Walt Disney Director Ben
Sharpsteen and Calistoga's
Sharpsteen Museum

Jean will be at the gallery for painting demonstrations
on the following dates. Make plans now!

Jean recalls when she was a child, her grandmother would ask, "Jeanie, would you make a picture for me?" Of course Jeanie eagerly agreed and her grandmother displayed her paintings all over the house. Later, Jean's teachers encouraged her more and she came to see herself as a painter. She was always looking at shapes, natural rhythms and colors in the natural world and expressing them in paint. She says, "After a while, I just had to do art, it was part of my life."

Lifted

Today Jean recalls how important encouragement was to her, so she in turn encourages her students that they can do it. Jean believes they too can know the joy of exploring what is around them and "make a picture," just like she did as a child when she was encouraged by her grandmother.

Jean says, "I learned to leave some things unsaid in a painting to let the viewer complete the picture with his or her own experiences."

Hakone Garden Oak, Saratoga

She says, "Representational images spark the interest in the viewer while the abstract involves their experience and interpretation. It always has been my goal to challenge the static image, to paint more of what's going on, both on the surface and below the surface, drawing on people's different levels of consciousness."

When people say they have no artistic talent, Jean refuses to believe them. She has an answer to which she's given considerable thought.

people in one of my classes. I would have the students go from paper to paper, leaving a mark. Then when students return to their paper, they have the challenge of incorporating all eight marks into their painting. They turn it into magical things. One of the paintings in the show began this very way.

Along the way, Jean has learned from some of California Watercolor's best painters, Millard Sheets, Milford Zornes, Robert E. Wood and George Post. As Jean looks toward her artistic future, she says with confidence that she's never felt she's arrived." With wide bright eyes and an unmistakable smile of an adventurous spirit, she confidently says, "I'm always striving for that 'next,' whatever that next is."

In 2000, Jean’s daughter Wendy asked Jean to create some African animal pictures to decorate the nursery for Jean’s newly born grandson. Jean created eight African animals. Wendy thought they were so good, she wanted to share them. She made a series of 1000 numbered off-set prints on acid free paper which Jean signed.

Jean is now making these prints available through Bodega Bay Heritage Gallery.

Individual prints are $35.00
The full series of 8 are offered at $200.00.

In California, Grace exhibited widely including exhibitions at the California State Fair and the California Palace of the Legion of Honor. Today, her works hang in the Sonoma County Museum, the Sonoma County Courthouse and Santa Rosa City Hall. Grace sold many of her paintings through Berkeley's Claremont Hotel, Gump's in San Francisco and the Kanst Gallery in Los Angeles.

Grace's artistic talent was evident when she was a child. To build on that talent, Grace's parents sent her to far off San Francisco to attend the Cogswell Polytechnic College where she studied under Bohemian Club painter Lorenzo P. Latimer. It should be noted here that Grace's parents had an amazing philosophy of raising their three daughters. Grace, the oldest, followed her passions in art. Her younger sisters Alice and Nell were encouraged to follow their talents as well.

Alice became a protector of natural treasures and today would be called an environmentalist. She worked hard to preserve Griffith Woods just north of Sebastopol from a threat from the University of California which wanted to remove the redwoods to dig up mastodon bones discovered underneath them.

Nell became a poet producing five books of poetry and was published in many magazines including Good Housekeeping, Better Homes and Gardens and Reader's Digest. Her poem "A Blood Donor's Prayer," was reprinted all over the world and included in Eleanor Roosevelt's syndicated column.

Grace painted what she knew best, stylized pastoral landscapes of Sonoma and Marin Counties. Her father Nathaniel was good friends with Luther Burbank. Luther enlisted Grace's artistic talents to record some of his hybrids.

Although she worked in oil from time to time, her primary expression was through soft and sensitive watercolors, capturing the mood and harmonic colors of the land she loved.

Just after World War I ended, Grace and her sister Alice maintained an artist studio in Honolulu. Grace's watercolor style and technique worked wonderfully with island scenes. Local critics in the islands called her "the wizard of watercolor." The same sensitivity she used to capture Sonoma County's sheep grazing amid old stands of mossy-covered oaks was now capturing old Hawaii's landscape, its sea vistas, its plant life and its colorful people at work.

