March 11, 2005

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Palo Alto Online

Permanent Ink

by Terry Tang

Imagine a respected arts organization asks you to create a piece reflecting its 84-year-history. Layer on top of that the thoughts and feelings of dozens of aspiring contemporary artists in Palo Alto's artistic community. And black is the only available hue on your color palette.

For some brush-wielders, tackling that canvas might be too much, with so many distinct voices echoing in their heads. But, for Stanford alumnus Drue Kataoka, these conversations can be symphonies. When the Pacific Art League commissioned the certified master of Japanese brush painting, known as Sumi-e, to create a bold, ebony-streaked original, they knew they would be tapping into an ancient and exotic medium.

The piece will help Pacific Art League raise $6 million to retrofit its facility and make it wheelchair-accessible.

"This is an art form a little different from what we see around here [at the League], practiced by someone whose image is different," executive director Claudia Morgan said. "She's also a young lady who grew up in the Palo Alto area. So, it's great to do a project with someone from the community."

The non-profit organization unveiled "Pacific Riminiscences," Kataoka's Sumi-e opus, on March 10, with a sold-out cocktail fete at Spago Palo Alto. Commemorative prints of the work, which depicts a moonlit El Palo Alto tree next to shimmering rail road tracks, will be available for purchase, with all proceeds benefiting the Pacific Art League. There are 300 prints available for sale, ranging in price from$50 to $1,000 -- depending on if the print is signed or numbered (Print #1 is $5,000).

A play on the past and the League's proximity to the Pacific Rim, "Riminiscences" involved a unique research odyssey into the history of the group that began life as the Palo Alto Art Club. Before conversing with people in the arts community, Kataoka unlocked the League's "history cabinet," a literary feast for any history buff. The 4-by-4 foot, wooden cupboard holds an estimated 20 scrapbooks filled with newspaper articles, photographs, membership rosters and even old class schedules. Besides demonstrating a conscientious preservation effort, the materials are a testament to the League's historical value.

Established in 1921, the group's founding members included Professor A. B. Clark, head of the Stanford Art Department and Mildred Hoover, sister-in-law of Herbert Hoover and the club's first president. Initially meeting weekly in each other's homes for sketching, they later relocated to the Palo Alto Library. Today, the program's gallery-classroom combo draws over 1,600 students every year. In addition, the League is recognized internationally for its biennial Pacific Prints competition.

From the League's executive director all the way down to artists-in-the-making, Kataoka saw each sub-group as "concentric circles" of the organization. She primarily asked each individual what the League meant on a personal as well as cultural level.

In total, Kataoka talked with 78 people -- including city historians, professional artists and children -- over the course of several months. For some, that may seem like unnecessary digging. But, in Sumi-e , which portrays the essence and the heart of its subjects, one can never dig too deep. The ability to translate memories and sentiments with a canon of four core strokes shows a talent that goes beyond painting.

"If you hear our conversations, you'd think they had nothing to do with art, said Clifford Nass, Stanford professor of communication and a long-time friend who asked Kataoka to design the cover of his new book. "The word art never appears. But then she goes off -- without me, thank goodness -- and creates art. That's really the magic."

Having given the brush treatment to numerous subjects -- from jazz musician Wynton Marsalis to The Red Barn at Stanford -- Kataoka knows how to use Sumi-e 's elegant economy of strokes to relay emotion.

"Once you lay down a stroke, the ink deepens. It's like a wine that ages," Kataoka said. "It's so vibrant. It's fairly quite astonishing that it deepens over time. I'd say that's a metaphor of my sense for this project. As a painting deepens over time and ages, over time...my sense of Palo Alto just deepened. Each day was a new discovery and was its own unique brushstroke of a metaphysical painting that you can't see."

As Kataoka sat down to grind her pine-soot ink stick and lay out the proper brush, her vision of the painting became anchored by El Palo Alto. The old redwood, once used as a haven for the Portola Expedition Party of 1769, signified, in her view, a "North Star" for people in the past and present. The railroad tracks emerging from one corner of the painting serve as a symbol of the city's evolution, technologically and culturally.

"This ribbon of rails is the arts, our cultural tradition," Katoaka said. "The arts require constant cultivation. Someone always has to be laying more tracks; otherwise the train will be derailed. It's a constant cultivation. The Art League has done this."

Despite its deep roots in Palo Alto, the Pacific Art League sometimes appears a wallflower in the city's social scene. There was a time when they reaped enough income, making elaborate fundraisers unnecessary. But today the Pacific Art League must now work harder to stay on residents' radar, Morgan said, as only 20 percent of their revenues come from contributions.

"We're really interested in becoming part of the community. And the Palo Alto Art Walk is big part of that. We want to be bringing tons of people to downtown each month. Morgan said. "It's part of our mission to really put forth that the arts inform every aspect of society. A healthy society needs art culture. We can't do that unless people know we're here."

Putting color on local artistic causes has always been on Kataoka's to-do list. The artist currently balances group and individual commissions with preparing her cable TV series, "Drue's Brush," which chronicles her creative process. But she sees herself as a guardian of the arts.

"It's incumbent upon us. I hope this painting serves as a call to action," Kataoka said. "If we don't nurture the arts in our community, it has very grave implications for all of us. When the arts are no longer nurtured, our cultural memory disappears. The rhythms are forgotten. The stories -- to use a Silicon Valley term -- are deleted."
"Pacific Riminiscences," a Sumi-e brush painting by Drue Kataoka, can be viewed at the Pacific Art League, 668 Ramona St. in Palo Alto. Purchases of commemorative prints will benefit the Pacific Art League. For more information please call (650 321-3891 or visit www.pacificartleague.org.

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