The dimensions are 46.5″ x 24″. It is done in oil on canvas. It is now safely in our collection in Sacramento. On the back it clearly states that it was painted in Copenhagen (København). One thing very special about King’s work is that he always wanted the hands to be doing something rather than just being there. In this detail, we can see that he has taken the opportunity to present the hands performing a complex task.
There is a lushness in the depiction of the head with its full hair and quiet concentration of the work of the hands.
The shoes add a touch of casualness to the tableau.
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One of the larger pieces in our collection is by Gale Hart. It is titled Forced To Wear Makeup.
The premise is that rabbits are harmed by cosmetic companies that use them to test the allergic reaction to cosmetics. It is on stretched canvas 41 inches by 71 inches. It appears to be done in acrylic.
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Gary Viviano
Recently added to our collection is another work by Gary Viviano. It was acquired from the Dolores Dietler Collection.
The piece is mixed media on wood, and is 23 1/2 inches in diameter.
The first piece by Viviano was acquired in 1988. It is titled The Real Fun Doesn’t Start Until th Wee Hours of the Morning.
This is a mixed media drawing on paper and measures 30 inches by 40 inches. The image turned out fairly well considering that it is framed with a glass cover. The picture was taken outside in full sunlight, but on a cloudy day. The work was recently re-framed or, more specifically, the frame was taken apart and reassembled minus a moth that had hatched in side the sealed frame and crawled into roughly the middle of the picture before dying.
There are a number of interesting elements in the structure of the work. Two men are standing on a see-saw device while two nude women sit on their shoulders and wrestle with each other. A “referee” sits on a tall chair in the background. A man is emerging through a hole in the floor carrying a shovel … his head may be seen just to the left of the man in light-colored shorts. A tree branch is in the room upon which hangs a gym sock. Some poor fellow sits on the sofa chair covering his eyes so as to not see.
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Annie Murphy-Robinson
We have just acquired a sanded charcoal drawing by Annie Murphy-Robinson. It is of here daughter Emily and is titled Trophy.
Its dimensions are 29″ by 42″, unframed. =====================================================
Gillian Hodges
These nine ceramic slab masks were acquired from Beth Jones at the Jennifer Pauls Gallery when it was on 10th Street between J and K Streets.
They have hung, stretched out in a line, over the window in the master bedroom. Gillian taught at Sierra College, Nevada County Campus in Grass Valley, CA. There is an outdoor sculpture garden at that campus, named in her honor.
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Adit (Edith) Pank
This work was acquired from a dealer in Israel in late 2009. Adit Pank has a successful career illustrating children’s book. In the 1970s she was a protégé of Raymond Rowley King. A painting by King was our first acquisition. ==================================================
Raymond Rowley King
An article about King may be found here: http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1948&dat=19641018&id=Mf8tAAAAIBAJ&sjid=E4AFAAAAIBAJ&pg=2692,3097055and is reproduced here.
SAN FRANCISCO –AP—The Modesto Bee – Oct 18, 1964
Raymond Rowley King, who became an artist and sold $24,000 worth of works while in prison, has fled to Sweden in violation of his parole.
But officials say it is unlikely they will seek extradition of King, 37, who served three and one half years on a narcotics conviction before being paroled a little more than a month ago.
John J. Cullen, head of the parole division, said the artist obtained a passport.Parole and police records are not checked before a passport is issued, Cullen said, and Sweden lacks a visa requirement.
King disappeared soon after he opened a studio in San Francisco.Some critics said his oils show near genius.He learned to paint in the California Medical Facility near Vacaville, Solano County.
King was the key organizer among the prisoners in the establishment of art shows which have attracted nationwide publicity to the medical facility.There is at least one inaccuracy in the article. According to Victor Heady, King had attended the Chouinard School of Art in Glendale prior to his conviction. He had entered that college because he thought it would be a good way to meet girls. Heady also told me that King’s parole officer had advised him to leave the country because he was going to get a parole violation for being “dirty” … using heroin. Our first painting by Raymond Rowley King was purchased in 1963 from the Barrios Gallery in Sacramento. Benny Barrios had purchased it from an art sale at Vacaville Medical Facility. This one is 40″ high by 48″ wide and is done in oil on ¼” tempered Masonite. It is a depiction of a restaurant on pilings at the edge of a bay. It consists of a shed built on to an old street car.
