Every issue of Picture Framing Magazine, the framing industry’s monthly trade journal, includes a feature called Design of the Month. We’re proud to have had our work chosen for two issues in 2023—the first back in April and now this month.The April feature, which you can read here, was our frame for “Jormungandr,” a painting on paper by Croatian artist Milivoj Ćeran, which I blogged about here…

Milivoj Ćeran, “Jormungandr.” Click image for more…

…and this month’s feature, which you can read here, recognized our framing of a large color photo by Stephen Goldblatt, posted in the blog here.

Photograph by Stephen Goldblatt. Click image for more…

Many thanks to Picture Framing Magazine, and especially to editor Kim Biesiada!

“I seek the common thread that binds us together and moves us forward—nature, tradition, love and beauty.” —Randall Sexton (1958-2023)

Randall Sexton, “Purple”.
Oil on linen panel, 12″ x 16″

When a community loses a vital source of knowledge, skill, wisdom and inspiration that community feels its loss deeply. Bay Area painter Randall Sexton, who passed away this week, was one such vital figure. Randy was recognized and appreciated for his own artistry in a range of genres, earning signature membership in the Plein Air Painters of America and garnering many awards. His influence, though, wasn’t limited to what he painted but was felt and experienced through his teaching, including a decade as a faculty member of Pixar University coaching many of that studio’s talents.

Randy participated in “Treasures From the Bay Area,” the 2020 California Art Club exhibit hosted by Holton Studio Gallery, earning an award for “Purple,” the oil painting shown here.

I didn’t know Randy well, but the tributes being shared by our friends, including those in the gallery’s roster, testify to a penetrating shared grief.

The arts are how we join the world, and, as the quote at the top of this post demonstrates, Randy understood that well. Even as he himself let go of “the common thread,” his life’s work left it stronger.

Read Eric Rhoads’s moving tribute to Randall Sexton…

Watch Eric Rhoads’s interview with Randy, which includes a painting demo…

Our annual all-gallery show, Beloved California VIII, continues this week. Terry Miura has been part of every one of the eight shows, and is represented this time around by these three small but compelling paintings below—all exemplifying the spirit of an exhibit that celebrates our state’s rural life and landscape.

We framed “Carefree Days,” 12″ x 12″, in a No. 22.6 CV—2-1/2″ in quartersawn white oak with Medieval stain, and a parcel gilt sight edge.

Terry Miura
“Carefree Days”
Oil on panel, 12″ x 12″. $2,100 framed.
BUY

We set both the 9″ x 12″ “Fields of Green” and “Through the Orchard” in the same simple 2″ flat profiles with a carved chamfered sight edge (No. 16 CV) in quartersawn white oak with Medieval stain.

Terry Miura
“Fields of Green”
Oil on panel, 9″ x 12″. $1,650 framed.
BUY

Terry Miura
“Through the Orchard”
Oil on panel, 9″ x 12″. $1,650 framed.
BUY

Come to the gallery to enjoy these beautiful paintings in person. Beloved California VIII continues all month. We’re having a holiday open house on the last day, Saturday, December 30, from 11 to 3. I hope you’ll come.

See our complete inventory of Terry Miura’s work here…

Deb Stoner is a photographer in Portland, Oregon. She came in to the studio with a friend to whom she’d given one of her remarkable botanical photographs.

We set the 8″ x 10″ “Iris and Ferns” in a flat 2″ wide stained walnut frame with shaped corners articulated with shaped proud splines. The inside of each corner is also shaped. The frame has a flat slip gilded with 18 kt gold leaf.

I first played with these corners, but in a slightly different fashion, on this frame for a painting on paper by illustrator Milivoj Ćeran.

Visit Deb Stoner’s website to learn more about her…

Today is the opening for Beloved California VIII, with a reception for the artists from 2 to 4. Jessie has, once again, done a brilliant job hanging the exhibit—and we’re eager to show it off! For you to preview, or if you can’t come in person, we’ve posted the entire show online here and at our online store, here.

This year, we’re very pleased to be adding Timothy Horn to the roster. One of Tim’s pieces is shown here—”Sonoma Barns,” oil on canvas, 11″ x 14″. The stained quartersawn white oak frame is in a 2-1/2″ wide carved slope filleted on the inside and outside, and has a gilt slip.

