Art in Oil and Clay at the Bandon Library

“Merging Worlds” Paintings by Morgan Johnson, and clay sculpture by Cary Weigand, at the Bandon Library Art Gallery.

Reception for the artists on March 4, 2023, 2 p.m., in the Sprague Room, free to all. Refreshments will be served.

Oil painter Morgan Johnson breaks the world into pieces of color and shape, creating images of a mosaic-like reality, rather than a straightforward one. This has the effect of calling our attention to the multitude of colors in a sky and its fractured reflection, the snakeskin-like textures of a tree, or in the form of a swimmer under the disrupted water. Shapes may be geometric or free-form flowing lines, but these lines and shapes of color emphasize the overall image, rather than detract–or distract–from it. The work is almost hyper-real, introducing a micro element to the macro image, merging the two points of view. Johnson’s paintings are up through March 31st.

Cary Weigand’s sculptures are made with stained and glazed cone 6 porcelain, then combined with other materials, such as wood and hair. She finds inspiration in the materials themselves—their connection to the earth—and in the secrets of human and animal nature. She combines rougher slab work with incredibly fine detail, picking out the tiny fingers of a woman or the whorls of an ear. In her work, the animal and human worlds merge to create relationships beyond mere companionship; they all seem to speak the same mystic language, and assume the traits of one another. It is the highly skilled work of a unique imagination. Weigand’s sculpture will remain in the gallery through May 31st.

The gallery is open during regular library hours, 1204 11th St. SW, in Bandon City Park. For more information about the gallery, visit the Bandon Library Friends and Foundation website, Bandonlff.org.

Article courtesy of Tracy Hodson. Art images, “Trying to Surface” oil painting by Morgan Johnson, and “Dreaming Together” Bas Relief Sculpture by Cary Weigand.