A man stands at the back and is throwing a tub of dishwater out into the bay. Fog is whisping by, represented by cobalt-umber-gray scumbles.
The end window identifies the structure as a streetcar. Note the neon sign in upper left corner. It is seen from the back side.
As with many of the paintings of Raymond Rowley King, you can study this work for months and suddenly discover something that you had not perceived before. By chance, I discovered that a small resale gallery in The City had another oil painting by King. This would have been some time in the 1990s. After a bit of argy-bargy, I was able to bring home a second work titled “The Opportunist.
The work has a lot of the dark tones of the one of the restaurant on pilings. There are scumbles of fog moving past. I have described the subject as a cargo vessel, but now that I have looked at it again, it has some of the characteristics of a trawler. The oil painting measures 45½ x 8½ inches on Masonite and is set forward on a frame of rough wood. There are three known works using the subject matter of an old-fashioned country doctor making a house call in a horse drawn buggy. This one is 48½ x 48½ inches oil on canvas.
In the painting we see a powerful horse controlled by the driver in a tall hat. Ray liked to wear tall hats. In at least three paintings on the subject a man in a tall hat is controlling (a) horse. The word “horse” has sometimes been used to mean heroin. There is a picture of Raymond Rowley King at work on a painting.
It must be from some newspaper article of the time … around 1963. Ray would have been in prison at that time. Another picture of Raymond, with his wife at the time, Happy” was given to me by Ray’s second wife, Ebba.
I am most appreciative of the glimpse in to his life in Israel. Among the more recently acquire works are two scenes that are of a nautical theme. Sea Poem was acquired from an auction in Oakland, California. The title contains an obscure reference.
Sea Poem is a rather large piece at around five and one half feet square. It is parenthtically titled the “Osaka Maru”. The subject is the half submerged hulk of a ship. There were a number of ships named Osaka Maru. One of them carried iron ore for Japan’s war effort plus several hundred prisoners of war who were forced to work for Japan during World War II. A fuller story may be found here: http://www.opendiary.com/entryview.asp?authorcode=D661851&entry=10018&mode=date A second work along the same lines is “Sand Spit”.
This work is only slightly small that Sea Poem and was purchased in the same year. One of the most difficult purchases was an item offerred up at auction in South Africa. It was barely 36″ x 36″ and done on canvas. It had been painted early on in Sweden and the subject matter was a trio of “hippies”, if you will. The auction house owner was willing to accepte the money, but wanted no part in moving it out of that country to California. It was a challenge that I accepted. After winning the piece at auction and paying for it, I went to blogspot and found someone who was willing to go to the auction house to pick up the painting, then remove it from its stretcher bars, roll it up and ship it to me on my corporations FedEx account. To pay him for his efforts it was necessary to transfer money to the PayPal account of a friend of his from England who would reimburse him. That worked out alright. Once the painting arrived, I inquired of FedEx as to the charges so that I could pay for them my self (so as to not pierce the corporate veil, you understand). No charge from FedEx was ever forthcoming. I have received one or two works through the auspices of eBay, and I shall present them here.
This was up at auction in Denmark and I was outbid for it. It subsequently appeared on Ebay. It was sold to me for a higher price, but not too princely a sum. I find it to be quite exquisite. I was contacted by someone in Ohio whose father or uncle had been something like a step-brother to Ray … something like that. I purchased from him four smaller works. One was of Don Quixote and his sidekick (or squire) Sancho Panza , both astride horses.
There is a brick wall behind Don Quixote and there are irregular sheets of red, white and blue through which we see the brick. Sancho has a slight resemblance to Ray himself. Perhaps the elder Don was modeled after Ray’s grandfather. It is approximately 36″ high and 14″ wide. Texture paint gives a three dimensional feeling to the work, especially in the lower half. Oddly, the work is painted on a piece of corrugated cardboard that is about one inch thick.”
In a detail of the lower portion, we see a rather whimsical horse with its head resting on the pavement. Pancho’s steed appears to be a donkey.
An image of an old man painted by Ray has been identified by someone who knew them both as being of his grandfather.
