VCA joins ‘Remembrance Project’

This week, portraits of civil rights leaders Fred Hampton, Bayard Rustin and Ida B. Wells were installed in the large, tall windows of the atrium of Vashon Center for the Arts. The portraits, by West McLean, are part of the Vashon Remembrance Project, which has also been responsible for the installation of more than a dozen other large portraits placed in business and shop windows on Vashon. According to the project’s website, the Remembrance Project aims to “memorialize through interactive art and reflection historically marginalized peoples, heroes of social justice and civil rights, and individuals who have lost their lives to tyranny, and develop and share educational materials on historically accurate and under-learned events to combat forgetting.” For more information, and to read about the lives of Hamptom, Rustin and Wells, visit vashonremembers.org.

Summer Arts Fest adds new shows

The latest opening reception for Summer Arts Fest exhibitions will take place from 6 to 8:30 p.m., Friday, Aug. 7, at Vashon Center for the Arts. This opening will feature new work in the ongoing rotation at the visual arts fest, including a group exhibit by 21 members of Vashon’s clay community, plus exhibits of Lyle Harris’ hand-carved wood vessels and Elaine Summers’ mosaic pieces. These new exhibits will join other 2-D shows that opened a couple of weeks ago at the arts fest.

Some of the artists in the clay exhibit have lived on Vashon for decades, while others are new to the island and their craft. The show contains examples of earthenware, stoneware and porcelain, and several different firing and glazing techniques. Artists include Christine Beck, Sonja Bergstroem, David Blad, Abraham McBride, Mary Lynn Buss, Jane Neubauer, April Dalinis, Lisa DeFaccio, Karen Fevold, Lin Holley, Mary Hosick, Liz Lewis, Gale Lurie, Greg McElroy, Eric Nelsen, Irene Otis, Jon-Eric Schafer, Carolina Silva, Mary L Robinson, Marla Smith, and Barbara Wells.

“The Frog Prince,” by Elaine Summers, will be on view at VCA’s Summer Arts Fest (Courtesy Photo).

Lyle Harris’s collection of “Sacred Vessels” includes vases made from wormwood found on Vashon beaches as well as pieces made from old growth cedar and giant Black Walnut. Elaine Summers’s mosaic works have bases of fiberglass, concrete, glass or porcelain, covered with porcelain or Italian glass tiles. The works on view at VCA include vases, pet bowls, and ukuleles.

Gallery hours are 12 to 4 p.m. Thursday through Saturday and 4 to 7 p.m. Thursday, by appointment only. Safety protocols include mandatory masks, limits on crowd size and physical distance. VCA’s restrooms are closed to the public. For more information, visit vashoncenterforthearts.org.

VALISE opens again for First Friday

VALISE Gallery will be open from 6 to 9 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 7, for its first gallery cruise reception in months. Works by a member of the gallery’s artist collective, Lenard Yen, will be on display. Yen’s show, “Gradients, Inflections, Palindromes,” will be on view, filled with work he described as“color abstractions that are both full of motion and also meditative views of stillness and explorations into expressing light in vivid form.”

Yen’s opening will be VALISE’s first foray into in-person viewing since COVID-19 safety measures began in late February. Protocols will include mandatory mask-wearing and limiting groups to less than five. In addition, VALISE will be open from 1 to 5 p.m. on Saturdays, and by appointment. Sign-ups can be made for this show by sending an e-mail to lenard@lenardyen.com.

Tune in for shows at VCA

At 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 6, Vashon Center for the Arts will broadcast a world premiere dramatic reading of the new play by Yussef El Guindi, “Hotter Than Egypt,” at vashoncenterforthearts.org. The play tells the stories of an American couple on a vacation in Egypt and the locals who are their tour guides. For more information, visit vashoncenterforthearts.org.

At 2 p.m. Friday, Aug. 7, Vashon Live will roll into the VCA atrium to debut Vashon ARTworks Video Magazine, a new live-stream creation that highlights VCA’s Summer Arts Fest and other island arts happenings. The show will broadcast live from VCA on the Facebook pages of Vashon Live, Vashon Events and VCA. Guests will include Kevin Joyce, Lynann Politte, Allison Shirk and Pete Welch (of Vashon Events), and Sarah Howard (of Vashon Live). Visual artists Bennett Hu, Vladimir Luna and Renee Marceau will be interviewed, while Danny Newcomb and Erin Rubin will contribute music to the show.