Bodega Bay Heritage Gallery's collection of Grace Allison Griffith paintings will be on exhibit through August. Stop in and get know one of Sonoma County's best historic artists and make one of her works part of your treasured collection.

Interior of the Sharpsteen Museum in Calistoga, a step into California's past with pioneering animator Ben Sharpsteen (1895-1980) as your guide.
Ben directed 31 films for Walt Disney between 1920-1980. He created this Museum to tell the story of Calistoga and the Upper Napa Valley.

Ben was one of Walt Disney's closest advisors and directors. He joined Disney Studios in 1929 and was central to the production of both animated and live action films. Among his distinguished long list of directorial credits include Dumbo, Fantasia and Pinocchio. Over his Disney career, he directed 31 films

After graduating from U.C. Davis with a degree in agriculture, Ben enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1917. After WWI, Ben worked for the Hearst International Film Service where he worked on the early animated series, Happy Hooligan. From there, he worked for Paramount, Jefferson Films and Max Fleischer Studio in New York. Then, a good friend suggested he approach Walt Disney Studios

Our Gallery Hours are from 12:00 P.M. to 4:00 P.M., Wednesday through Sunday. We are also available for scheduled appointments, especially for those who wish to view the gallery on Mondays or Tuesdays. Please call Dan at the gallery and schedule a visit, or call him on his cellphone, 510-414-9821

Last month, we told you about a mention in Matier and Ross's column in the SF Chronicle that San Francisco was offering George Lucas some prime real estate across from Piers 30 - 32 just south of the Bay Bridge for his museum of illustrative arts. On Tuesday, June 24, Lucas announced plans to locate his museum in Chicago. Previously, we supported Lucas's hopes of locating his museum in the Presidio.

We are saddened by this announcement in as far as San Francisco is concerned. Had it come to pass that the Lucas Museum would share the Presidio with The Walt Disney Family Museum, it would have been a world class attraction. We congratulate Chicago and will include plans to visit the Lucas Museum on our next trip to the Art Institute of Chicago.

Dan's I-Phone video of pelicans and dolphins sharing a feeding frenzy on Doran Beach in Bodega Bay.

When Dan isn't at the gallery, he can often be found walking the shores of Doran Beach, a place he likes to call his personal gym. Last month, we wrote about his pelican rescue. Word is our pelican has now been released. This month, we wish to share a rare sighting of dolphins. This past month, Dan noticed some pelicans diving and a dolphin would jump just as the pelicans hit the water. He suspects the pelicans spotted the dolphins herding fish and feeding. As the fish approached the surface, the pelicans would dive just as the dolphin broke the surface to take his share.

IN DUNCANS MILLS Quercia Gallery
Impressions in Wax -- Encaustic Paintings
by Kathy Knebel -- through August
Hours: 11am-5pm, Thur - Mon (707) 865-0243
http://www.quercia-gallery.com | Back to the Top

IN PETALUMA Vintage Bank Antiques
Vintage Bank Antiques is located in Historic Downtown Petaluma, corner of Western Avenue and Petaluma Blvd. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Warren Davis and the rest of the team at Vintage Bank Antiques has assembled a spectacular inventory of paintings. From the 18th Century to Contemporary Artists. We have paintings to suit every price point and collector level.
If you have a painting for sale, please consider Vintage Bank Antiques. Contact Warren Davis directly at WarrenDavisPaintings@yahoo.com, 101 Petaluma Blvd. North, Petaluma, CA 94952, ph: 707.769.3097
http://vintagebankantiques.com | Back to the Top

Bolinas
Bolinas Museum
featuring their permanent collection,
including Ludmilla and Thadeus Welch,
Arthur William Best, Jack Wisby,
Russell Chatham, Alfred Farnsworth.

Pasadena
The Huntington Library
American Art Collection
Paintings by John Singer Sargent,
Edward Hopper, Robert Henri,
Albert Bierstadt, Thomas Moran,
William Keith, Mary Cassatt,
Thomas Hart Benton and many more.