"Habitat" •The New Exhibit at the Dolphin Gallery in March Featuring the Art of Sara Post and Thomas Post
“Habitat” is a new exhibit, featuring the art of Sara Post and Thomas Post, set to open at the Dolphin Gallery, Cypress Village, Gualala. The opening is Saturday, March 12. The gallery will be open from 11:00am to 4:00pm. Sara Post paints abstract landscapes—worlds to see and live in. Thomas Post builds imaginary constructions that take the form of stones, boats, walls and house shapes. Their work, taken together, gives weight to natural environments and to human presence. Both artists use a variety of media in their work.
Sara Post may use any combination of collage, oil paint, cold wax medium, oil pigment sticks, art graf, colored pencils and solvents. She paints on cradled boards often joined together to create dimensional wall pieces. Thomas Post makes sculptural objects with what comes to hand—clay, wood, paint and assorted found objects, which may be fired, stacked, nailed and glued together. Despite the wide variety of materials, the resulting work of each artist is quiet, even minimal, evoking stillness rather than activity. Their work is abstract, inviting the viewer to participate with her/his own associations around nature and human constructs.
Thomas Post majored in economics at UC Berkeley and taught mathematics in the Peace Corps in Gambia before veering unexpectedly into work with ceramics. Not a stranger to hand work, he had built a boat and small land structures, and worked for a while with wood, but was attracted to the combination of function and aesthetics offered by creating works in clay. From 1981 to 2010 he was a partner in T.S. Post Ceramics, a pottery studio in Davis, California that produced functional and decorative ceramics sold nationwide. Life after clay has included various sculptural experiments in clay and wood, using both organic and inorganic shapes.
Sara Post studied art and literature at Southern Methodist University and discovered ceramics after graduation during an extended visit to the UK. Returning to the US, she earned a graduate degree at Northern Arizona University in Don Bendel’s ceramics program, based in natural materials and processes. She made nationally recognized ceramic wall pieces until 2012. That year, she returned to painting, creating layered abstractions in oil and cold wax medium. Her current work combines collage, painting and drawing to create quiet, minimal landscapes.
The exhibit at the Dolphin Gallery will continue through Sunday, April 3, 2022.
