Mapping the Artists' Community

Leigh Knowles Meteer-Visual Artist

Yesterday was a lucky day! I began mapping my travels to visit  Kitsap Peninsula's unofficial, resident artists' community. I plan to visit the studios closest to my home, talk to my friends about their artist's lifestyle, the satisfactions and frustrations of being an artist, the dreams that beckon them to this way of living, and any other philosophical musings they are inclined to share with me. Knowles Studio and Gallery is close to the road, and often  visitors can meet other interesting people who also have dropped by to see what is going on, so I decided to begin my travels at Knowles Studio and Gallery.  

Following the s-curves on the back road out of Suquamish on route to the residential town of Poulsbo on Liberty Bay, Knowles Studio is just five minutes away from my home and always a great place to sit for a cup of tea or coffee with Leigh, the owner, and visit.

This morning is overcast. The sun plays peek-a-boo with the layered clouds, teasing us with a "maybe"promise of showing up this afternoon; a touch of chill necessitates wearing a jacket out-of-doors. After the 85 degree day we all enjoyed last week, this overcast sky invites a downcast attitude. However, not all living things droop under Puget Sound weather, the vegetable gardens of brassica, rhubarb, and early lettuce thrive in it, and hybridized rhododendrons are marvelous, majestic shrubs that tower above us. Incidentally, the Pacific rhododendron is Washington's state flower: "Pacific Rhododendrons are found most abundantly on trails in the eastern Olympic Peninsula and along Hood Canal" which borders Kitsap County on the west.

 Photo by Dave Schiefelbein.


Knowles Studio is open today, but Leigh is looking after other things this morning. I see her across the meadow in her greenhouse, and stroll over to the vegetable garden area for a greeting. The pots are full of plants which have grown another two inches since I stopped by a few weeks ago. She has been hunting for cabbage moth caterpillars which have recently invaded the vegetable garden, but I am a welcomed distraction. We sit down for a cup of Earl Gray tea and a little conversation about traveling and artists.

Leigh has a particular view on reasons that people travel.

"I place traveling in three categories," she says. "There are those who travel for education and learning, others who travel for the romance, by romance I mean there are the history, legends, art and people of a country that travelers want to explore. Then there is entertainment. Some go traveling to enjoy the shopping, the music, the food and drink of a different culture, and they take lots of pictures to share with folks at home." I think to myself that I tend to straddle the first two categories. They are similar in purpose, integrating the intellectual connection and the sensuous one as well.

 "There is a trend, a movement among artists today to travel other places to paint and draw," she notes. It is not the same thing as travel writing, but neither is it simply traveling for the purpose of education, romance, or entertainment. "It is sort of a gypsy life-style," Leigh observes, "because there is a growing segment of artists who move and travel together, taking their art with them, and they essentially live the life of a gypsy, constantly on the move."

In my Rhetorics of Travel Writing class, we read a chapter from a book by James Clifford entitled Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century. In "Traveling Cultures" Clifford used the term "traveling indigenous culture-makers" to describe the work of Bob Brozman in concert with the Moes, a family group who entertained in the states during the early twentieth century with Hawaiian slide guitar and vocals. The group traveled around the United States for over five decades, traveling and sharing Hawaiian music, almost never returning to Hawaii.

This idea of cultural mobility seems to be applicable, or at least a familiar lifestyle among contemporary artists as well. Today we witness a very transient, traveling culture here in the Northwest; the place is on the "go." A travel writer can stay home today and let visitors bring their own cultures when they come to visit. Leigh and Jim, her boat building husband, have people stop by every day at their place. I doubt that constant flow of people would be such a strong current if they did not live off a main road, right at the round-about.

Because Leigh teaches art at her studio as well as producing it, she is often preparing for an event, an art walk, or an exhibit. Such is the schedule today because she must prepare for a local artists' open studio gathering at the middle school. Some of her own students will be working on various projects for the three hour "happening." Her phone rings, and she must get to work loading canvases and various artists' tools in the back of her Subaru.

Robin Weiss-Plein Air Painter

I am not alone for long, however. Robin Weiss, a plein air artist who rents space at Knowles Studio  meanders out onto the wide cement patio to visit with me for a short time. He sits against the rusty iron guard rail around the patio, which has purposely been allowed to rust into reddish-brown, tea cup in hand, painting apron reaching to his knees.

"So, Rob, why do you make art?"

Rob needs not think long about the question. "We are God's image bearers and as such, it is in our nature to create art," he says, "I do what is natural for me to do. I did not always have the opportunity to paint; I worked twenty years installing heat furnaces and raising a son; it was a lot of hard work."

Rob talked about his recent trip to Mexico to give a painting workshop. Bouncing along the pothole roads was exhausting. The ex-pat who rode his horse back and forth to town and around the community had the right idea. Rob and his wife stayed with another plein air artist who is part of an ex-patriot community in Cerritos, Mexico. They enjoyed the "guest room," the living room couch. It was primitive in comparison with their home in the Northwest. His website hosts some of the recent photographs of the paintings and scenes of the area.

"You really enjoy the plein air painting, don't you?"

"I do. It is my favorite way of painting; you get the color of light and feel of the place when you're on location. It is the best discipline to paint from life. Have you heard the term 'extreme sports'?"

"Sure I have."

"There is a growing group of artists who call themselves, 'extreme plein air painters.' Check online and you can see what some of them are doing."

Plein air painting has a rich and vibrant past. Most of us are familiar with the French impressionists, who were by and large plein air artists, but there is a resurgence of this approach to painting now, and the artists involved are creating a microcosm culture of their own, one in which travel is paramount and integral; there is a journey with a departure, adventure, and return as observed by Bantan from Travel Writing: The Self and the World. The journey's record is "written" on canvas, as artists map the geography of remote places, rural places, and urban places, in all seasons and weather, attempting to capture a particular moment in time, a place of significant memory, in the company of other liked-minded people.