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214 North Main Street Pendleton, OR 97801 541-278-9201 artscntr@uci.net |
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Admission to our exhibits is always FREE of charge, thanks to Wildhorse Foundation. |
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ABOUT OUR MAIN GALLERY
The East Oregonian Gallery at the Pendleton Center for the Arts is a beautiful space for viewing a wide range of artwork. Funded by the East Oregonian, publisher of the local daily paper since 1875, the gallery is flanked by large windows original to the building, bamboo floor and more than 1800 square feet of display area. Sculpture, paintings, photographs, artist’s books and fiber arts are just a few of the mediums that have been showcased. We invite established artists from outside the area to exhibit as well as local emerging artists. Want your work considered? Get more information here. |
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The Lorenzen Boardroom Gallery is an space that we make available to community members who would like to exhibit their artwork for a four-week period. For more information, call the Arts Center at 541-278-9201
Interested in seeing YOUR artwork at the Center? Get more info here. |
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This website is owned and maintained by the Arts Council of Pendleton and the Pendleton Center for the Arts © 2005 The Arts Council of Pendleton is a 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization established in 1974 This site is generously sponsored by Eastern Oregon Telecom |
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Upcoming Exhibits
April 4 – April 25, 2008 Jean Christofori Howton
May 2 – May 30, 2008 Open Regional Photography Exhibit
June 6 - July 4 Bill Piper, Ed Brannan, Bear Ullman, Claude Birt
July 11 – Aug. 1, 2008 Kat Galloway
Aug 8 – Aug 29 Jeremy Lilwall
Sept. 5 – Oct. 10 Philip Miner
Oct. 17 – Nov. 17 Catherine Lee
Nov. 21 – Dec. 31 Holiday Exhibit - The Art of the Gift
You can view highlights of our past exhibit and read about the artists here.
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Gallery Hours: Tuesday - Friday 10:00 am to 4:00 pm Saturday Noon - 4:00 pm
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Jean Christofori Howton April 4 - April 25, 2008
The 45th parallel runs through the country of France and the state of Oregon, and both are home to Jean Christofori Howton, a painter whose exhibit opens in the East Oregonian Gallery at the Pendleton Center for the Arts on Friday, April 4th.
Howton was raised in Walla Walla and has been making art since she was a kid. Her mother and sisters have been involved in the arts and while some college study provided her with information on the basic structure and materials of painting, she is mainly self-taught. |
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She was able to write well long before she could read and understand what she was writing. She studied drawing and watercolor while attending elementary and middle school. As the family moved frequently with her father’s military career, she became distracted from drawing and watercolor for many years. “After becoming settled into my work in the USA I was able to find a little time to reflect on the dreams I have about my life. I decided, even though I work many hours at a restaurant, I could use some of my free time to live out one of my dreams and become an artist”, said Lee. She bought and read many books about painting with watercolors and started painting. She displayed her paintings in the restaurant and many customers bought them and encouraged her to continue with her dream. She has broadened the scope of her work to include oil paintings and continues to develop her techniques. Many of Lees paintings have been accepted in juried art exhibits in Oregon and Washington and she received the Peoples Choice Award at the annual Hermiston Desert Arts Reception in 2006. “I am very appreciative of my customers, They have purchased my paintings and have taken them all over the USA and some outside the USA. These customers are bringing my dream to life,” said Lee. |
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Apple Lee
April 4 - April 25, 2008 in the Lorenzen Boardroom Gallery
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Her bi-continental lifestyle allows Howton to take advantage of a wide range of exhibition opportunities and the European market has responded very positively to her work. Her travels include a year living near Chernobyl, the site of the world’s worst nuclear power plant accident. That highly emotional experience culminated in an exhibit of paintings that were shown in Kiev. More recently her work was exhibited at the Nicolas Poussen Museum in France.
In the United States she was originally well-known for her representational works of animals and still-life scenes, but about twelve years ago a shift occurred. |
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Howton was raised in Walla Walla and has been making art since she was a kid. Her mother and sisters have been involved in the arts and while some college study provided her with information on the basic structure and materials of painting, she is mainly self-taught.
She travels regularly between her home outside Hermiston and a second home near Normandy, France which she compares to Portland or Seattle.
“If you put some chateaus and some cows in near Portland, it would look pretty much like Normandy”, she says.
She and her partner Pierre are moving their French household to the south of France this year, a place she equates visually with Southern Oregon. |
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“Representational painting was becoming less and less engaging. I had thought originally that it was more of a challenge, but when I started working on abstracts again I came to realize that the true challenge is to abandon any idea of a plan and just let the painting take over.”
Her abstract works are large expressions of rich color that have been compared to the vibrant nature of jazz.
“Ironically, being immersed in the mindset of making abstract paintings has made revisiting the representational works more fun.”
In 2005 her work caught the eye of Rick Small and Darcy Fugman-Small, owners of Woodward Canyon Winery. Since 1992 the winery has created a label as part of their special Artist Series to showcase Washington State Cabernet. Howton’s painting “Stop the Blues” was used for the 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon that will be unveiled May 2 – 4th during the Walla Walla Valley Spring Release Weekend. Howton will be at the winery to sign bottles and prints. Woodward Canyon Winery is located in Lowden, about 13 miles west of Walla Walla, Washington and the tasting room is a restored 1870's farmhouse.
Attendees of the Opening Reception at the Arts Center will enjoy a preview tasting of the wine bearing Howton’s label, thanks to Woodward Canyon Winery.
The exhibit is made possible through the generous support of Coldwell Banker Whitney & Associates.
Jef Farley and the crew at Coldwell Banker have been great to step in and fund this exhibit. We couldn’t support the artists with exhibits of this magnitude without their support |
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This month the Lorenzen Boardroom Gallery at the Pendleton Center for the Arts is hosting an exhibit by Hermiston artist Apple Lee. The exhibit runs from April 4 – 25.
Lee was born in Nan Ning, China and always had a dream of becoming an artist. As a very young girl she used to watch her father do Chinese calligraphy and she practiced copying his work on the tile floor of her house. |