This portrait is done with heavily impastoed oil on a canvasboard measuring 12 inches by 16 inches. It has been commented that the look of the man is stern, as if to say, “Ray, you have strayed from the path. An additional early work is of two bottles and is done on thick, heavily wrinkled paper stock of the kind used on drawing pads. I am not certain as to the type of paint is used. The density of the pigment gives the paint an opacity not often found in watercolors.
This unframed painting is irregular and roughly 8 inches by 12 inches. Taped to the back is a note that reads: I offer you an old port wine bottle & a Gilbey’s gin. Or possibly Vermouth - Martinis? An email arrived one day from Johannesburg, South Africa. It was from an estate auctioneer who had one of Ray’s works for sale. We agreed a price and I was able to get the money to him using a cashier’s cheque in SA money and FedEx, but there it sat. The dealer had said that he wanted no part or responsibility in shipping it to me. Finally, I contacted someone on a blogspot service in Joburg who was willing to go to the auction house, remove the painting from its frame, roll it up and send it to me via FedEx charging it to my account. Paying him for his efforts involved sending money through PayPal to a friend of his who would be visiting from England. Had I consulted someone here about the process, they would have told me to roll it no tighter than a six inch diameter. It arrived with a visible crease on the right side. Also, I never got a bill from FedEx. The title of the piece is Hair. It is oil on canvas, is 36″ x 36″ and was done in Malmö, Sweden in the late 1960s or early 1970s judging by its subject matter … three hippies.
From the same source comes a piece titled Star of the Show. Of course, the star is Ray Himself.
In a detail from this work, you may see a resemblance between this self-portrait and the image of Sancho Panza.
A Portrait of a Delightful and Charming Lady. This small “cameo style” work is done with oil on Masonite, cut in an 9-1/2″ x 11″ oval and sanded down along the edge. It was done in 1974 in Yaffo (Jaffo), which is now a part of Tel Aviv in Israel.
Ray liked to decorate with keys. He would hang them by bits of cord on nails stuck in the wall. On the lower left of the photo above, you can see a rectangular tab coming in from the edge. This is actually a finely made L-shaped piece of wood with both parts of the “L” being the same length. There are eight of them … two on each corner holding together the dark wood frame, which is 1/2″ wide and 3″ deep . It was a very precise fit when it was constructed. When the painting is hung on the wall, the key is embedded on the right hand vertical side near the bottom. I have received word that the Delightful and Charming Lady, who is the subject, was Jane Krivine. Her father collected other painings by Ray and had commissioned this portrait, but did not like the finished product.
Just in from Atlanta, Georgia, is the Sweetest Thing in Town. The dimensions are 48 inches high by 36 wide and it is painted to look like a torn and wrinkled poster of the kind that would be sloppily pasted on to the side of a building or fence. Dated September of 1963, this would have been painted while Ray was still confined to Vacaville Medical Facility. As with many works of that period, it is painted in oil on 1/4 inch tempered Masonite.
This was also painted in September of 1963. On February 14 of that year, Ray completed this large work, a cityscape titled A San Fransisco Tapestry. The dimensions are 47″ x 47″. It is not only painted on canvas, but a second layer of canvas of matching size, but with an irregular section torn out of it has been glued to the main canvas to give a layer of texture to the painting.
To illustrate the second layer of canvas with the large section missing, here is an image with a white line indicating approximately were the second layer has been cut away to expose the first layer.
Written on the back, as a subtext, are the words, “Height * Ashbury District”. (Ray would have known how to spell “Haight”.) There is some little story that came with the work. Ray, who was still in Vacaville Medical Facility at the time, is said to have explained that it represented his imagination of what the world looked like outside of the prison walls. San Francisco is rather densely packed visually with one building butted up against the next so that lightwells running vertically between the buildings is the only thing that breaks up the gloom inside. Yet, in this piece, the elements are isolated and uncluttered by other competing elements. Buildings stand alone or in pairs to demonstrate the contrast in architecture and mood. That some structures appear high above others is a way of indicating the terrain of The City. In the lower right corner there appears to be a store or perhaps a restaurant that remains open in the nighttime, its internal lights reflected on the wet pavement. Above the store, there is a light in a window.
In the upper right there is, in the background, a single Victorian house and, to the right of that, the roof of a commercial building upon which is a water tank.
