 Welcome to Gallery Works. My name is Kitty Lynn Klisch, and we're in the studio today with three artists whose work is now hanging in the new gallery at the Plymouth Art Center Gallery 110 North. The art center has completed the gallery portion of the remodeling, and for all of the local visitors, I want you to be sure and stop by and see these gals work. We have, the name of the show is The Nature of Three, and we have Diane Bywaters, Kristen Jeradsett, and Laura Ibbitson. And each artist works in a different medium, but they have a very connected relationship, and I'm really thrilled to have them on the show today. Welcome to the show. Thank you for having us. Thank you so much for coming. I know you guys had to drive quite a little ways to get here. Thank you very much. And Diane, how did this all come about, this relationship between the three of you, and is this the first show that you've done the three of you together? It's the first show just with us in it. We've been in group shows before, and really it's Kristen that got us all together to do this show. So I taught Kristen years ago, and then she's taught Laura, and then Laura is now an artist in her own right. So it was like three generations of artists so that have affected each other and love nature. Right, right. And even though the thing that I find surprising is that you all work in different mediums. And I just, I think that's, you don't like copy one another, you've learned, but you've gone off and done your own thing. I think that's really fantastic. And you are a professor of art, right? Right, I teach at the University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point, and I have for over 20 years. And Kristen was an outstanding student of mine. And I think really a successful teacher doesn't make you a copyist. We don't need more people painting like me. And so I think she has come up with her individual concept and statement in her work too. So I think all three of us, you can see that we have a similar subject and a love of painting, but we're coming out at different views. Right, right. And that's what makes this particular show at the new gallery, so such a marvelous show for the gallery to open with because I'm telling you, the opening night, I walked in there and it just knocked my socks off. I mean, the work is spectacular. All three of you, you know, it's just spectacular. And Kristen, now you are also work at an academy, right? Yes, I teach at Wisconsin Lutheran College and I'm the art department head. And I've been teaching there since 1995. And Laura was one of my students. And she was one of your students. Yes, and she shared a love for nature as myself and she traveled with me on a faculty mini grant to the Redwoods in California to paint and draw for a week. So we had a fantastic, fantastic experience. Yeah, I guess so, yeah. It's really when you, I remember many, many years ago when I was learning and my teacher took me under her wing and let me come to her private studio and study privately with her for a week. And that was kind of the same thing as you're going to the Redwoods with Kristen. I mean, there's nothing, there's nothing like it. You just feel so special. You really do. I know, I know, so. And I love your work. I really, Kristen, you know, see, I don't do watercolor, so I'm an awe of anybody that can do watercolor. It's so great. So I would like to talk a little bit about your work. And Diane, once again, I'll start with you. The painting that we opened the show with, what's the title of that and where is that? It's at Yellowstone National Park and it was a creek. So it's just rushing water is the title of it. And I'm working in Plain Air mostly all the time. I do do some studio works, but mainly I am working on location. In Plymouth, there's some very large scale pieces, eight feet. And I'm still working on location with those pieces. And that's a real true love of mine is sitting on location and painting. And how long, how do you do that? Do you, I mean, because of the light change in everything, do you have to go there every day at the same time? You bet. And work on it. And for those like those eight foot long pieces, you know, there's some that are what, two, two and a half by eight. And in order to do that, how many days are you there working on? So I'll try to do a key one of those on one of my residencies in the National Parks or a private foundation residency. So usually those are limited to two weeks, but I don't have any distractions except being in the park to paint if I get selected for those. And so it's a real intense process and a real productive process. So I will go at the same time every day and paint in plein air. It's called, it's a French term painting in open air. Right. And do you just work on one piece at a time? No, I'll be doing one large key piece and then I'll do smaller scale pieces too. So I might pick the afternoon to be working on a large scale piece and then I'll spend the morning and late afternoon to finish smaller pieces. Yeah, right. And if I remember correctly in your resume, you have been a painter in residence at National Parks more than any other artist in the United States. I believe so. I have had tremendous luck getting into the National Parks from Alaska to Hawaii twice to Rocky Mountain National Parks. Loc, you know, more regional, it's Apostle Islands and Voyagers. Yeah, I've had a tremendous, just a tremendous time and I'm really honored to be a part of that experience. And what you do as