Timothy Horn
“Sonoma Barns”
Oil on panel, 11″ x 14″. $2,200 framed.
BUY

About this painting, Tim Horn says,

I love those two barns, with their tin roofs, and the smaller pump house up on the hill. The large mass of eucalyptus offers a nice organic shape in contrast with the man-made structures. I’ve painted this beautiful scene in Sonoma county several times before, at different times of day, different seasons, different sizes and compositions, and always from life. Though this is the first time there were sheep in view, and I was very happy to add them as a foreground element. Sheep are fairly simple in their shapes and coloring, but they never really stop moving!

I hope you can join us for the opening today from 2 to 4 and help us welcome Timothy Horn to the roster, toast these twenty-one terrific painters—and, most of all, celebrate with them the beauty of the Northern California landscape.

Beloved California VIII runs through December 30.

Tomorrow is the opening for Beloved California VIII. Here’s a peek at one beautiful work that’s included: Christin Coy‘s “Evening, Tomales Bay Wetlands,” 10″ x 20″. The stained walnut frame I made for it is 2-1/4″ wide. It’s mostly flat, but coves up to a carved sight edge cushion. It has a rose gold slip.

Christin says,

In this painting of Tomales Bay I wanted to capture the warm light at sunset which occasionally will cloak the landscape in a warm glow, covering the hills along the eastern shore, and the wetland waterways along the western shore. I really enjoyed portraying the peaceful evening mood in this tonal painting depicting one of Marin County’s many beautiful and inspiring views of the natural landscape.

Come meet Christin Coy at the artists’ reception and opening for Beloved California VIII this Saturday—tomorrow!—from 2 to 4.

As we prepare for this Saturday’s opening of Beloved California VIII, I’m sharing some of the work in the show. Today’s painting is “Jane Morris at Sunset” (22″ x 36″) by Paul Roehl. We gave it a No. 183 “Maybeck” at 3″ wide in quartersawn white oak with Saturated Medieval Oak stain.Paul describes this as “a kind of homage to the Pre-Raphaelites.” Just as Dante Gabriel Rossetti had idealized his late wife, Elizabeth Siddal, in paintings as Dante Alighieri’s own Beatrice, after Lizzy’s death, Rossetti similarly represented William Morris’s wife, Jane Morris. Note how the trees form a Roman numeral IX. In the “Divine Comedy,” explains Paul, Dante associates Beatrice with the number nine (IX),

because her root is in the Trinity, he met her when she was nine and she died at eighteen (twice nine). She is perfection both physically and in spirit to such a degree as to allow her to lead Dante into heaven itself. She manifests the idea that the experience of beauty in nature and each other reconciles us as an antidote to the despair of being. And that’s an idea that finds favor with artists! I thought it would be interesting to represent Jane Morris (Beatrice) in that role as a kind of divine muse overseeing the end of the day.

Beloved California VIII opens Saturday with a reception for the artists from 2 to 4. Come meet Paul Roehl and revel in the beauty of “Jane Morris at Sunset”—and our entire gallery and showroom of landscape paintings.

We’re finishing up the framing and beginning to hang Beloved California VIII, our all-gallery show opening on Saturday. Included in the show is this dramatic gouache by Erik Tiemens, titled “Contours of Change,” (10″ x 14″). We framed it in a plain slope No. 2 at 2-1/2″ wide in stained quartersawn white oak with a carved rounded liner finished with bronze wax.

Beloved California VIII opens this Saturday, with a reception for the artists from 2 to 4 in the afternoon. Come join us—and meet Erik!

We’ll be busy at the Gallery this coming week, as we put together Beloved California VIII, our all-gallery show that’s topped off each year since we moved to Berkeley in 2016. The exhibition opens this coming Saturday, November 4, with an artist reception from 2 to 4.

Our postcard shows off the piece below, Bill Cone‘s 18″ x 22″ pastel “Ediza Morning.” It’s from this year’s Granite Group trip, which Bill has been co-leading with Paul Kratter since 2004. This work is an excellent example of Bill’s masterful ability to capture the beauty of the Sierra Nevada—the Range of Light.

For the frame, I used black walnut and made a simple 3″ wide profile in a convex or cushion form suited to the awe-inspiring big granite, shaping it with a hand plane, so it’s subtly faceted and has a few tool marks. The profile is canted in to the picture to sustain and enhance the wonderful perspective. The inside edge is chamfered and carved. The back slopes in a just a little, which helps expose the proud splines that accent the corners. Inside the frame a carved liner with bronze wax harmonizes with some of the muted golden tones in the foreground grasses and cliffs awakening in the sun.

I hope you can come to the opening next Saturday. Again, it’s from 2 to 4. Beloved California VIII will run through the end of the year, closing December 30. It will also be viewable online, here.

Below, a couple apropos photos I stole from Bill’s blog.