Finally, two details of the left side of the painting with a block of added canvas to which varnish has been applied. This is in contrast to the umber staining in the background.
The two elements, which are partially highlighted by varnish on the first layer of canvas, appear also to be houses of a kind numerous in San Francisco … tall, slender and with pipes and chimneys shown on rooftops and odd bits of architecture sticking up to the sky, as is evident on the house on the left. The slant-sided structure on the rooftop has decorative iron grillwork across the highest horizontal surface … the kind with sharpened iron spikes pointing upward.
Atop the house on the right is a Mansard-shaped skylight and some chimneys. A slender Victorian house seems to be growing out of its roof. It has been raining and light bounces off of the street reflecting, in the lower-right-detail, the lights of the store. One is tempted to step in out of the rain and purchase some fresh apricots, a large chocolate chip cookie and a bottle of German wine: a Zeller Schwarze Katze or perhaps a Niersteiner Domthal, or, if it is an eatery, to have some latenight chop suey. Is that a cat in the lower left … or just a reflection? The left and rignt sides are formed by slashes of white where the first layer of canvas is exposed. Its “ears” are white paint on the rolled over back side of the second layer of canvas. The tone of this work had been echoed in pieces painted by one of his two protégés, Joseph Ullery. Certain elements of style were used early on by the other, the late Victor Heady. Additional works by Raymond Rowley King may be seen at this Open Diary: http://www.opendiary.com/entrylist.asp?authorcode=D661851&mode=dateIf there are any questions about this artist or if you have any further information, you may contact us at collectedartworks(AT)hotmail(DOT)com. =====================================================
Ted Yasuda
Late in 1963 or early 1964, I came across an art gallery in Stockton named Harlequin House Gallery and was run by an artist named Maxine Dalben. It was there that I acquire a second painting. It was an oil on canvas, 24″ x 12″ done by Ted Yasuda and is titled Division III.
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Maxine DalBen
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Maxine Dalben Dec. 29, 1920 – Mar. 3, 2011 Age 90, of Stockton.
Sutter Street Memorial Chapel. 209-464-2214
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Years later, I was in Stockton by chance and found that the gallery was still there and that Maxine DalBen was still alive. She had a number of very good paintings store above the gallery, which, in the main, served as an instructional area for weaving and contained several looms. Maxine DalBen was living in the area of Stockton during the winter of 1955 to 1956. That was a year of horrendous rain and potential flooding. Levees broke on the Feather River in the area of Yuba City. The Feather River is a tributary to the Sacramento River and exits the mountains just north of Oroville. Flooding occured throughout the delta area around both the Sacramento and San Joaquin areas. Ironically, Folsom Dam had only recently been finished and held back the waters of another tributary to the Sacramento River, the American River. Had the dam not been there, much more flooding would have occured. This piece is titled Delta Flood 1955 – 1956.
This work is one of the smaller pieces in the Delta Series. It is oil on canvas, 40″ x 30″ of a farm house near Stockton stranded by the flood waters. This work was created with an experimental technique. The artist made a reverse drawing of the farmhouse, trees and fencing on a hard surface such as masonite. She then applied a wash of grays, blues and browns onto the canvas and kept the surface ‘wet’ with a medium such as turpentine. Then she pressed the canvas against the drawing to transfer the ‘print’ onto the canvas. There was a period of years during which Maxine DalBen lived and worked in the small Sierra community of Amador City. As you head south on old, historic Highway 49 from Placerville (once known as Hangtown and before that, Old Dry Diggins) you join Highway 16 out of Sacramento and continue on a winding mountain course, cross a bridge over Rancheria Creek then, rounding a curve to the left, you drop down into Amador City. (Now you have to make a special effort to go to Amador City because of a new by-pass.) When the old highway turns to the right, you go straight instead past the Post Office and up a slight hill. At School Street, you turn left on to East School Street and motor up hill past the old school house to Church Street. It is there, at that northwest corner, that the old Battaglia House stands. From School Street walking north on Church you pass a vine covered wall made of flat stones from local soil. The are colorful in ways that make the viewer of the canvas think that artistic liberties have been taken. It is not true. All the colors are there, but now they are hidden under vegetation. In fact, when we first went to take a look, there was an ugly motorhome blocking the view.
