(Above: A lush landscape by Oregon artist Humberto Gonzalez is part of the “Five Oregon Painters” display at the Karin Clarke Gallery)

By Randi Bjornstad

The new show at the Karin Clarke Gallery, titled Five Oregon Painters, definitely stands alone, but it’s also a has a tie-in with another major art event in town.

Margaret Coe’s work is part of a new show at the Karin Clarke Gallery; she and her late husband, Mark Clarke, recently were featured in a retrospective exhibit at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at the University of Oregon

That is a show at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art on the University of Oregon campus, called Creating Visual Magic, that features the work of artists who had ties to Oregon in the 1960s and ’70s, gallery owner Karin Clarke said.

George Green, who was friends with her artist parents, Margaret Coe and the late Mark Clarke — and who founded the George D. Green Art Institute in New York City — is one of dozens of originally Oregon artists who will be represented in the show at the UO.

Local artist Bets Cole is included in the ‘”Five Oregon Painters” show

“I believe the JSMA came up with about 40 artists to include in their show, and I’m familiar with many of them, so I thought it would be fun to do something to tie my show in with that show,” Clarke said.

Her new show is primarily a landscape exhibit, featuring work by five painters — Craig Cheshire, Bets Cole, Humberto Gonzalez and Erik Sandgren, along with her her mother, Margaret Coe — whose work she has represented through her gallery.

Of those, Cheshire studied at the University of Oregon with her parents during the tenure of famed Oregon artist David McCosh, and Cheshire’s work appears in both gallery shows, Clarke said.

Gallerist Karin Clarke’s family has close ties with artist Craig Cheshire

“Craig (Cheshire) is about my dad’s age, also tall and a really humble, nice man like my dad,” she said. “I have many ties with him, but I have never done a show of his work. I think if McCosh had had a son — he didn’t have children — it would have been Craig Cheshire.”

She could have included many more artists in her show, “but my gallery is so small — I don’t have huge space like the UO does — so I decided to limit mine to these five people,” Clarke said. “JSMA is showing so many artists that each one has only one piece on display, so I decided to show more of each artist’s work, which I feel will make for an interesting combination in this space.”

Five Oregon Painters

When: Jan. 16 through Feb. 23

Where: Karin Clarke Gallery, 760 Willamette St., Eugene

Gallery Hours: Noon to 5:30 p.m. Wednesdays through Fridays, and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays

Information: 541-684-7963 or karinclarkegallery.com

Erik Sandgren, like his late father Nelson Sandgren, has made his reputation as a noted Oregon artist