Join the Bainbridge Public Library for the August 2023 First Friday Art Walk, featuring artist Peggi Erickson
The Bainbridge Public Library is dedicated to spreading the joy of reading and the discovery of ideas with not just our local community, but with visitors from near and afar. In addition, the library is fortunate to house beautiful local works of art both inside and outside the building. Each month the library celebrates a local artist (or artists) with an exhibit, which opens monthly on the Island’s First Friday Art Walk tour, and includes a reception hosted by the featured artist.
The Bainbridge Public Library is proud to present an exhibit by artist Peggi Erickson
Peggi will host a “meet and greet” from 5pm-7pm on Friday, August 4th to open her new exhibit, “Watercolor Journey“ for First Friday Art Walk
For watercolor artist Peggi Erickson, the journey of inspiration and learning to paint began in the 1980s when she cam upon a copy of Stephen Doherty’s book on Sondra
Freckleton’s work, Dynamic Still Lifes in Watercolor. “Her paintings were unlike any I had seen and that book changed my life and set me on this journey,” she says.
Peggi began painting in the evenings after putting her young son to bed, “My first attempts at watercolor were truly awful, but to learn anything one must be willing to be a beginner,” she explains in her BPL Artist Statement. She chose still life because they stood still, unlike life, which is constantly in motion and much of her early work was cast aside over frustration or distraction, but she never gave up.
When her son spent summers with his father, Peggi took week-long watercolor workshops at the Coupeville Arts Center from artists such as Judy Morris, staying in her VW camper at Ebey State Park. “It was wonderful! One summer I also travelled to Walla-Walla to take a workshop from Judy Treman. More recently I was studying with Elizabeth Kincaid and attending her studios twice a month in Kirkland.” All of the teachers and artists she’s learned from have had a great deal of influence on Peggi and helped her grow as a painter. She also has quite a large library of watercolor books and videos she refers to and is a member of the Northwest Watercolor Society, where she learns from other artists who bring in their work for the monthly meetings.
Peggi’s paintings traverse from soft, silky colors to bold and vibrant. “I love watercolor. There is a magic in it that comes from the way light travels through the paint, hits the paper and bounces back. Light gives watercolor a lively quality, a brightness, a beauty. In creating a watercolor, I get to see paint and light and water dance together, and that dance can create magic on the page,” she says in her Artist Statement. “Soft edges that fade to white, washes that go from the deepest hue to a whisper of color. It’s just amazing, and loads of fun (and sometimes frustrating, too!). Watercolor is challenging. I won’t ever finish learning how to paint in watercolor… for me it’s a lifelong journey, but I am beginning to like my work and claim that I am an artist.”
Although she has occasionally entered her work in juried art shows over the years, such as the North Kitsap and Crafts Fair, this will be her first exhibit. But for Peggi, it isn’t about exhibiting her work, it’s the process of creating, “Art is a soul-nourishing activity, and I believe that every human has a creative force coming through them that wants to express itself in the world. There are hundreds of artforms… and watercolor is mine.”
Peggi grew up in the East Bay town of Danville, CA with her parents and nine siblings. She went on to live in San Francisco and Marin as a young woman and eventually made her way to Jamaica where she taught school for several years. Later, she moved to Eugene, OR where she attended the University of Oregon for computer sciences. In 1985 she joined EDS Corp in Poulsbo as a software engineer and commuted from Port Townsend, where she lived with her (then husband) and young son. However, the commute was too time consuming and her ex-husband wanted to work on small wooden boats, so they decided to relocate to Bainbridge Island where they rented a house in the Port Madison neighborhood before buying a home in Seabold where she’s lived and created art since 1987.
Peggi’s work can be viewed in the library meeting room from August 1st through August 24th and on the library website, www.bainbridgepubliclibrary.org.
A portion of sales is donated to the library.
As always, thank you for supporting your Bainbridge Public Library and local artists. If you have interest in exhibiting your work, feel free to contact Linda Meier, art coordinator, at lindameier2000@gmail.com
***Library content and images provided by Linda Meier, Bainbridge Public Library and Peggi Erickson.
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