Oil on canvas, 60″ x 24″, circa 1967. Here is a photo of what the wall looks like today.
To the left of the house there is still some exposed rock wall. Compare the colors of the rocks in the photo with colors of the rock wall in the painting.
Many similar rocks may be found along Rancheria Creek. Maxine and a few other painters would hike from Amador City down to the creek along an old trail that once served as a short cut to another settlement now long gone. There was a meadow along the creek where they liked to paint. Unfortunately is was inhabited by rattlesnakes. One imagines several artists walking along an overgrown trail wearing tall leather boots to guard against bites. It was in this setting that these four painting were created. I will work in future toward better color correction on the reproductions. These were shot in shade, so the illumination was the blue sky. 
Though I have said that these were all done on Rancheria Creek, that is an error that I made in the presentation of these four. They are all oil on canvas utilizing a similar pallette and all four measure 16″ x 12″ and all were done in the 1970s, but one of them was actually painted in the city limits of Amador City, California. The steps shown in the third painting lead up to St. Joseph’s Catholic Church. “The church was built probably in the 1870s and I think was used until WWII. When the population of Amador City shrunk to only 202 people, the parishoners in A. C. were taken in at Sutter Creek nearby and the church was left empty.”, communication from artist dated 4/6/05. Maxine did like to experiment with different techniques. Her variation on collage was to apply paint to large sheets of rice paper allowing them to dry Each sheet was in a different color within the pallet range that she wanted, however the application of paint was not uniform. When forming the image on canvas from a live model, she would tear off pieces of the various colors of paper and glue them in place. The earliest of these was a reclining nude here shown enlarge for detail. The work is 48 inches by 24 inches and was photographed from an oblique angle to eliminate glare.
Another, somewhat older model presents a pleasant posterior view. This work is also 24 inches by 48 inches. Done in 1975, the actual title is Danae and on the back the inscription on the frame reads, “Once I stood and felt the golden shower. Now I am chilled without it.” Done on Masonite.
The largest piece in this collection is of Diana the Hunter. The same model is used who posed for the Reclining Nude.
The dimensions of this work are 48 inches by 72 inches. Below is the face in detail.
This is a depiction of a tranquil little stream. I believe that it is also on Rancheria Creek. The measuremens are 24 inches by 48 inches. and is oil on canvas. Once again, this was photographed outside in the shade so that the illumination is from the blue of the sky.
This last oil painting, titled Road to Volcano, is difficult to photgraph in that it looks very differently depending on the lighting. This shot of it was taken with the painting facing the sun on a slightly overcast day. The dimensions are 40″ by 30″.
If there are any questions about this artist or if you have any further information, you may contact us at collectedartworks(AT)hotmail(DOT)com. ———————————————————————————————–
Eugene Garin
Around the same time that I had visited the Harlequin House Gallery, I knew an artist named Victor Heady. He had learned some of Raymond King’s techniques while the two were “in the Joint”. I had met him when I worked in an art gallery in Sacramento in late 1963 and found that he had started his own gallery out on Fulton Avenue. I mentioned that I could put him in touch with a painter who did some rather popular seascapes. Later, through Victor, I was able to assist my mother in purchasing one of those seascapes through Victor. It is by that process that she acquired, and upon her passing, I gained, a painting by Eugene Garin.
Victor went to visit Eugene Garin in his studio in Bryte over in Yolo County. Eugene showed him that he had a series of scrolls that he coul pull down from hangars on the ceiling. On each scroll were paintings of various elements used in his paintings … a rock jutting up out of the sand; a bit of shoreline, waves, boats. He was able to use a pantograph to transfer the images on to a canvas using a pencil. Once the layout was complete, he would add paint, including his “luminous waves”. Garin had come to this country from somewhere in Russia. He worked, at that time, as a janitor for Montgomery-Wards. He had managed to get them to offer his paintings for sale along the basement hallway leading to where the payments were made on revolving charge accounts. Over time he had sold many paintings, all with the same 24″ by 48″ canvas, and all of them appearing to be rather similar in composition. I had mentioned this to Victor. He took it up with Eugene and encouraged him to put more variety into his creative output. Soon the scenes began to become more variable. Different ships were added. Large and sometimes more rocks were depicted on the shore. Larger canvases were sometimes offered He began to sell more and the prices rose. Eventually, he was able to quit his janitorial job and paint full time. After a while he moved to Carmel.