an artist in residence, you have isolated time but then they require you to maybe do a presentation or, and to donate one of your pieces. And it's always a privilege to have one of my pieces in the National Park collection. Of course, of course, yeah. That's wonderful. And now, okay, now this is three smaller paintings and I like this concept, this putting three pieces together. Are we looking at the same place from three different angles? Yeah, this is actually Ghost Ranch. Most people know of Ghost Ranch because of Georgia O'Keeffe. And I went there to paint and this was my view from my cabin, my little rest of cabin. It did have running water that I'd go out to the Mesa and paint every day, that view. I did a large piece and many, many smaller pieces and since it was the same view, I thought it would be nice to experience them together. I think that's beautiful and your presentation is gorgeous. Oh, thank you. I love that. Thank you. And then the little piece we have sitting up there, where is that? Actually, that's Milwaukee. I had the privilege of being UW Systems Fellow for an opportunity to the 21st century program. And that year it was called Past Knowing and only one artist was selected that year and it a lot of times is a group of humanities faculty that to get together and brainstorm ideas, shares each other's research and attend lectures. And I actually painted out of my office view and I did a series of paintings. That's marvelous. Thanks. And the one up above, another pound of Ramah. And that's, I'm from Stevens Point, Wisconsin, obviously if I teach there and that's Jordan Park, one of my favorite places to go with my students. It's just a couple of minutes outside of the town of Stevens Point and I always take my beginning painting students out there to paint. Oh, that's really nice. That really is. I really love your work. You're very, very accomplished. Oh, thank you. And I just, I'm really impressed. Thank you, Kitty. I mean, I was impressed when I walked in there. I mean, eight foot long paintings on and she does them out there on site. I mean, my gosh, I know. That's quite a feat. Well, thank you very much. And you, Kristen, let's talk about you. What did now, do you paint on site also? I do, I painted your own location and Diane was really instrumental in getting, encouraging me to apply for artists in residence programs at national parks as well. So I've been privileged with three so far, not as many as Diane, but I've been at Glacier National Park, Mesa Verde and Everglades. Oh, hi. And they definitely represent the best experiences of my life and I hope to do more. I know we've applied together actually to, for an Artica as well. So that's one of our dreams as well as artists. I noticed that there were paintings from Iceland. Yes. In the show. How did that come to be? As a professor at WLC, I'm kind of been put in charge of organizing trips. And so every two to three years, I organize a trip somewhere to paint and draw to make art. And so I decided Iceland would be a great place and both Laura and Diane came along with me as well as a number of other students and guests. And we experienced just an amazing, majestic, verdant, green, beautiful landscape for eight days. Oh my gosh. Now you work in several mediums, right? Yes. My favorites are pastels and acrylics. I also work in watercolor, though not the same approach as Laura, yes. But I'd say drawing trees are one of my favorite subjects. I just think they have a lot of personality. I enjoy their qualities like people, their animated branches and showing relationships and using them as a metaphor for our experiences as people. Right, exactly, exactly. That's really wonderful. And let's see some, let's see some, well we have the painting behind you there. That's from Rocky Mountain National Park and I have not been the artist in residence there yet, but I have visited there several times. It's one of my favorite places and then Laura and I had gone there on a trip together. This is one of the hiking routes by Lily Lake and there's these really kind of sort of strange root systems as the trees sort of try to hold on to the sides of the mountains. Right, right. And so the roots are actually above ground. Yes, yes. Yeah, it's like that in Alaska, too. Because the ground is so shallow. Yes. And then there's rock underneath, yeah. That's beautiful, that's beautiful. Thank you very much. Such great, such great range of value and texture. I love it, yeah. Thank you. What else do you have to show us? Well, I have a smaller piece here. This is actually inspired from up north, Northern Wisconsin. I grew up spending my summers north of Stevens Point a couple hours in Hazelhurst, Wisconsin. And so these are a couple of the trees on my grandparents' property. That's really where I began my love of forest. I would spend the summers hiking with my grandpa. It's beautiful, just beautiful. Now, is this pastel? This is pastel, this is cante pastel, yes. Beautiful. You know, may I just ask? Yes. Was the large tree represent your grandfather in the smaller one, you? I guess I didn't think about that when I created that, but that's certainly fitting. It's definitely fitting, Kitty. And then this was a study created after the fact Laura and I had gone to Redwood National Park. And one of the experiences I'd hoped to have was to see the Redwoods in the mist, in the fog, and we had that opportunity for a couple hours one morning. It was just a really spiritual, peaceful environment. And so I