The Green Antelope Gallery in Bellevue is gearing up for a spring opening featuring the work of gallery owner and photographer Brooke Bonner and part-time valley resident and artist Sonja Allender. The artist reception will take place on Friday, June 13, from 5 to 9 p.m. The gallery is located at 116 South 2nd Street on the corner of Oak and 2nd Streets in Bellevue.
The show is mostly landscapes with a few abstracts. Allender's work is an array of mixed mediums and collages, which include gold and silver leaf with acrylic glazes layered with many papers or found materials.
"The gold and silver leaf are my favorite part because it adds to the depth and light of her work," Bonner said. "In one of the pieces in this show, Allender used cob webs and laid them on canvas, soaked the pattern, then took off the cob webs and painted around the process."
Bonner said that Allender's work has a great deal of texture and the different patterns she uses are mixed with paint. Allender has been with the gallery since it opened in December 2006. Bonner has known Allender and her work since she was a child. She is excited to feature her in the gallery especially since Bonner has watched Allender's work evolve for so many years.
"She saw the building when I first got it, and she could not imagine it would be a gallery," Bonner said. "When we finished it, she was really amazed."
For the first time at her gallery, Bonner is unveiling her own photography. Bonner's work is a spectrum of images dating back to 1997. Bonner studied photography with Emmet Gowin at Princeton University in New Jersey and has been shooting pictures ever since.
"I found photography at the end of my college career," Bonner said. "It was amazing for me to find Emmet Gowin. He is a wonderful person, and I was inspired by how he lived his life around art."
Gowin is known for his work on scarred landscapes such as the Nevada test sites and the aerial images he took after the eruption of Mount St. Helen's. Several of his images are in the permanent collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Corcoran Gallery of Art.
Bonner said she has been taking pictures camping in Idaho and on her travels to the South America and Europe, but her dedication to the many causes and non-profits she supports has taken time away from her own work. She uses large format cameras and prints from negatives, but due to her environmental consciousness she has pursued greener printing processes.
"I have a dark room in my house and my house is non-toxic and green," Bonner said. "For years I have been struggling with my environmental beliefs and my art. I don't want to use chemicals, but I love the work."
Bonner scans her negatives with a high-resolution scanner and prints her images on archival paper, which lasts longer than gelatin prints. Having the opportunity and time to present her images is a new experience for Bonner. She said it is a big transformation from practical living to doing what she loves.
"I am trying to be green and do what I love with minimal damage," Bonner said. "It's all about striking a balance."
For details, call 788-2353 or visit greenantelope.net.
"Night Runner" by Sonja Allender. Mixed media on canvas at the Green Antelope Gallery.
