Tempestuous

Got an email from deep in the past this week, asking for information about a sculpture from 2003.

Rebecca and I would like to find info regarding the artwork "Prospero Raising the Tempest" such as price, date of purchase and if it was bought through you directly or a gallery (maybe Alder Gallery). Any info will be greatly appreciated.

This artwork is now in the Aimes University Art collection in Des Moines, Iowa since Rebecca donated many artworks there.

We still have "Soji [sic] at the Wheel" in DC.

A follow-up email from Rebecca clarified a bit: The piece is actually on a two-year loan to Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa, as part of a collection that will be donated to their permanent collection after the two years are up.

I received my PhD from ISU and they have a very extensive university museums program that is used by the entire university.

This is actually the second Prospero I made. The first, made in 1998 or '99, was the first piece I ever had accepted to Eugene's competitive Mayor's Art Show, and later was purchased from my solo exhibit at the Alder Gallery. The second was a smaller version, made specifically by request of Alder's owner, Candy Moffett.

I used to sell a lot of sculpture through Alder. Candy was a friend of the Craft Center director during my years there, and saw my first few sculptural pieces--unfired--while visiting one day. She immediately said to get in touch when I had enough for a show, and displayed and sold many of my works over the next decade. She closed Alder in 2008, and passed away in 2011.

An unexpected benefit of our relationship occurred in 2003. A regular patron of the gallery, a Eugene native who ran a research and analysis group in Washington, DC, had just started a charitable foundation dedicated to the arts. For their inaugural event, she proposed to bring six Oregon artists to Washington for a weekend exhibit in the offices of a downtown architecture firm, followed by a reception in her Georgetown home. Included were a printmaker, a paper artist, a glass-blower, two bronze sculptors, and myself.

It was an amazing week. Candy arranged packing and shipment of the art; Rebecca paid our airfare and lodging. I bought an extra ticket for Denise, and we flew out three days ahead of everyone else. Spent a lot of time at the Smithsonian, bopping between Natural History, Sackler and Freer Museums (Asian pottery), the Renwick Gallery (crafts), and the Hirschhorn Sculpture Garden. Got to visit the American Crafts Expo at the Postal Museum, where I talked to no less than five Ceramics Monthly cover artists.

I took seven sculptures along, didn't sell any, though eventually all but one found homes through Alder. Prospero #2 staying in DC, as a thank you gift to Rebecca for making it all happen.

And now it's bound for the Iowa State Museum, for their museum collection. Another piece of mine, a tribute to potter Shoji Hamada, is still with Rebecca in Washington, DC.