Elephant in the Room
Artist: Mark Chambers
Mark Collin Chambers was born in 1954 and died from ALS on April 20, 2015. He grew up in upstate New York and moved to the Pacific Northwest to attend The Evergreen State College, where he and I met and became friends. Mark was an entrepreneur and a colorful, outgoing and charismatic friend. Painting and photography were among his creative passions. In 2015, before his death, Mark gave me this painting of “The Elephant in the Room“ because I had admired it many times.
The Long House
2002 | Artist: Coyote
The artist Coyote was born in Seattle WA in 1965. Coyote is half Native American Muckleshoot and half British Canadian. He has a master’s degree in Public Administration from the University of Montana. He retired as the deputy regional director for the Bureau of Indian Affairs Navajo Region, and worked as the top executive-operations manager for the Muckleshoot Indian Tribe, and the CEO for the Snoqualmie Indian Tribe.
Coyote was forced into early retirement after becoming blind. While he could no longer read or write, he discovered he could still paint. His paintings to him represent the will to survive, as the coyote is a survivor, and so is he.
Artist: Milton Thompson Bard
A family friend, with an M.A. in Design and Industry, Milton Thompson Bard taught pre-engineering studies at Hartnell College in Salinas, California until his retirement in 1989. But his first love was art. He created outstanding pen and ink drawings, and continued to develop as a creative artist in watercolor and acrylic painting in Las Cruces, New Mexico. After moving to Olympia in 1994, he continued to produce fine paintings and drawings while taking on an active role as treasurer of the Olympia Art League for ten years. He held memberships in Arts Olympia and Tumwater Allied Arts, and was chair of the Heritage Art Festival. Milton died in 2005, in Lacy, Washington.