A visitor from Japan showed up at Christine Martell's studio door. Miki Yamashita was visiting Portland for the SIETAR-USA(Society of Intercultural Education Training and Research) conference. "She noticed my posts on Facebook about the studio tour. She arrived before the conference started and came to my place to try out gelli printing and purchased a painting," said Christine.
The pictures show Miki doing gelli printing with acrylic paint. According to Christine, "The one she is holding is watercolor with ink and colored pencil on paper. The ones in the background are acrylic gelli print collages on panels."
Tim Gabriel's most memorable Open Studio story started with a phone call from a mother looking for help with a home school history lesson. "She asked if I was a real blacksmith and if she could bring her sons to my studio to watch me work. I told her to come by my open studio," said Tim. He not only talked about the history of blacksmith and forged a leaf, Tim gave it to the boys as lesson learned.
"She arrived out of breath at my studio door asking, Is this the open studio? Are you the artist?" According to Darla Boljat, the woman had been riding her bicycle through Sherwood when she saw the Washington County Open Studios signs and followed them to the artists' studio. The winded visitor enjoyed her tour so much, she is now taking classes at Darla's studio.
Terry Grant told about a couple who arrived at her studio wanting to take photos. It was no problem, she assured them. After his wife went upstairs to look around the man said, "My wife is an artist, but she has been very ill for the past year and has not been able to do much. She misses it. She goes in for surgery next week and will be recovering for awhile. I wanted to bring her out to see the studios today and she can enjoy the photos as she recovers and be inspired to create when she is well again."
Artist Lynn Adamo and a visitor connected over a love for the artist, Morandi. This artist inspired Lynn to create a mosaic piece which she saw the visitor admiring. After they talked about Morandi, the visitor purchased the piece bringing together inspirations from two artists' work she admired into her own life.
An expected class reunion happened at Ana Quinn's studio. On the tour weekend, four of her classmates from Hudson's Bay High School in Vancouver, Washington showed up at her studio!
Bringing together artists and visitors from around the block and around the world. Inspiring imaginations, teaching lessons, connecting and re-connecting artists with the people who love art.
That's the magic of the Washington County Open Studios Tour.
To find out more about being an artist or visitor for our 2015 tour, check out our website at www.washcoart.org
