The heat and smoke of the inland valley were a good excuse to head for the coast and do some gunkholing, which means to meander from place to place. Gunkholing is a great way to see small towns and hidden gems that you might not otherwise find.We just spent three days gunkholing from Astoria across the bridge to Cape Disappointment and Long Beach. We visited the renowned LightBox Photographic Gallery in Astoria, the Bay Avenue Gallery in Ocean Park, and the Bold Gallery in Long Beach. We also visited a farm where goats paint.
Astoria is really an art destination in and of itself. Our big art stop was at the renowned LightBox Photographic Gallery right on the main drag at 1045 Marine Drive. We caught the “Analog Forever Exhibit.” One very cool entry was by Matt Ragan, who had fused blue cyanotype flowers into glass plates, which were then bolted together to make a magical blue lantern.
The next day, we crossed to the Washington side to drive the length of Long Beach, finding art in each of its little towns. In Ocean Park, we found the Bay Avenue Gallery. Multimedia artist Jane Powell had a watercolor of an Anna’s Hummingbird that was very naturalistic, but when I got closer, I saw the entire image was made of pressed flowers.
At Bold Gallery in Long Beach, I admired the work of Rita Brown, who makes full-size serving plates of fabric with well designed ocean scenes on them.
We were irresistibly drawn to the farm advertising "Paintings by Goats." We had to see for ourselves if the goats could really paint.
The painting goats are trained to hold a paintbrush in their mouths, dunk it in tempera and apply color to paper. And yes, the art was for sale. I settled for getting in the pen and playing with the goats, who were as lighthearted as their cheerful art.
There’s lots of summer left–go gunkholing!
