January 19 - March 11, 2023
Curator: Carin Jacobs
This exhibit, featuring works by two PAC Artist Members, explores the assemblage and multiplicity of objects and textures in nature and in everyday life. It stands alone, but also serves as a tandem display to Petaluma Collects.
Kris Ekstrand
About the Artist: Kris Ekstrand is a west coast painter and printmaker. Her work has been featured in one-person shows in Washington State including Skagit Valley College, Moses Lake Museum, Smith and Vallee Gallery (Edison), MUSEO (Langley) and juried shows at Shack Art Center (Everett), Cascadia College, Bainbridge Island Museum of Art, Museum of Northwest Art, Anacortes Arts Festival and venues throughout the Northwest. She lives in Petaluma with her writer husband, Carl Molesworth, and two Norwich terriers.
Artist’s Statement: These large-scale nest pieces are part of an ongoing series I’ve been working on for the past five years. I was primarily interested in the dynamics of nest construction: energy, centrifugal force, gravity, strength/fragility and tension. But as I’ve observed and drawn a wide variety of nests, I’ve developed a deep respect for the complexity of nest construction and the instinctive skills of the builders. As a result, the drawings have taken on an emotional presence of their own that varies from drawing to drawing.
Marilyn Dizikes
About the Artist: Marilyn was born in California and earned a Bachelor’s degree from U.C.L.A. and a Master’s degree in Painting from Virginia Commonwealth University. She has pursued art her entire adult life and currently shows at The Find in Petaluma. She has had numerous solo exhibits, beginning with her first in 1980, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, where her husband was a diplomat for the United States. She has lived in Germany, Greece, Malaysia, and Denmark and moved to Petaluma in 2013. Her repertoire includes painting in acrylics, watercolors, and pastels, as well as printmaking and hand-built ceramics.
Artist’s Statement: A painter uses imagination, skill, and a palette of colors to create something original. This is the artist’s unique vision. I agree with Kandinsky’s philosophy that there are no “musts” in art. Although I’m primarily an abstract painter, I move freely from Abstraction to Realism, always searching for the best way to express an idea. Color, shape, texture, and light are my guides. I take inspiration from nature, the spiritual, exploration of media, and the world around me. On a trip to Germany I visited a yarn shop in Munich. It had huge movable walls of color-coordinated yarn. I could move a wall and underneath another wall would appear with contrasting colors. I knew then I wanted to paint this experience but wasn’t sure how, until I attended a Riley Street art store demonstration showing Sennelier Abstract Acrylics. These paints gave me the texture I envisioned.
