All About Me

Kettle Falls, WA – Kettle Falls artist, Gloria de los Santos’ encaustic painting entitled: “Pathos” was chosen for inclusion in the Boise State Women’s Center , Women’s History Month National Juried Exhibition, for the 2nd consecutive year. The artwork will be displayed during March 2007. The exhibit’s reception will be held Friday, March 22, 2007 from 5:30 – 7:00 p.m. in the Student Union Gallery. This year’s jurors, Jennie Myers, Laurie Blakeslee, and Julie Clemons said in a joint statement, “The quality of work submitted was exceptional, making this year’s selection process extremely competitive. From 92 entries submitted by 28 artists, we selected only 24 works by 15 artists for the final exhibition.”
de los Santos was recently awarded a PDAP 2007 (Professional Development Assistance Program) grant from Washington State Arts Commission to study encaustic painting and photographic processes at the Art Association of Jackson Hole, Wyoming.

North Country Artist Trails

Professional artists and artisans are invited to be a part of the 3rd annual “North Country Artist Trails”.

“North Country Artist Trails”, a program of Colville Arts Foundation, is a folded 4” x 9” professionally designed brochure detailing artist’s studios and galleries located in Stevens and Ferry counties. The website is: www.northcountryartisttrails.com
Mission StatementNorth Country Artist Trails, a CAF program, provides an alternative venue for artists & craftspeople residing in Colville & N. E. Washington State. Collectors & appreciators of fine art now have the unique opportunity of touring working studios & galleries, meeting the artists, while traveling through the spectacular scenery of Northeastern Washington.

North Country Artist Trails will include:
o 1-2 full-color photographs of each artist’s work along with a 3-4-line description, phone number and opening times, along with address, web site or any other pertinent information.
The guide will list studios and galleries stretching from Northport to Hunters, Colville to Republic, Orient, Kettle Falls and other towns via a full-color map.
The guide gives the artist an incredible opportunity to build up a clientele for their fine art & fine crafts—selling directly to art lovers, collectors and/or interior designers.
Membership in the Colville Chamber of Commerce and the International Selkirk Loop’s website

Distribution:
Over 158 hotel/motel sites throughout Spokane, including Museum of Arts & Culture, Felts Field Aviation, Executive Lounge, Westcoast Ridpath Hotel, and Service Stations.
Riverfront Park – IMAX Building in Spokane
AAA Auto Club Visitor Centers throughout Spokane
Service Stations in Spokane
Deer Park, Liberty Lake, Chewelah, Colfax, Green Acres, Mead, Clarkston, and Pullman, WA to name a few towns included in the distribution
Chewelah, Colville, and Ritzville Chambers of Commerce
Spokane International Airport
Many more sites to numerous to list!

Experts predict two significant travel trends will dominate the tourism market in the next decade:
Mass marketing is giving way to one-to-one marketing with travel being tailored to the interests of the individual consumer; i.e., the art lover and art collector.
A growing number of visitors are becoming special interest travelers who rank the arts, heritage and/or other cultural activities as one of the top five reasons for traveling.
The combination of these two trends is being fueled by technology, through the proliferation of online services and tools, making it easier for the traveler to choose destinations and customize their itineraries based on their interests— namely, ART!
If you are interested, please email ncat@hughes.net for more information, or call 684-3002.
To provide an optimum experience for visitors on the Trail, participants must be committed to open their studios at least two days per week between Memorial Day and Labor Day. Opening your studio or gallery more days is encouraged but is, of course, up to the discretion of the individual Artist/Craftsperson.

This year, we’re focusing on the last weekends of June, July and August for all studios to be open. The exact dates are: June 29, 30, July 1st, and July 27, 28, and 29, and August 24, 25, and 26.

Tomorrow is another day

Tomorrow A. is coming to tan hides and I'm a little apprehensive, but not much. Also, I have finished my taxes. That is a sweet relief. Wonderful. Tomorrow a visit to the Fed-X man and that's it. It's done--taxes are completed for 2006.

Now I can relax and make that art project out of the dead skunk I found at the dump. So cool. Bones and all. Dave said, "Leave it in the shop". It still kind of stank. There was black and white hair still stuck to the bones. I'm going to take some pix and post them here.

