Photographer Michael Miller begins with things like coral, a tomato, or even an ordinary screen door, and goes in close. The macro photograph is then manipulated to find a new and dynamic image that realizes his vision; he strives to find the beauty in unremarkable objects. The process is mysterious but surprising in its clarity. He seems to see what’s latent there, before he makes the photograph, and experiments with a wonderful freedom. His images are filled with light. Some compositions beg to be called surrealism, such as “Green Sphere.” I am so pleased to have Michael at Bandon Library Art Gallery for the first time.

The work in the cases harmonizes with Michael’s photograph. A selection of Ken Ayers’ sculptures return to the gallery. These bronzes all started with plant parts, but are not copies of them. Instead, Ken put disparate elements together—a leaf from this plant, a stem from another, seaweed, a pod, some twine, a bulb—to create otherworldly flowers and plants; plants that have more than a touch of the surreal about them. They are unnatural yet graceful, strange yet intriguing, and both familiar and unfamiliar simultaneously. They are beautiful.

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, photo by Michael Miller.

Soirée d’Artiste: Enjoy a “Night Amongst the Stars” at an art gala with musical interludes featuring Matte Hanna. Gourmet appetizers, dessert and wine. Space is limited to 50 guests. The gala opens at 7 p.m., Thursday, June 8.

Soirée Musicale: SIX internationally acclaimed musicians present two chamber music masterpieces by Brahms and Tchaikovsky. A performance you won’t want to miss! The concert starts at 7 p.m., Friday, June 9.

Both events are presented at the Sprague Community Theater. Admission to the Thursday gala is $75. Admission to the Friday concert is $35. Combo pricing for both events is $100. This event is presented by Nicart Gallery. Tickets and more information are available online at NicartGallery.com.

Soirée d’Artiste: Enjoy a “Night Amongst the Stars” at an art gala with musical interludes featuring Matte Hanna. Gourmet appetizers, dessert and wine. Space is limited to 50 guests. The gala opens at 7 p.m., Thursday, June 8.

Soirée Musicale: SIX internationally acclaimed musicians present two chamber music masterpieces by Brahms and Tchaikovsky. A performance you won’t want to miss! The concert starts at 7 p.m., Friday, June 9.

Both events are presented at the Sprague Community Theater. Admission to the Thursday gala is $75. Admission to the Friday concert is $35. Combo pricing for both events is $100. This event is presented by Nicart Gallery. Tickets and more information are available online at NicartGallery.com.

With the piece Oil Tanks, Glassman shot his image on B&W film immediately after the tanks had been painted grey. Using a red filter, he exposed and printed to push the negative’s contrast just enough to create a disorienting image of floating staircases in empty space. Yet what you see is what was really there, just slightly tweaked to create a puzzle that you have to decipher. Come peer through a knothole at what lies beyond, or notice that a seemingly B&W photograph is actually in color. The world is full of mysteries, but it can take an artist who sees from an unusual angle to show it to you. Thomas Glassman is such an artist, and we are pleased to welcome him to Bandon Library Art Gallery.

“The Unaltered Image” will be at Bandon Library Art Gallery until September 30^th 2022.

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 by Thomas Glassman: “Reflections on the Hudson,” “Oil Tanks” 

Enjoy scenes of mountain grandeur, and hear some of Tim’s engaging stories as he takes us on the best among 100 mountain trails featured in his new book, including some great hikes right here on the coast of southern Oregon.

The program will be on March 11 at 7 p.m. at the Bandon Community Center. The public is invited to this free event sponsored by the Cape Arago Audubon Society and the Kalmiopsis Audubon Society.

Tim is the award-winning author of 28 books about the environment, outdoors, and adventure travel, and he speaks to audiences nationwide. He lives in Port Orford. See his work at timpalmer.org.

Artists Reception: Saturday, February 29, 2020, from 3 to 5 p.m. in the Library Sprague Room.

Just as it is easy to take a good photograph of a beautiful woman, so too it is easy to take a good photograph of beautiful scenery such as we have here— in abundance— in Bandon. The ocean just sits there looking gorgeous, and one aims a camera at it; after that, it’s just a matter of the degree of artistry the photographer brings to bear on the scene.

Bandon has many excellent scenic photographers, and we certainly count Susan and Steven Dimock among the very best. But a deep dive into their body of work reveals that they have often gone beyond the seascape and into a more intimate examination of their surroundings. They focus not just on the majesty of a rock, but on the textures in the rock. They pick out the lone and glowing bulb of stranded kelp, or water streaming off a cluster of mussels, or the play of light on a small patch of sand and sea, creating images that are specific and yet abstract. They capture a mood, a moment, something unique and fine. It is an unveiling of the small mysteries that make up the whole of our world.

William Blake urged us “…to see a World in a Grain of Sand and a Heaven in a Wild Flower, Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand, And Eternity in an hour.” With this show the Dimocks offer us a chance to do that, and spur us to make such efforts on our own.

Jane Ujhazi returns to Bandon Library Art Gallery with another collection of her one-of-a-kind necklaces, earrings, and bracelets, made of semi-precious stones, worked metals, and beads. An avid collector of antique and tribal beads, she constructs her pieces to marry the contemporary with the ancient. Inspired always by the natural world and its gifts of beauty, as well as the long tradition of self-decoration that has ever been a part of being human, her work evokes many times and many lands. Jane’s studio is appropriately called Terra Nova— New Land— a place where each piece is a small treasure, a work of art like no other.

The gallery is open during regular library hours, Tuesday through Saturday, at the Bandon Public Library, 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 by Tracy Hodson. Art images “New Life” by Susan Dimock; necklace by Jane Ujhazi.