Garnering attention throughout the West, the Sun Valley gallery scene is an unparalleled art world for such a small town. Attracting world-class fine art and emerging artists from around the globe, Sun Valley galleries and their artists are extraordinary in this south-central Idaho locale. Quite often, artists accompany their exhibitions and always elevate the art experience. All year, art collectors and admirers consistently engage in the galleries that dot the streets of Ketchum discovering collectible works in the environs of a mountain town, which is quite different from the hustle and bustle of a major city. Whether it’s sculpture, photography, painting, mixed media or even neon, there’s much art to see and many opportunities to acquire it.
Sun Valley and its surroundings attract a multitude of artists representing an assortment of mediums. These men and women bring their expertise and talents to visitors, homeowners, businesses, and the community contributing to the quality of life—valued and cherished by all who discover Sun Valley.
GAIL SEVERN GALLERY
The Gail Severn Gallery presents several exhibitions for the winter including Linda Christensen’s Dialogues, which features her new work that continues to explore the figure. Christensen’s compositions create challenges and obstacles; in her work she creates solutions to familiar situations. “I continue to explore the figure and am looking more consciously at the reasons for doing so,” she said. “I enjoy working on a composition while creating obstacles for myself—this challenges me to select different solutions to familiar situations.” Christensen’s work evokes the simplistic yet formal essence of the human form, wrought in a humanistic paradox of perfection and imperfection. Through her paintings she depicts a vulnerable representation of humanity caught in quiet everyday practices.
The gallery will also present Theodore Waddell’s Tucker’s Seasonal Words of Wisdom, Waddell’s newest book for children and dog lovers of all ages. The second of Waddell’s children’s books, Tucker’s Seasonal Words of Wisdom follows Tucker the Bernese Mountain Dog and his fellow ‘Berners’ and human pals through a year of fun and exploration in the Northern Rockies. The happy ‘Berners’ experience the joys of each season, all the while sharing their uplifting brand of canine wisdom. Waddell’s beautifully painted works of oil on paper adorn each page of the book. Gail Severn Gallery is pleased to be able to offer the original works on paper that are the images on the pages of Waddell’s new book. Waddell is an internationally recognized artist who has spent more than 50 years painting and sculpting his beloved Western landscape. His work, mostly of horses, cattle, and sheep are given life by his impasto style of painting using washes, endless colors, and wax. The paper pieces in this new exhibition show off his sense of humor and his talents as an artist.
Gail Severn Gallery will also present Better Days with new works by Michael Gregory. A nationally recognized painter, Gregory creates richly detailed landscapes that are realist in style, but painted from imagination and memory. Gregory is fascinated with the study of old barns, silos, and homesteads, which have become some of his most frequent subjects. Gregory has also built a loyal client base for his characteristically limited palette of whites, grays, blacks, and muted tones in his portraits of the American West’s barns and silos.
gailseverngallery.com
LIPTON FINE ARTS
When Gary Lipton arrived in Sun Valley 27 years ago, he brought his art collection with him as well as his passion for collecting contemporary art. Lipton Fine Arts is Lipton’s lifelong dream to own a gallery and share his passion for the works he collects. Presenting works mostly seen in museums, high- end metropolitan galleries, or in large corporate building lobbies and public spaces, Lipton Fine Arts not only sells and collects contemporary art by Modern Masters such as works by Jim Dine, Alexander Calder, Robert Motherwell, Saul Steinberg, and Jean Dubuffet, but the gallery also sells antique furniture, America Indian art, organic dyed oriental rugs, Navajo classic blankets, American art pottery, and paint-decorated dowry chests. Works from Lipton Fine Arts can also be seen at the Knob Hill Inn dining room in Ketchum—a combination of Annie Leibovitz photographs and Calder works on paper. Current exhibitions include lithographic posters by Chagall collected from Israel, Germany, France, England, and the United States. Lipton searched for over a year for Chagall posters signed and printed on the presses of Fernand Mourlot in Paris for a his latest Ketchum exhibition. “All the posters have come from affiliations with the Mourlot printing house,” Lipton said. “They’re all courteously signed.” Lipton said Chagall would go to a museum show or his dealers, which had posters and he would sign them when asked. After World War II, there was a renewed interest in commercial or artistic posters. Considered special, these rare lithographs are not paintings. They are one of the many mediums revealing the incredible versatility of Chagall.
“Chagall is one of the most pivotal artists of our lifetime,” Lipton said. “He worked in oils on canvas, watercolor, mosaics, ceramics— every medium possible. He was widely popular throughout Europe and the U.S. He was and still is a mystical figurehead. It’s the color, floating figures. It’s his roosters and lovers’ embraces.” Lipton Fine Arts will wrap up winter shows with an exhibition Everything is True featuring four Wood River Valley artists Jen Galpin, Lisa Wood, Karen Jacobsen, and Nolina Burge. All women present works of art ranging from paintings to photography as well as mixed media.
liptonfinearts.com
KNEELAND GALLERY
Since 1982 the Kneeland Gallery has exhibited artists of the American West. The gallery represents as many as 40 artists who often join Kneeland Gallery for their opening exhibitions. Although the gallery covers a spectrum of subject matters, its main focus is regional landscape and contemporary Western figurative works. Paintings, sculpture, and fine art prints as well as plein air work are available at Kneeland Gallery.
kneelandgallery.com
SADDLETREE GALLERY
Saddletree Gallery has been a Ketchum staple for fine art photography, painting, and framing for more than 30 years. Owner Jerry Hadam, a photographer, framer, and purveyor of regional and statewide Idaho art, showcases unique Native American works including cedar artist Lee Wilkerson. Hadam’s gallery includes stunning works by Idaho artists with paintings by Ed Anderson and Kevin Bowers as well as photography by Tory Taglio, Ed Cannady, and several others with new works by Steve Malshuk from Antarctica and paintings by Hannah Moghbel. Hadam also has a collection of Warren Miller images. As a photographer and collector, Hadam also is a fine art framer whose attention to detail and quality is impeccable.
saddletreegallery.com
