Join us for the First Friday Art Walk festivities!
Ashland Gallery Association Exhibit Openings & Artist Receptions
First Friday Art Walk, October 4th from 5 to 8 pm
For more information about all of our exhibits and to download the October Gallery Tour map, please visit: www.ashlandgalleries.com
Ashland Gallery Association
October Spotlight Exhibits
Ashland Art Center
Autumn Art in Multiple Mediums
Our theme for October is autumn and all it brings with color, texture, warmth in layering and the merging of foliage with art. Our featured artists include Jeanne La Rae in our main gallery. Her show, ” Color Reflected,” showcases Jeanne’s favorite subjects, water and autumn color. Katherine Dron will be showing her work in the upstairs lounge. Her show, ” Fragmenting Flowers explores our local, natural environment by marking paper with ink and watercolor. In our Photographers Co-op, Diana Standing is featured. Her show, “Autumn Impressions,” is a tribute both to her favorite season, Autumn, and to some of her favorite painters of the impressionist and expressionist traditions. She uses a slow shutter speed, camera motion, rare light, and in some cases an occasional breeze to achieve the desired affect.
Finally The Cascade Bonsai Society and local Ikebana artists will be exhibiting a collection of bonsai and art representing nature and the changing of the seasons in their show, “Living Sculpture, Connecting to nature through the art of bonsai.” The show is in the main classroom at Ashland Art Center. The exhibit is a collection of Bonsai Society member’s finest trees, and is timed to celebrate the fall colors.
To enhance the viewers’ experience, Art Center painters’ and photographers’ work has been paired with the trees to complete each display. From rocky hillsides and mossy forest floors, to urban environments, each respective display tells its own story.
A collection of Ikebana (Japanese flower arrangements), created by local ceramic and Ikebana artists will also be on display. These seasonal works of art will be for sale, with all proceeds going to the Art Center.
This is a rare opportunity to view living bonsai sculptures and celebrate the changing seasons.

Jeanne La Rae, “Mirrored Duck” painting
Photographers’ Gallery
Featuring Diana Standing
“Autumn Impressions,” Ashland photographer Diana Standing’s exhibit at the Photographers Gallery at the Ashland Art Center opens on October 4th, the First Friday Art Walk, and continues for the month. Her exhibit is a tribute both to her favorite season, autumn, and to some of her favorite painters of the impressionist and expressionist traditions. She uses a slow shutter speed, camera motion, rare light, and in some cases an occasional breeze to achieve the desired affect.
To Diana, there’s a unique quality to the light of autumn, one that adds a profound depth and vibrancy to nature. It’s a season of many moods and constant motion, with bursts of color and abstract patterns, some bright, some brooding. It’s nature’s final gasp in all its glory as it fades into winter. She hopes to have captured this layered atmosphere in her images, with its correspondences to our deeper senses.
Diana traveled to an exhibition in Barcelona, Spain, in 2017 where her series of four still life images were finalists in the Julia Margaret Cameron Awards. She exhibited along with 77 other women photographers from 15 different countries. She felt very fortunate to be among such a diverse, creative, and caring group of women. The trip was a reminder of the gifts the world and its people have to offer.

Diana Standing, “Standing Tall,” photograph
Art & Soul Gallery
The Joy of Color
“The Joy of Color” is born of the joy of drawing and painting outdoors. Throughout the spring and summer the Bennetts, husband and wife, have been converting these studies into larger studio paintings. They have been highly energized by new studio spaces adding a spark of color and creativity to their work. Sue Bennett debuts a new path of charmingly colorful and illustrative acrylic paintings designed to bring a smile and lift the heart. In June, 2019, Steve Bennett was awarded Signature membership in the Pastel Society of the West Coast.
“We hope our show will bring a smile and a spark of joy to our viewers.” – The Bennetts
Live music of First Friday will be provided by “Sidewalk Café.” The trio – Beth Martin, violinist and singer, Craig Martin, guitarist, and Todd Ragland, fretless bassist play swing, Gypsy jazz and bossa nova.
On display at Art & Soul Gallery from October 1 – 27.
Meet the artists at our First Friday Reception, Oct. 4th from 5 – 8 pm!

Sue Bennett, “Many Suns Maui,” acrylic painting
Ashland Art Works
Paintings and Sculpture
For the month of October, Ashland Artworks will be featuring paintings by Michael Gibson and wire sculptures by George Popa. Meet the artists at the First Friday Artwalk Oct. 4th from 5:00 to 8:00pm.
Michael has a passion for art, travel and photography that is reflected in his art. He is prolific, and works in many mediums, which can be viewed at Ashland Art Works. Michael will also be on the Studio Tour in October.
George’s work expresses a childhood fascination with moving things that he’s never lost. He creates his sculptures using stainless steel wire and silver solder from sketches. His work ranges from airplanes to sharks.

Michael Gibson, painting
Shepherd’s Dream
In the Moment
Mixed Media by Pamela Ourshalimian
Pamela Ourshalimian has explored a myriad of mediums, but has expanded into Mixed Media. Pamela is fascinated by perceptions of self image, and the value placed on the physical form, especially that of women, and explores the driving force behind these perceptions. Her art is an abstracted expression of personal experiences, using distortion and exaggeration of the feminine form, and to evoke a personal connection between the painting and the viewer. Her hope is that her fascination is contagious and intoxicating to the viewers of her work. Pamela is constantly reminded that there is no separation between art and her life. She says of her art, “it leads me to “being in the moment” when it’s all to easy to be thinking about what’s in the future or the past, and reminds me how grateful I am to be an artist.”
Pamela has lived throughout the country in places as varied as Santa Barbara, Michigan and Hawaii, after attending the Flint Institute of Arts in Michigan in the 1960’s. She currently resides in southern Oregon, where she has learned and worked with many of the talented and skilled artisans. Pamela continues to attend workshops in the Pacific NW, continuing to study her craft with nationally acclaimed artists.

“I’m Considering” mixed media by by Pamela Ourshalimian
Please see the October Gallery Tour Map.
Special Event!
6th Annual Ashland Open Studio Tour
Come Into Our Studios…
October 19th & 20th 11 am – 4 pm
Free to public
During a weekend in October a group of local artists will open their private studio doors to the public for the Sixth Annual Ashland Open Studio Tour!
The Ashland Open Studio Tour is an inspiring self-guided arts tour, brought to you by the Ashland Gallery Association. The Tour will guide visitors to a variety of artist studios in Ashland and the surrounding communities of Talent and Phoenix, while journeying through the beauty of the fall season.
We invite you to come see the creative processes behind our incredible and diverse arts community. There will be a variety of mediums, as well as demonstrations, presentations, and screenings to reveal each individual’s unique methods.
Pick up a map to the studios at Ashland Art Works on Oak Street or download off the Studio Tour website:
Visit www.ashlandost.com for more information
Facebook : www.facebook.com/ashlandost
Instagram : www.instagram.com/ashlandopenstudiotour
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.