PORT ANGELES — It will be a sight unlike any before now at Studio Bob: some 400 paintings from the hands and hearts of three men.
Since Feb. 1, Port Angeles artists Jeff Tocher, Doug Parent and Johnny Rickenbacher have finished one, and sometimes more than one, painting every day.
During the Juan de Fuca Festival of the Arts’ evening concerts of May 26-30, the three did paintings inspired by the bands and dancing crowds, finishing several canvases each night.
And they’re not stopping: This project is yearlong, to continue through Jan. 31.
Now the trio, which has adopted the name Three Legged Dog, is about to unleash its work so far.
Studio Bob, the upstairs gallery at 118½ E. Front St., is the display space and the venue for an opening reception from 5 p.m. until 8 p.m. Saturday.
The show also will be open for public viewing from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday.
Admission is free to both events, which mark a change in Port Angeles’ Second Weekend art-show schedule.
After holding artists’ receptions the second Friday night of the month for the past three and a half years, Studio Bob and a number of other downtown art galleries are switching to Saturday nights.
So from this month forward, venues such as the Art Front, 118 E. Front St.; the Waterfront Art Gallery, 120 W. First St.; Blow Hard Glass at 110 E. Railroad Ave.; and Karon’s Frame Center, 625 E. Front St., will have their opening receptions at 5 p.m. Saturdays.
Second Friday Art Rock, however, will continue to blend live music and performance art the second Friday of the month at Bar N9ne, 229 W. First St.
Bob Stokes, the Bob of Studio Bob, said it’s high time for a change that will, he believes, appeal to locals and tourists alike.
People are often too tired on Fridays to go out to a string of art parties, he believes — or they haven’t even arrived yet on the North Olympic Peninsula.
This is why, Stokes said, Port Townsend holds its gallery walk the first Saturday of the month instead of Friday.
Those who visit Studio Bob this Saturday night will get an eyeful: that exhibition of some 131 daily paintings times three artists.
They also will see the painters doing their thing: creating that day’s piece during the reception.
Finishing a painting every 24 hours has been difficult, easy, painful, pain-relieving and exhilarating, depending on the day and the artist.
Before this project, “my biggest problem was finishing paintings,” Tocher said, while working on yet another canvas during one of the Monday painting parties at Rickenbacher’s home.
Tocher, who makes a living in large part on his whimsical wildlife paintings, said he’s regained his relish for the act of creation — for its own sake.
Completing a canvas each day and sharing it on Facebook, he added, allows him to give his art to the world and to receive the response from friends nearby and far away.
Rickenbacher, for his part, calls himself the newcomer in the trio. He said Tocher and Parent are helping to raise the artistic standards he sets for himself.
A contractor who rebuilds old houses, Rickenbacher picked up his paintbrush just a few years ago in response to something he calls “the art ache.”
“I mistook it for loneliness in the past,” Rickenbacher said.
These days, his energy for painting seems boundless — and his canvases have eased that ache.
Parent, a 62-year-old retired carpenter, said the yearlong project is both a stimulant and a walk into the unknown.
“I think we need to be challenged in life,” he said.
“I put myself on narrow ledges sometimes, but that’s the joy of living. I don’t want to live a mundane, everything-comfortable kind of life.
“It’s like in the wilderness, when you don’t know what’s around the bend but you want to go.
“The more you put into something, the more you get back,” Parent said.
“You push, it pushes back. It’s just a life force going on.”
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Features Editor Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-417-3550 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.