This Web Provide Jim Russell to demonstrate gourd art techniques at Art Center show

Jim Russell to demonstrate gourd art techniques at Art Center show

Local gourd farmer and artist Jim Russell will present two demonstrations this month of the decorative techniques he uses to transform this nonedible relative of the cucumber, melon, squash and pumpkin into fine art.

Working at the art center, in conjunction with the 9th annual National Gourd Fine Art Show, Russell will be there June 18 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., turning a hard-shell gourd or two into something altogether different. His second demonstration will be held from 5 to 8 p.m. June 24, when downtown Fallbrook will be alive and jumping with one of the Connections Networking Group's popular Main Street parties -- barbecue night.

Russell was the featured artist at the 7th annual National Gourd Fine Art Show, June 2003, and made a presentation on gourds and their decoration at its opening reception. A former Fallbrook Citizen of the Year, he is well-known in the community as chairman of the Fallbrook Community Planning Group. He grows the gourds he works with, and also owns a grove of macadamia nut trees.

Nineteen artists are displaying their work in the show, including five who also showed here in 2004: Patricia Boyd, Larry McClelland, Diane Piccola, and Russell and Jan Seeger. Others are Jeanne Ames, Keely Berry-LeBlanc, Angela Briggs, Kristy Dial, Judy and Larry Cunningham, Betty Finch, Betty Herrington, Paul Klopfenstein, Robin Przybysz, Sally Rosenberg, Diana Tollenaar, Don Weeke and Peggy Wiedemann.

This year's exhibition, which has been sponsored by Temecula Valley Bank, will continue through June 26 at the art center, 103 S. Main St. Admission/donation requested is $5, with art center members admitted free. Regular hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and 1 to 4 p.m. on Sunday, except for June 24 and 25, when the center will be open from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday's expanded hours will make it possible for avid gourd art fans to attend the International Gourd Festival, staged at the Welburn Gourd Farm in De Luz Canyon. Reputedly the largest hard-shell gourd farm in the world, it is located on De Luz Road about 16 miles west of I-15. The festival offers entertainment, refreshments, gourd art demonstrations and the chance to buy from a wide selection of gourds.

Summit on art of gourd-carving

Longtime Los Altos Hills resident Ginger Summit and co-author Jim Widess have released the latest in their series on gourds, the "Complete Book of Gourd Carving" (Sterling Publishing Co., 2004), a beautiful and unusually informative coffee-table showpiece.

The authors demonstrate the ordinary-seeming vegetable's history as an adaptable art form in 192 pages of instruction on engraving, linear carving, chip carving, gouge work, relief carving and inlay.

The "Complete Book of Gourd Carving" adds to the series examples of gourd carving from Africa, Asia, the Pacific Islands and South America throughout history. The authors discuss Peruvian carving techniques used more than 4,500 years ago.

The decorations on these ancient fragments indicate different techniques of enhancing the gourd art, including scratching on the outer shell, fine-line hatching and a combination of pyroengraving and carving. The book, which contains 625 color photographs, explains the cultural background of each style of gourd-art.

The "Complete Book of Gourd Carving" includes the work of 92 artists and the tools they employ in the different forms of carving.

Earlier books in the series are "Gourds in Your Garden" and "Making Gourd Musical Instruments."