DUNGENESS — Consider Dungeness artist Carrie Rodlend’s latest work a redux of the classics.
For the last year and a half, she’s been working with art students to recreate some of the world’s most famous paintings as her teen and adult students advance their skills.
“It’s a good way to train the eye and learn geometry,” she said.
Next weekend, Rodlend will auction off 33 of her re-imagined works of 18th, 19th and 20th century art by such greats as Claude Monet, Edgar Degas and Vincent van Gogh.
Rodlend will open her studio from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday at 562 Holgerson Road in Dungeness. Parking attendants will be on site. The auction will begin at noon with Karl Hatton serving as auctioneer.
She plans to carry and show the art to bidders as Hatton begins the auction. Minimum prices are set for all auctioned copies. Her original paintings, prints and papier maché are priced as marked.
The art will be set up at her studio with the doors open, and the auction will take place outside. Items will be spaced apart with social distancing strongly encouraged and masks available. There will be beverages — mimosas and champagne — too.
“I want to give people an experience while trying to make the pricing accessible for all walks of life,” Rodlend said. “I’m also going to take every precaution to keep safe, social distancing.”
As for her affection for the classics, she prefers them in her home, or at least her recreations of them.
“You never get tired of the classics,” she said.
Rodlend paints each work side-by-side with each student.
“Some of them are very accurate, and some are more of my interpretation,” she said. “Looking at copies online, I’d say these are pretty darn good.”
Her goal is to auction off all the artworks, so she can make room for new pieces, she said.
Rodlend, originally from England, was a fixture in local schools since starting her “Carrie Art” program in 1982 for students in Sequim and branching out to more schools on the Olympic Peninsula.
She retired from helping in schools and continues to teach from home and explore the great outdoors with recent treks to Arizona and Colorado.
For more on Rodlend, contact her at monalisa@olypen.com or 360-477-5011.
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Matthew Nash is a reporter with the Olympic Peninsula News Group, which is composed of Sound Publishing newspapers Peninsula Daily News, Sequim Gazette and Forks Forum. Reach him at mnash@sequimgazette.com.