made a couple of pieces from that, and this is one of those drawings. It's beautiful. It doesn't quite capture the size. These are trees that are two to 300 feet high. Right, right. Around 50 feet in diameter, so just, I think that's been one of the blessings of going to national parks is just seeing the diversity of landscape, of the animals, the plant life is just so incredible and so inspiring that you never run out of things to paint. No, no, you don't, no you don't. It's, oh, that is beautiful. And you have shown, you've captured that feel of the mist, and the feel of the forest, the forest floor, it's beautiful, it's beautiful. Just enough color to give it lots of interest. I like it a lot. Thank you. And then I have a couple of drawings that are more in progress here, there's one here. This is actually Lapham Peak State Park, and these are more recent works. So I was actually sitting outside drawing in the woods, and one of the things that I've started to add and would like to incorporate more into my work, I have, as you look closely, there's butterflies and birds that came, life that came up to me, you know, set by me. So I've been trying to incorporate a little bit more of that into my environments. And this is pastel as well. And these are- The papers are very warm gray, isn't it? Yes, I prefer to work on colored papers for the pastels. I think it brings out the contrast. Sure. And the highlight's quite nice. Yeah, and it gives a very subtle warmth that's coming through that makes it so much more than just black and white, you know, beautiful. And now I know there's another one underneath there. So I'll take this and, okay, we got it, all right. Look at this. Now this is actually Greenfield Park in West Dallas. Don't put around the corner, I think it's a buckle, it's kind of like hold it straight. Okay. Okay, thank you. Oh boy. So this is a very- A draftsmanship, my gosh. This is two days of work. Two days. Two days of work, yeah. Oh, yes. On site. On site. Oh, isn't it hard to work in pastel on site? It is, insects and yes, you get quite messy. Yeah. I mean, like, you know, one will drop a perspiration. Mm-hmm. What do you do? Fortunately, I don't sweat too much. I stay pretty calm. But the wind you have to worry about and you always have to have enough clips because otherwise the paper, you know, blows up and I'm sure that it doesn't become smudged. And like I say, insects, you know, that's the thing that, you know, they might try to bite you and, you know. Well, when you're painting in oil, it's Diane knows and I'm an oil painter, you know. You just leave them on because after the paint dries, you flick them off, you know. Yeah. And sometimes you can get the nicest effect for these little legs walking around with oil paint. That's beautiful. Oh, thank you very much. Oh, thank you so much for bringing those along today. And now, Ms. Laura, what do you have to show us? And first of all, tell me, how does it feel to be sitting here with your mentor and your mentor's mentor? Very exciting opportunity. I guess when I first studied under Chris tonight, was starting just to dabble in art and I appreciated it and I guess I never realized how far it would actually go and speaking about the opportunity to paint with her at the Redwoods, I would say that was probably one of the most influential opportunities to then go into painting from nature and that was probably the thing that influenced me most to then go on and paint the things I am now. I, when I met you the other night, you were carrying your baby with you there at the opening and isn't it rather difficult to juggle your artwork with being a new mommy? Yeah, it's pretty difficult. She, whenever I think I have things figured out and I can paint at a certain time of day, she always throws a loop in there and I always have to paint whenever she's sleeping and or at night, late at night. So she keeps me pretty busy but I still try and make time for it and paint when I can. Mostly now it's from photos instead of plein air. I prefer to do that but eventually when she's older I'll go back to painting in plein air. I'm sure, yeah, everything is in stages when you're young, you know, and then this too she'll pass. Yes. And then you'll be sorry that she grew up so fast. Yes, it's already going too fast. Yeah, I'm sure she's beautiful. Okay, and so let's see some of your work. Well, first of all though, what I'm really curious about with an oil painter and a pastel charcoal mentors, what prompted you to decide that you wanted to try watercolor? What about watercolor really, you know, made you interested in using it as a medium? Well, I had started out doing, studying oil with Kristen and studying drawing and I liked all those things but none of them really felt like they were coming naturally to me. I enjoyed them but they weren't, I guess my chosen or they weren't the exact thing I felt like I should be compatible yet. And then I, she was starting a watercolor class and I thought, well, I'll give this a try to not thinking that this would be the medium that I would enjoy most. And the first day in the class that was, it's like, it suddenly clicked and all of the things I learned so far all got combined together and it just flowed. It was that very aha moment. Yeah. And when that happens, doesn't your heart just feel? Yeah. But you just feel like, oh, I'm like soaring, I know because it's like, it's a wonderful moment. Yes. It's a real revelation, I know. Well, I'd like to see some of your