German background and the Jugendstil movement (the German counterpoint to Art Nouveau) through stylized representations of flowers and vegetation, sinuous double curves, and linear geometric lines using forged steel rods paired with porcelain clay or hand-carved wood forms. These pieces speak to our own struggle to manage, control or covet the natural environment. Though my processes, inputs and outcomes are multi-faceted, my objectives remain constant; I aim to forge connections between the viewer and the natural world through the varied structures and personalities of plants.

Artist Bio:
In addition to being an artist, I like to refer to myself as a beanbag botanist because of my love of researching plants and my passion for the outdoors. I’m a fully mixed media sculptor living in rural Central Washington state where I moved in 1996 to obtain my MFA from Central Washington University and never found a good reason to leave. I am a founding member of Punch Projects, a rural arts collective, gallery and event space. As a five member team we also collaborate on multi-media installations and interactive projects. For the past 20 years I have worked as the Exhibition Coordinator and preparator at Gallery One Visual Arts Center. I have worked on two curatorial projects through ArtsWA’s Art in Public Places Program and graduated from the Seattle Office of Arts and Culture Public Art Boot Camp in 2023. I am a three-time recipient of the GAP Grant from Artist Trust, a recipient of the McMillen Foundation Fellowship, and and was recently awarded a residency at Playa in south central Oregon. I currently have three works in the WA State art collection and two pieces in the collection of Swedish Hospital in Seattle.

Tom Gormally

Artist Statement:
This work addresses climate change and political leadership that refuses to address the dire nature of what is in front of us. In these sculptures, I combine the shamanistic aspect of effigy representation with folk-like carvings, fabrications, and inviting light elements. The element of craft is an essential part of my artistic process. Some of my sculptures reference the working class and the logging industry. I focus attention to detail in recreating, in wood, everyday tools such as the ax and vintage railroad lanterns. Some of my sculptures feature a fox motif, paying homage to the wily trickster spirits of Native American oral tradition or vaudevillian villains whose hijinks both horrify and entertain. Other work incorporates an owl motif, referencing my concern about the potential loss of spotted owl habitat in the Pacific Northwest. Birds keep me company in the backyard outside my studio when the weather is good. I use birds in my work; historically, birds have been used in art as a metaphor for warning or forecasting danger. Another sculpture combines a tornado made of fig tree limbs tearing through minimal, house-like forms, reminding us of the power of nature and the acceleration and ferocity of climate change.

Artist Bio:
I’ve been a practicing artist for over 45 years. My recent solo exhibits include Shunpike Storefronts (Seattle, 2023), the San Juan Island Museum of Art (2022) and METHOD Gallery (Seattle, 2016), and two-person exhibitions at the University of Northern Iowa Gallery of Art (Iowa, 2021) and the Blanden Art Museum (Iowa, 2019). My first permanent outdoor sculpture, commissioned by the Blanden Art Museum (Iowa), was installed in 2023. I was awarded a Civita Institute Fellowship for a residency in Civita di Banoregio, Italy, in March 2023. In 2021, I was awarded a residency with the University of Northern Iowa Public Art Incubator. Other awards include a 2019 Allied Arts Foundation Artist Award, a 2015 Artist Trust Fellowship, and a 1985 National Endowment for the Arts/MAAA award for sculpture. I attended the California College of Arts and Crafts and the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, where I obtained my BFA; I earned my MFA from Wichita State University. I was born in Fort Dodge, Iowa, raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and have maintained a studio in Seattle since 1987.

🏆 David Julian

🏆 Juror Top Pick (1/3)

Artist Statement:
As I visited natural history, science, and art museums as a child, the halls of glass cases containing beautiful specimens, cultural treasures, and unusual devices fueled my imagination and dreams. I was later inspired by the work of great 18th-20th century explorers, inventors, alchemists, and surrealists. Working at Harvard’s Biological Laboratories further influenced my aesthetic as I began collecting remnants of nature and vintage technology. I combine materials to create fictitious devices or interpret personal narratives about natural history, psychology, and technology. My visual stories are often inspired by lyrics, dreams, or from what I sense kinesthetically while holding a natural object. As plants have been used as tribal medicines and connectors to the spirit world, I use plants, insects, and minerals as metaphors for the powers beyond our own. I intend the viewer to be drawn into the details and visual clues found within my works, rekindling their own evolution in the process. These elements are built into vintage or hand-constructed boxes, domes or reliquaries. I embrace the time-worn imperfections in my materials to preserve the stories of their past experiences. I also work in Photographic Collage, which offers conceptual flexibility beyond the constraints of size and available materials..

Artist Bio:
Dave Julian began a life-long love for the natural world growing up near Boston. At 18, he worked at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology while also studying the works of classic surrealists, which further influenced his imagination and aesthetics. He attended Pratt Institute in Brooklyn to earn his BFA in 1979. While working as a designer, Dave develop his photography, traveling to document fragile ecosystems, earning support from The Rainforest Alliance, TimeWarner, Kodak and Fujifilm. His first show was at Nikon House, NYC, where he exhibited "Every Sixty Seconds”, documenting our interdependence with tropical rainforests. Dave's love for pairing science and art grew into parallel commercial and fine art careers, earning awards for his illustrations and photo-collages. He has built storytelling installations or photo-collages for corporations and collectors. His series "Taken From The Heart" contains 30 photographic portraits of personal objects lost during natural disasters. It was selected for exhibition in 'Katrina Exposed' at NOMA, 'An Uninvited Aftermath' at the United Nations, and 'Tragic Beauty' at the Center For Photographic Art in Carmel, CA. Eleven of his works were chosen in 2022 for the exhibit "The Artists' Alchemy: Transforming the Found" at the Kirkland Arts Center.

Aaron Morgan

Artist Statement:
Trees artist statement Stephen Meyer’s main thesis in his book End of the Wild is that human influence and dominance has fundamentally changed what is “the wild” and by default, a radical shift or reframing is necessary when we discuss the natural world. What we think of as “nature”, or so-called “wild spaces” no longer exists. Humans and human dominated interests now define, govern, and direct what was the natural world. In my series Trees, I’m exploring those themes and that philosophical tract around nature and technology through the images of cell towers placed on Post It notes. Cell towers are an unintentional analogous proxy for trees in the 21st century and thus are a form of the new human made “nature”. They aesthetically resemble trees in shape and form while also providing a tree-like covering that historian James Burke would refer to as the “blanket of technology”. Cell towers indispensably connect and provide the basic invisible infrastructure that makes modern technological society function. The use of Post It notes in the pieces reinforces the themes of technology and collaborative communication as well as providing an additional design element that provides shape, flow and color to the compositions.

Artist Bio:
Aaron Morgan is a self-taught artist who lives and works in Seattle, Washington. He specializes in creating works using traditional and non-traditional media on re-purposed found objects, mostly paper-based materials such as loose books pages, office supplies like Post it notes, cardboard boxes, discarded food wrappers and cigarette packaging. Aaron ties these unorthodox materials to images of both ubiquitous technology items such as phones and computers as well as figurative images such as humans and animals to comment and spark dialog on various aspects of American society such as anxiety, addiction, technology, nature, and speciesism. Since 2010, Aaron’s work has been featured in numerous printed works, online sources, galleries, and group shows domestically and internationally. He has pieces held in the collection of Seattle based PANEROS Foundation, Turkey’s Kafkas Universitiesi , the Brooklyn Public Library, and Kariuzawa New Art Museum KNAM located in Japan. He shows regularly in the greater Seattle and Portland area and has a revolving set of ongoing new works on display at Push/Pull Gallery located in Seattle WA.