Lorna Hunt
Though
Lorna has drawn and painted for most of her life, it wasn’t until the last 15
years that she has been able to dedicate her time to fine art.
She
enjoys the flow and spontaneity of watercolor, and also the rich, juicy
qualities of oil paint. Oil paints are well suited to Plein Air painting, and
that combines well with her love of the outdoors.
Lorna feels privileged to have studied with many area
artists and to have participated in workshops given by local and nationally
known artists.
She emigrated from Argentina to Pleasant Hill, Ca. in the
early 60s, raised a family in Livermore, Ca., grew almonds in Ripon, Ca. and
retired to Sonora where she can indulge in her artistic endeavors.
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Sunny Sorensen, sunny.sorensen@yahoo.com
Sondra Sorensen
N
|
ative
Californian, Sondra (Sunny) Sorensen
graduated with honors with a BA in Studio Art from University of California,
Davis in 1979. There she studied oil painting under acclaimed California
artists Wayne Thiebaud and Roland Peterson; and ceramic sculpture under the
late Robert Arneson. She entered competitions for a year after graduation, won
a couple prizes, did odd jobs, and eventually took off for Scotland where she
lived for two years.
Returning to California,
she had to get a real job. “I had the
outlook of an artist—even as a kid I loved to draw—but not the discipline to
make it a career move. At the same time,
I was too impatient to teach art¸ but I loved the educational scene, and would
have happily become a professional student had someone offered to foot the
bill.” Finally she landed a job in a high end private high school and went on
to wear multiple hats of the Tin Cupper,
Glad-hander, Organizer, Magazine Editor, Writer, and Designer. To relax, she
led Sierra Club backpack trips in the Sierra for ten of those years. Teaching,
she thinks, would have been less stressful.
When the millennium rolled
over, Sunny retired from the multiple-caps job, with hand and arm injuries due
to excessive computer work, waited four years for the injuries to subside, and
then turned to pastels, planning to take up art where she left off. “I thought
I wanted to paint the Sierra and deserts I had schlepped through over the
years. Only there was a problem. As a
delinquent Bay Area Figurative studio artist who at one time leaned toward pop
art, I was unprepared to paint landscapes, especially on location. A monumental
learning curve loomed before me and all I had to get around it was an
untrustworthy bicycle. So I looked up the pastel artists who painted the way I
thought I wanted to.” For three years she took workshops from Richard McKinley,
Richard McDaniel, Kim Lordier, Gil Dellinger, and Marc Hanson.
In 2008,
Sorensen again became interested in figurative work, and although she continues to do landscapes in both
pastels and oils, she is leaning more strongly to the live figure. She quickly
learned that painting from a photo can be a curse that it doesn’t take the
place of what you really see. “One of the reasons,” she says, “is that each
individual sees the same scene or subject differently with two eyes. When you
paint from a photo, you end up painting what the camera sees with its one eye.
If I use a photo, it’s generally as a loose reference from which I depart after
the first margarita.”
Sorensen, who divides her
time between Mexico and Hathaway Pines, has been accepted into several
competitions, won a few awards, including first place in Ironstone’s spring
competition in 2009, accepted commissions, taught a few plein air workshops and
runs a summer eight-week life drawing
class at Town Hall Arts in Copperopolis.
Recently she has started up a summertime plein air group, Calaveras
Outdoor Painting Society (C.O.P.S.), which has been written up in The Union Democrat (Sept 21,
2012).Anyone with plein air painting experience who lives in Calaveras County is
welcome.
Anthony
Pooler
Anthony
Pooler is a local artist, currently residing in Modesto. He works primarily in
watercolor and acrylics. His art education started at an early age, as his
great grandfather, mother, and uncle were all artists. He is also an avid
fly-fisher and fly-tier. This occasionally leads to conflicts about whether to
fish the stream or to paint it.
His
formal art education includes instruction at UC Berkeley, with additional classes
at Cal State Hayward. Images include plein air work as well as paintings
created from photos from his extensive travels. Of special interest as
subjects, are landscapes, and vintage and classic automobiles. He is a member
of the Central California Art Association and the Valley Suncatchers. His work
can be viewed on the website of fineartamerica.com, and frequently at the
Mistlin Gallery and other local venues.
Commissions
are welcome.
______________________________________________________
Cheryl Bloomfield
My love of art began
at a young age when teachers would ask me to paint backdrops for school theater
and portraits of fellow students. This led to a senior high art award after
four years of art classes given by a devoted and creative teacher. 
While raising our
children, I used my hands to construct orthodontic appliances for six offices
in the Bay Area, and oil painted as a “break” from our busy family
schedule. As our children matured, I
dove into painting wall murals as a business known as “Have Brush—Will Travel”
in homes all over San Joaquin County, California.
I have read and studied art
books and artists, but taking plein air workshops by Kathleen Dunphy has
inspired me to take off in my creative aspirations. There is so much to learn
and an abundance of materials to learn from, that I can’t soak it in fast enough. I will
forever be studying art to learn to convey my message. I want to show people, who can’t or don’t
travel, the beautiful treasures of scenery on the back roads of America, and
just how special this country is.