work too and I know the viewers would too. My first painting is actually one of my first watercolors. Is this one of your first paintings? This is one of my first watercolors. Oh my. The photo, I had worked from a photo for that one and it was from a trip in Arkansas in the springtime. Oh gosh, it's beautiful. Thank you. So delicate. That's just beautiful and I love, I love your color choices. Just enough of the cool to really pop the warm. Very nice. Very nice. My next piece is. This is a painting that was done in Plenaire in Colorado. Oh, that is beautiful. You know, the producer of our show here, he works, he's a watercolorist also and I know he's like in this right now. This is beautiful. This is really beautiful. And this one and the next three we're all done at the Forbes Ranch. The Forbes Ranch, now where's that home? It's in Colorado. It's a Southern part of Colorado. Okay, really, really pretty. Very nice. And Laura's being humble. She was selected to be the artist in residence at the Forbes Ranch. Well, gosh. So it was one of, that's the only artist in residence. Well, I guess two, I did the artist in residence at Whitefish Students here in Wisconsin. But the Forbes Ranch, it was a group of 20 artists that were selected through the American Artist Magazine. And we spent a week there drawing and painting and then we had a show in New York afterwards. About a year later. Oh, you're kidding. No. It was quite the opportunity. How long have you been painting? I would say at least, well, I studied under Kristen and graduated in 2003 and then I've been painting since then so it'll be close to 10 years soon, so. Oh, okay, you look so young. You look really young. I'm going through it. I don't know, you're crazy. For a little while now. Oh, that's marvelous, that's a marvelous accomplishment. It really is, let's see the next piece. And these were then done back in my studio afterwards from photos that I took there. This one is of Aspen Trees and the title is called Aspens. I love that, all that, so soft, so subtle. And one of the things I loved about the ranch is they had the very low valleys where you could look up at the mountains and then they had these really, you could go up in the mountains and paint the trees or paint the rivers and they had quite a bit of difference in their landscape there. Beautiful, beautiful. And the draftsmanship there again, yeah, you really learned from your teacher. You're really nice, yeah. Thank you. It just, you know, I just get a feeling of peacefulness from this. It's very, very peaceful, it's beautiful. And the last one is from the same place, more of the valley where it was drier. We had a lot of sagebrush there. Beautiful. And that was a lot of the other things that I painted, the very soft sagebrush with the shadows. This one has more of a contrasting shadow but most of their ones were softer but the abstract shape is what attracted me to that one. That's just what I was going to say. The composition on this is very good, very strong and the thing that I really like about your work is that your darks, even though they're many, many layers, they're still translucent and they're not opaque. I mean, it's just, it's soft, soft, soft all the way. And I find that people's personalities come out in their paintings, don't you think? I think so. Yeah, it's beautiful, just beautiful. And I have to tell the viewers that if you really want to see a show that is absolutely extraordinary because this has just been a very small sampling of these three artists' work. You've got to go to Gallery 110 North at the Plymouth Art Center at the new gallery and see the show. How long is the show gonna be up? Till the end of February. Until the end of February. All right, you've got two months. You've got to go see it. If you're local, go and see it because it's fantastic. And we just have a couple minutes left. Who was your mentor? I enjoyed Robert Sudlow as far as landscape. He's from the University of Kansas and Lawrence. I was born and raised in Kansas City. So he was a great influence on my work. And has anyone other than Diane influenced you I mean with your drawings? One of my professors at UW Milwaukee for graduate school was William Nichols. And he was always very supportive. He's a landscape artist as well and just a really great teacher. Good, good. And for you, is there any other watercolor artists that you really look up to that are just mainly work in the field of watercolor? Not really any watercolors, but when I was growing up, my grandfather was a painter too. And that influenced me. I always looked at his work when he had passed away before I was born. And I always looked at his work and admired it and always wanted to be an artist as well. So that was a big influence in my life. Oh, that's beautiful. It really is. Yeah, that's nice. And so the three of you are gonna be at the Plymouth Art Center. Your work is until the end of February. And I just, I wanna thank you so much for being here today on Gallery Works. This is Diane Bywaters. And this is, let me check my pronunciation here. And this is Kristin Gerstett. But what nationality? It's Norwegian. Norwegian, okay, all right. And Laura Ibbitsen. And thank you, all three of you, so much for being here today. Oh, thank you. It was lovely. It's really been a pleasure. Thank you for having us. It's really been a pleasure. And once again, this is Kitty Lynn Klisch for Gallery Works. And don't miss our next show because it'll be another good one. Bye bye for now.