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Gualala Arts
Promoting public interest and participation in the arts since 1961.
Archive of past events: 2004 through 2014
The Dolphin Gallery will be showing the landscape photography of Scott Chieffo and the innovative ceramics of Kazuko Matthews from the opening on Saturday, June 5 from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. through June 30. About Kazuko Matthews
Born in southern California, I moved with my family to Japan as a young child. Entering adulthood, I returned to the United States to further my education. I attended Mount San Antonio College and Chouinard Art Institute, where I studied with Otto and Vivika Heino.
My Japanese heritage and sensitivity provide important foundation for my work. Today, having lived in the United States for more than half my life, there is a broader fusion of the two cultures within my personal life. And as an artist, America, with her vast space and carefree atmosphere, has given me the sense of unbound freedom to explore and create. Certain things or events, whether experienced fleetingly or in a small way, bring me joy and excitement. My work is the reflection of, reliving of and restating of these feelings.
The process of interpreting these feelings becomes exploration for new expression . . . each work is a new chance for another passage, another annotation. The way I juxtapose patterns and forms, with or without colors, all converge, I hope, to create my own unique expression.
About Scott Chieffo
Scott explains, "Photography is the ultimate means of getting in touch with myself, and the world around me. Through the camera's viewfinder, I am able to see the beauty of the natural world with a unique intimacy. My main photographic goal is to be able to communicate this unique viewpoint to others, such that they are able to look upon my images, and develop a new and stronger appreciation for life's details. I believe that a fine art photographic image is most powerful if it can be viewed with increasing pleasure over and over again for many years, rather than simply have a strong initial impact."
Scott was born and raised in Southern California, and has lived most of his adult life in various Northern California locations. His degree in Environmental Biology sparked a strong interest in the natural world that has continually grown throughout his life. He received his first 35mm SLR camera as a college graduation gift more than twenty years ago and has been seriously photographing the natural world ever since.
For the past several years, Scott has shown his fine art photography prints at art festivals, galleries and exhibits along the west coast. His work is represented in private collections throughout the United States and beyond.
The Dolphin Gallery is located at
39225 Highway One in downtown Gualala, CA |
My work as a clay artist has evolved over 30+ years. Starting out as a functional potter, my desire for ever-widening range drew me into exploration of diverse forms and searches for innovative expression. Today I work mostly with slabform construction to create my ceramic sculptures.
Following a short career in graphic design, I chose to devote all my time to ceramics. In this pursuit I continued my education at both Santa Monica College and Scripps College where I studied with Paul Soldner. I have exhibited extensively throughout the United States and in Japan, including the Los Angeles County Museum, the Renwick Gallery of Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. and Striped House Museum, Tokyo.
In the six years that he has been living on the Mendocino Coast, Scott Chieffo has developed an intimate photographic relationship with its unique landscape. His images capture the subtle beauty of the coast with a highly unique, "painterly" style.
"When I go into the field, I rarely carry any strongly preconceived ideas about subject matter for my images. I study the light, as it falls upon the landscape, and look for ways in which it may bring out the hidden beauty around me. When things are going well, I literally enter a meditative state of mind, which allows me to create images that communicate the subtle emotions aroused by the scene surrounding me."