Knowledge is at the root of many things in photographer Earl Olsen’s life.
He’s excited about learning new technologies and happily moved forward from film to digital.
He likes to open his studio to the public so people will get to know him better.
And he believes that the more he knows his subjects, the better his work will be.
“When I return to a subject, it’s like visiting an old friend,” said Olsen, breaking into a slow, warm grin.
Olsen is among the more than 100 artists who will greet the public this weekend during the 11th annual Whidbey Island Open Studio Tour. The tour is most of Saturday and Sunday and is sort of like an art treasure hunt where people purchase a map and guide as their ticket and then use the map to go from studio to studio. As a way to help decide where to go, visitors can start at tour headquarters at the Bayview Cash Store, 5603 Bayview Road, Langley, where an exhibit will feature one work from each artist.
Olsen is the poster artist for this year’s tour. His close-up image of the bark of a madrona tree challenges the viewer to guess what it is and is an iconic example of Olsen’s belief that sometimes beauty is hiding and it may take time to bring it out.
“I’m using nature’s design team,” Olsen, 72, said of his work. “They are doing a good job and they need a little recognition.”
Olsen said he was busy this past year learning a new camera and so has lots of new work to share during the tour, including panoramas, triptychs and large prints. He also has some beautiful and moody work from his travels to Oregon and to the Palouse in Eastern Washington.
A former Fluke Corp. employee, Olsen said he is a self-taught photographer who first picked up a camera during the Korean War when he found himself in Morocco wanting to capture the stimulating scenery. His photography went through periods of “peaks and valleys” since then, until 15 years ago when Olsen got more interested in learning how to make and sell his prints. He began entering juried art shows, and at one point took a first place in a Lynnwood contest for his image of cattail reeds called “The Old &the New.”
Olsen said he can spend a few minutes, a few hours or even up to two months on a picture. He uses a long lens and tries to probe his subjects or “visually investigate” them.
“It takes time to develop a rapport,” Olsen said.
A trip to Olsen’s studio will actually give visitors knowledge of two artists in one trip. Olsen is married to fiber artist Natalie Olsen, whose custom weaves are often three-dimensional blasts of color with curved instead of traditional straight lines. Natalie Olsen is also highly untraditional in her use of silk fusion, which becomes parts of pillows and whimsical mixed media pieces, where the artist provides an answer to that nagging question: What do you do with all those shallot skins?
Reporter Theresa Goffredo: 425-339-3424 or goffredo@heraldnet.com.
Artists on the Whidbey Island Studio Tour include (clockwise from left below): Callhan McVay (glass), Don Wodjenski (photogaphy), Natalie Olsen (woven tapestry) and Sharon Spencer (sculpture).
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