Victor Heady
I do have two of Victor’s smaller works, acquired recently. The first one is of a single house of Victorian style standing by itself. This is on canvas about 9″ by 10′.
The second is also of a Victorian-era house titled Victorian Cityscape. This one is shown at night and has a full moon in the background. There are other structures nearby. It is 12″ x 9″ on 1/4″ Masonite. 
These two paintings represent Victor’s early attempts at painting using a narrow band of skills learned in prison from other inmates at Vacaville Medical Facility. There were a few patrons who were sympathetic toward him and purchased his works as a means to encourage him. Eventually, as a result of that encouragement, Victor attended the University of California at Davis and earned a degree in Fine Art. He moved to Southern California and set up a studio in San Miguel, Mexico. His palette brightened away from the dreary and depressing umbers and greys, and move into yellows, ochres and blues as he painted the city scenes in Mexico.
In October of 2011, I was able to acquire an additional nine paintings by Victor. I will present them on a separate page dedicated to his work, rather than to make this page a great deal longer.
Victor Heady died on May 7, 2008 after a long battle with cancer. If there are any questions about this artist or if you have any further information, you may contact us at collectedartworks(AT)hotmail(DOT)com. ==================================================
Ken Waterstreet
Ken Waterstreet has a refreshing approach to painting. He is never one to take the world of Art too seriously. He likes to play with the notion of what art should be. This painting is as good an example as I have seen.
In this 55″ x 41″ acrylic on canvas titled Excursion VI from 1983, we see six of his students who have accompanied him on a field trip, probably to San Francisco. There is a bit of mischief associated with posed group pictures of students … but there is more. At first glance, it seems that someone has taped a child’s fingerpaint picture on to the canvas. In fact it is only the two pieces of tape that are not a part of the painting.
The dangling legs of the two colorful “fingerpaint” characters dangle below in shadow for. Another “fingerpaint” character looks at us from the rearview mirror.
Similar faces in textured black paint laugh at us from the darkend windows in the background.
Students in painting are (from left to right) Norm Anderson, Sean Minot, Bryan Borovec, Alex McNiell, Kathy Harp and Diana Buselli. Other works by Ken Waterstreet may be seen at: http://www.manevolves.com/ken-waterstreet/ ==================================================
Joseph Craven
Two mixed-media works painted by the mandolin player Joe Craven in 1987 supply a contrast. Both are 32″ x 40″. The first is a depiction of a woman who seems to find style in cacophony. The various elements of style include lipstick, gauntlet gloves depicting serpents, a Saudi headband with white cloth to shelter the neck, sunglasses, a native breastbone ornament and a pink tutu. There is an inserted postcard of a woman dressed up to play the part in the two-act opera La fille du régiment by Gaetano Donizetti. She salutes near an American flag. Perhaps it represents the eternal search, on the part of many women, for style, and for the acceptance of their “tastes”.
The second piece is not of a kind with the first. The title of this second work of the same size by Joseph Craven is The Discovery of Beauty. This work can bring about moments of confusion. The inserted postcard shows six women carring tall baskets on their heads whil dressed in full burkhas. (It bears the inscription, “Luxor. A group of Native Women.” (sic)). There are design elements on the sides that suggest Native American culture. That is echoed in the bead-work that covers her eyes. There is something like a “shadow” of the beads on her forehead and “something streaks from near her eyes and across her cheeks past her bright red lipstick. While the visual symbolism may remain obscure, a verbal message does not. There can be great pain and sorrow in the discovery that you have “beauty”, for that at once attracts when present and in its full, but can repel when age begins to take its toll upon that beauty. It has been suggested that the model for this series of paintings may have been a man.
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Susan Keizer
Who Would Have Guessed It by Susan Keizer is from 1987 and is of acrylic on canvas, (83″ x 59″).
Susan described the works in this series as having been imaginings of the prow of a ship cutting through water. In our home, this painting hangs on a wall painted tomato red. Susan Keizer’s works may be seen at: http://susankeizer.com/ ==================================================
John Tarahteeff
This piece by John Tarahteeff is 20″ wide by 22″ high. It is acrylic on canvas and was painted in 2003.
