(Above: Gallery owner Karin Clarke readies some of artist Marjorie Taylor’s “herd” of needlepoint animals for the opening of a show of recent work by the winning artists from last year’s 2020 Eugene Biennial; photos by Paul Carter)

By Randi Bjornstad

In what quickly has become a tradition since the first Eugene Biennial in 2016, in even-numbered years the Karin Clarke Gallery hosts an exhibit of work by artists from Lane, Linn, Lincoln, Benton, Douglas and Coos counties, selected by a jury of three that includes gallerist Karin Clarke and two other art aficionados.

As part of the exhibit, several among the dozens of participating artists receive special recognition for their entries, and in the following odd-numbered year, Clarke revisits them and puts together an exhibit appropriately called Eugene Biennial Award Winners: One Year Later, featuring what the winning artists have done since.

Last year’s winners (alphabetically) include Zoe Cohen, Tallmadge Doyle, Heather Jacks, Margot Lovinger, Satoko Motouji, Christopher St. John, Andrea Schwartz-Feit, and Marjorie Taylor. Their recent work is on display at the gallery through Aug. 21.

“I was really happy I was able to visit them all before the show and really see the way they have built on what they had done before,” Clarke said. For example, in last year’s biennial, Marjorie Taylor’s entry was “My Dear,” a 5-foot-tall needlepoint fabric rendition of a doe.

“Since then, she realized that she couldn’t possibly do everything she wanted in that size, and that most people couldn’t put them in their homes at that scale, so she started making them much smaller but still with all the detail,” Clarke said. “She calls them her ‘herd,’ and we are showing them nestled together in a group. They are really enhanced by the fact that she collects old needlepoint fabric and uses it for her sculptures. It’s a nice way to honor the people who did that kind of art so long ago.”

Christopher St. John has created a bevy of animals for his part in the Eugene Biennial Award Winners: One Year Later show at the Karin Clarke Gallery

Animals — rabbits, cats, bears, and turkeys — also are a theme in Christopher St. John’s work in the show, but his are rendered whimsically as terracotta vessels and glazed with his particular concoction of ash, flour, sugar, and water during the firing process. He also does some of his animals in the form of paintings.

One of the most unusual pieces in the One Year Later show is Margot Lovinger’s large fabric “portrait” of a woman, which Clarke describes as “layers and layers of almost transparent tulle.”

“It is so amazing — she uses different shades of the fabric to create even skin tones, and the facial features themselves are done completely with fabric,” she said.

A detail from Margot Lovinger’s fabric portrait, using many layers of sheer tulle to create color and texture.

“Several of the artists in this show have come up with their own unique type of artwork.”

Other work in this show includes mood-filled painted and photographed landscapes by Heather Jacks, colorful, mid-century-inflected abstracts by Zoe Cohen, and a continuation of Tallmadge Doyle’s Underwater Garden series, expressed here using India ink, pigment pencil, graphite, and relief print techniques.

For those who remember Satoko Motouji’s densely colorful paintings that formed the projected landscape for Eugene Ballet’s Peer Gynt, her paintings in One Year Later represent a completely different style, rendered in black-and-white and with a noticeable homage to her roots in Japanese artistic and cultural traditions.

Andrea Schwartz-Feit’s four large rectangular wall panels round out the show, taking up a wall with richly colored monoliths that the artist says evoke the shapes, colors, and profusion of nature that she experienced during 16 years of living in the Columbia Gorge and her connection with it.

 

Eugene Biennial Award Winners: One Year Later

When: Through Aug. 21, 2021

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

Special events:

  • Reception for the artists, 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. on Friday, July 16
  • First Friday ArtWalk, 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 6

Gallery hours: Noon to 5:30 p.m. Wednesday through Friday; 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday

Information: Telephone 541-684-7963; email kclarkegallery@mindspring.com; online at karinclarkegallery.com

Much of artist Satoko Motouji’s recent art has been done in black-and-white and reflects the artistic and cultural traditions of her native Japan