After a delightful pre-party at Chris and Jan's, we headed out, during a fortuitous lull in the storms, to Lake Tahoe Community College's Art Reception.

This was an opportunity for us to meet the artists behind the work, as we strolled through three different galleries. Our first stop was visiting with Claudia Garza, a plein air painter who captures local scenes with beautiful colors and intimate brush strokes.
Next, we delighted in the submissions by the Tahoe Art League members. This watercolor, by Robert Schimmel called Florentine Window was one of my favorites. I know Robert. We took this photo to send to him and then moments later, we saw him and got to praise his work in person. Fun stuff.
The final stop was to see various art presented by faculty members from Humboldt State's Art Department. Awesome artist, Phyllis Shafer gave a wonderful lecture on how to fully appreciate the art before us.

This dog is actually embroidered onto wood. It was a unique technique.
Phyllis asked the group to share a piece that they loved. I volunteered my appreciation for Elyse by Keith Schneider. This work is all ceramic and I found the whimsy of it to be pretty irresistible.
From Mr. Schneider's website, "I am most interested in things that  “wear” their history: torn and yellowed scraps of paper, old wooden toys, discarded pencils with labels worn, used shell casings, obsolete maps . . . each of these objects, or fragments of them, has a presence that compels me to collect them and use them in my work.  The life story that each object could tell remains a mystery, but the hint of its past adds another layer of richness, even when drawn over or partially obscured by paint."
And he continues, "In my more recent ceramic work, I have used clay “fabric” to dress up my characters and clay tape and stitching to hold them together.   Since facial expression is so important in defining the personality of each of my figures, using wrinkles, tears and holes in the clay fabric has opened up new and exciting options for achieving this."

I absolutely love this piece, his motivations and the feeling that it all evokes. My goodness, it's all clay. What talent!