This one was labelled 2/100, meaning that it was the second print struck from the wood block. At the art gallery, a clerk explained that the artist was keeping his options open as to what the final product would be … in the 3rd or the 47th or the 100th iteration. I have mentioned this concept to other artists and one or two of them were “shocked” at this revelation. It was the intention of the atrist to vary the outcomes of the printing process with-in the same series. Some small part of the linoleum might be altered, or the colors might be changed. The outrage on the part of those others that the artist would do such a thing seemed odd at the time. For my part, I would like to see how subsequent prints turned out. The print is 14½” x 11¼”. It was these three works that were the beginning of a resumption of the collection of art works after almost a ¼ century drought. If anyone can identify these three Canadian artists, you may contact us at collectedartworks(AT)hotmail(DOT)com. I would appreciate the information. ==================================================
R. Babcock
On some occasions, a good piece can be found in an odd place. One of the works by Victor Heady had been picked up at a yard sale in Sacramento. On one weekend, I went to the Concord Flea Market with a friend. He was looking for tools and electronic parts. I was just looking for things that were unusual. This piece signed, “R. Babcock” caught my eye.
It measures 13-1/2 x 16-1/2″, without the matting. The medium appears to be ink with either water color or some sort of pastel marking pen. The subject appears to be involved in some sort of bondage scenario. Here is a detail of the head.
If anyone can identify the artist, you may contact us at collectedartworks(AT)hotmail(DOT)com. I would appreciate the information. ==================================================
Frankie Hansbearry
This piece, titled “Rooted” was picked up on bid at the Bra Show at Forty Acres Gallery in Oak Park, Sacramento. It is a ceramic piece by Frankie Hansbearry.
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Milton 510 Bowens
We acquired this piece in silent bidding at the re-opening of Forty Acres Gallery under the guidance of the artist Bowens.
It is mixed media on canvas measuring 23″ x 20″. More of his work may be found at www.milton510.com . This piece was recently framed for us by Darling Oldham Neath (D. Neath) at Archival Framing. ==================================================
Corey Okada
These two are among the smaller paintings that Corey Okada does. I believe that they are done in acrylic. The first is titled Glory:
The second is titled Knock Wood (Together Together):
Both works measure 9 inches x 9 inches. I was first attracted to his because of his name. I attended junior high school with his aunt, Joyce Okada. ================================================== Dawn Renee Pedersen An early work by Dawn Pedersen was a pen and ink rendering from a photo I had taken of her many years ago.
In the background of the photo was a painting that I had done in the late 1960s. She is seen in a highchair having a bit of lunch. If I recall correctly, the drawing is about 10 inches wide. She did a similar rendering of a photo of her brother holding a chick.
This one is about 10 inches tall. ===================================================
Lee Rose
Harvesting of rice in Colusa County, California was once accomplished by an awkward-looking machine captured in the oil painting by Lee Rose.
The painting measures 24″ by 30″ and is on 1/4″ Masonite and was painted around 1977. There is a version of this harvestor in the Heidrick Ag Museum in Woodland, CA (http://www.aghistory.org/) and (https://www.facebook.com/Heidrick.Ag?ref=ts). ==================================================










































Have had the pleasure of viewing this extraordinary work in person. This is a haunting, fluid work, mesmerizing, and one that seductively calls you into it. Strikes me as a Signature Piece, one presenting a very original style and characteristics, ever moody and mysterious, overwhelmingly enticing less creative painters to constantly imitate. Ive enjoyed RRKing paintings for years. One of the most enthralling Ive seen.
Very interesting. Did you take the photos yourself? You are one of the few people other than major media to say “the City” and assume that your readers understand that to be San Francisco, my birthplace. Yes, the City. There is none other.
Love this. Will be back to revisit. Thank you for the link. Stunning work, and love the history.
A great collection to be part of.
I’m very glad you stopped in my studio last Second Saturday – and told me about this online collection. It is fantastic! I look forward to perusing it in greater detail.