Tuesday I go to Spokane, and I'm glad for that. Gotta get it together. D. has his first track meet on Tuesday. I tried to tell him that it's OK to be nervous. He said he wasn't ready, but I assured him to go on and try it. You've got to see the lay of the land, his father told him.

Today was a good day. I try every day to make the best of it, even when I'm loading tons of garbage into bags and smelling the stink of a landfill. H. was sick, she got sick from something yesterday, probably not washing her hands enough. Don't know.

I'm tired of going somewhere every single freaking day. Staying home sounds real good right about now. A good book, and my bed.

Sometimes you win, sometimes you don't win YET!

Went to the Boy Scouts clean-up at the landfill today when I could have been doing a million other things. Oh well, such is life. The paintings aren't selling at Constant Creations, through no fault of anyone.

There is no blame. Now my knees, back and butt hurt from bending down to pick up trash, piles and piles of trash, plastic bags, papers, styrofoam, cardboard, a dead red-tailed hawk, x-rays, which I kept, a dead skunk's bones, which I kept, and will become an art project of some sort.

I guess this is all avoidance, as I don't want to clean my studio and I'm listening to a singer from Seattle named Flora McGill I found on myspace.com. Very, very good. Nice, clean lovely voice. Beautiful voice. Nice music. I was looking for something a little fresh-- I was getting tired of the same old 'sensual world' that I usually listen to.

Getting ready to do some painting, trying to fight tiredness, which is boring, and going to do some painting.

Bags and bags of garbage will infiltrate my dreams tonight. Huge stinking bags of garbage. AT least it's a lot better now, if we don't have another 'event', which is government-speak for windstorm! Landfill, but I call it a dump.

Appeared in the Statesman Examiner February 27 07

PO Box 375 Colville WA 99114

Thursday, February 15, 2007

Dear Editor,

I disagree with the letter from Evelyn Romo of CVPAA who claimed their organization was the only organization to “sponsor professional artists”. She should have stated “sponsor professional performing artists”. Colville Arts Foundation has strived to present many professional visual artists in our community, and worthwhile visual arts exhibits and displays. Working with the Colville Chamber of Commerce, who has been extremely supportive, we have worthwhile programs such as “Art Around Town” placing art in different business venues to give more visibility to our local PROFESSIONAL VISUAL artists. Also, the only 3-county self-guided arts tour, “North Country Artist Trails” presents a dazzling compilation of professional visual artists in the 3-county area to tourists and locals alike.

In its 5-year existence, Colville Arts Foundation has garnered very little support, yet we continue to believe in the arts, continue to support artists and performing artists. I beg to differ with Ms. Romo about the performing artists. Recently, a blues concert was held at Orient Elementary School with over 200 people in attendance. The Fat Tones were clearly professionals. Last year there were professional performing artists from The Blue Door Theatre in Spokane, (improvisational artists and actors), at Colville’s now defunct “Art Burst” (its demise due to a lack of attendance and support!). Art Burst’s performing and visual arts venue was an incredible effort by Dot Javorka and Jan Beardsley and many others, but its demise is a sad reflection of the lack of support. In 2004, Colville Arts Foundation sponsored Jason Webley, a professional musician from Seattle.

As the administrator of a generous Washington State Arts Commission grant, we are pleased to have “Tears of Joy Puppet Theatre” from Bellevue visit Orient and Valley Schools. This event is sponsored by Orient/Inchelium/Valley Arts Consortium. There are professional visual and performing artists in and around Colville but they are tough to find out about. This particular visit is sponsored by the Washington State Arts Commission.

I support all the arts, as an artist myself, but have found it necessary to go outside this community to present my own art, as the Bible states, “a prophet is not honored in his own hometown”. I hope we (as supporters of the arts) are growing in number and will have a voice--someday. Maybe we’re just a bit ahead of the curve.

Two years ago, Colville Arts Foundation lost its art gallery space, and if not for Colville Woodworking and Stained Glass and the library, there is NO community venue to display local PROFESSIONAL Visual artists’ work. Hence, the aforementioned, “Art Around Town” which valiantly conspires to display local professional visual artists’ works.

