Saratoga News

Photograph by Robert Scheer

Mary Ann Henderson (left), Starr Davis (center) and Kay Duffy show some of their contributions to Aegis Gallery's current show, which features works by local artists, including many from Saratoga and Los Gatos.

Seasonal inspirations fill Aegis Gallery

By Shari Kaplan

To share the creative spirit the winter season brings, the artists who belong to Saratoga's Aegis Gallery are exhibiting works of art for this year's holiday exhibit, Seasonal Inspirations and Artists' Tree.

Throughout the gallery is a wide mix of media, including oil, acrylic, watercolor and pastel paintings, black-and-white and color photography, Polaroid emulsion transfer images, pencil etchings, clay and porcelain pottery, wood-turned vessels, fiber art and bronze pieces.

The centerpiece is a bare-branched tree adorned with a variety of hand-crafted ornaments made from paper, fabric, glass and other materials, mostly natural. Among these are ball ornaments covered in layers of cast paper and tied with colorful, hand-woven cording by Los Gatan Jeanne Tillman. Her recycled paper gift tags also hang on the tree.

To make cast paper, Tillman collects fibers from dead leaves of the wild and bearded irises and crocasmia plants growing on her property in the Santa Cruz mountains. After cooking and bleaching the fibers, she blends them into a stringy pulp. Cast paper is the result of straining and drying the pulp through a screen or sieve.

Making recycled paper out of junk mail and other paper sources involves a somewhat similar process of blending and screening. Like Tillman's other hobbies--weaving and sewing--paper-making takes patience.

"Threads go throughout my life. I grew up in the Midwest, so I grew up with sewing and knitting," she says. "I've also been intrigued with weaving as long as I can remember. I've also been intrigued by paper-making.

"I've tried watercolors, acrylics and charcoal--the more traditional fine arts--but there's something more rewarding about making something from something other people might throw away," she adds.

Los Gatan Nancy Jo Lopp also resides in the Santa Cruz mountains, where she's devoted a third of an acre to growing lavender. Although she and husband Larry have grown the fragrant herb for many years, this is the first year Lopp is selling sachets of the dried purple flowers under the name of Highland Lavender. Many ribboned sachets adorn the artists' tree. "Everyone loves lavender. It's a smell that people like, and it's nice to touch and wonderful to bathe in. This type of lavender can be put into foods or brewed as tea for a relaxing effect," she says.

Lopp also incorporates the purple fields into her longtime creative endeavor, Photography with Feeling. Gift and note cards with color photographs of lavender are displayed near the tree.

Saratogan Starr Davis has also put artwork on cards for the holidays, although hers are winter scenes in watercolor of one of her favorite places--Yosemite National Park. The images of Half Dome and the Sentinel are done in soft brush strokes, combining whites and earthtones with pastel-hued greens, blues and purples.

Davis says she often paints by bundling up in snow garb, planting a beach chair in the snow and setting up her easel and watercolors around her. While her daughter goes skiing, Davis paints.

Occasionally, the water on her paper freezes, creating what she describes as a lovely crystalline design. Although the ice eventually melts, she likes to incorporate its unique effects and patterns into her own designs. Davis also likes the fact that since snow is white anyway, she doesn't have to worry about painting over all the places where white paper shows through.

Seasonal Inspirations and Artists' Tree runs through Dec. 28. Aegis Gallery is located at 14531 Big Basin Way, Suite 2, in Saratoga. For more information, call 867-0171.

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