Please support the arts in any way that you can! In general, artists are the most educated and underpaid of the population. As Stuart Wilde, a metaphysical writer stated his book, The Little Money Bible, “We don’t remember the businessmen of Rome or the various generals that fought the Trojan wars. Even the kings and queens of old are fairly uninteresting. What we value is the art, the architecture, and the feelings of bygone societies. What they believed in, what they did, the art they left behind—the Colosseum, Versailles, paintings, books—those are the things that have meaning, and so they last.”

We have the Spokane Symphony’s Woodwind section visiting Orient and Kettle Falls Elementary Schools. It doesn’t get any more professional than that.

What Stevens County needs is an arts council, a clearing house for performing and visual artists, a clear indication of its support for the arts. A local arts agency that can attract performing and visual artists, and support the local artists performing in and around Colville and the whole of Stevens County—providing venues and exhibition halls for dancers, actors, musicians and visual artists. It’s sad that we do not have such an entity.


Sincerely Yours,



Gloria de los Santos
Colville Arts Foundation Director
Visual Artist

Jackson Hole, Wyoming The Cowboy State

Jackson Hole is amazing. I loved it there, lots of good energy. I hope to go back real soon. This is an encaustic I completed at the class I took at the Art Association there. It's an amazing town. Although it was so cold, -25 F at night, and -10 during the day. I saw elk, bald eagles, and the Tetons are amazing. That's only on the way to the airport. Wonderful place.

Student Art Show Set at Stevens County Historical Society

A May Student Art Show is set for May 1st at the Stevens County Historical Society. The art work is by students only in the Orient/Inchelium/Valley Arts Consortium. It will be on view for the month of May. May is proving to be a busy month, as MCT is at Orient the first week of May so I'm going to need help on this. They want the show installed by May 1st.

I will have more details later, but suffice it to say that it will be up for a month, and we can schedule a reception for the students probably on May 10th or May 11th.

Ideally, all 2D work will be mounted and/or framed or matted. 3D work, I'm not sure of the setup yet. Their board of directors met, and it is sure thing.

Another request I received is from the Grand Forks Art Gallery in B.C., which would like some student work for a student show beginning March 15th. If you have anything for this show, let me know.

If you would like to help out with any of these two projects, please let me know. All art by consortium students is valid to be in the show, whether they have completed it at school or not.

Bad Weather - February 28 Winter holding on

I'm not kidding, a lot more snow last night and the channel 6 isn't even putting the Today Show on cuz they want to report all the traffic accidents, roll-offs and trecherous driving conditions. Glad I don't have to go to Spokane today, and praying tomorrow will be better. The temp is around 35 in spokane. The weather is freaky. Winter holding on strong.

A Wonderful View

Well, I do write when I'm upset with someone, that's for sure. Recently, I got an email from an acquaintance that told me to please accept an apology for pulling down a posting about an art class. I don't know if he pulled it down, because he doesn't like the teacher, and there is some kind of lawsuit going on between the two parties.

A long time ago, an acquaintance told me, "I'm like Tess, I don't mess."

I think that's a good way to be. Never get into the middle of someone else's mess, unless you are ready to get messy too!

Up Late At Night

Working on my show at Constant Creations, in Spokane, here are the details.

NEXT SHOW: Constant Creations, located at 524 W. 1st Avenue, Spokane, WA
Please come to the opening reception on Friday, March 2nd, from 6 p.m. - 8 p.m.
Spokane, WA – Kettle Falls artist Gloria de los Santos’ encaustic paintings and hand-colored photography will be on display for the month of March at Constant Creations, 524 W 1st Avenue, Spokane 99201. Phone number at the gallery: (509) 747-8600.

A reception for the artist will be held Friday, March 2nd from 6 p.m. – 8 p.m. Her show at Constant Creations is titled, “Encaustic Musings and Other Works”. The show is part of Spokane’s First Friday Visual Arts Tour.

de los Santos has displayed her work nationally and her encaustic painting titled, “Pathos” was chosen for inclusion in the Boise State Women’s Center, Women’s History Month National Juried Exhibition, for the 2nd consecutive year.
She was recently awarded a PDAP 2007 (Professional Development Assistance Program) grant from Washington State Arts Commission to study encaustic and photographic processes at the Art Association of Jackson Hole, Wyoming.