PORT TOWNSEND — This month’s Port Townsend Gallery Walk, a free event Saturday evening [April 5], beckons this time with a milestone party and, for one photographer, an entirely different genre.
“I am ‘normally’ a nature photographer,” said Stephen Cunliffe, the award-winning artist whose wild images grace the Port Townsend Gallery.
But when he traveled to Cuba, Cunliffe became a street shooter, a man seeking the essence of Havana.
The results, 14 selected images, are on display at the Port Townsend Gallery in “En las Calles: Street Scenes of Cuba and Mexico,” a show Cunliffe shares with painter JoAnne Heron. Heron adores Mexico, adores painting there, even if she sometimes cannot find watercolors bright enough to represent what she sees.
“The Mexicans are not shy about color in their houses, their clothes, their everyday household items. Nearly every building is either white or a bright color punctuating clear blue skies,” said Heron.
The Port Townsend Gallery, 715 Water St., will host a free reception with the artists from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday. Neighboring art spaces will do the same; here’s a cross-section of Gallery Walk stops.
■ The Wine Seller’s Loft Gallery, 1010 Water St., presents “Silhouettes,” the Port Townsend Photo Club’s juried show, opening Saturday.
Art lovers are invited to the reception — and to vote for their favorite works in the exhibit — from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday.
■ Gallery Nine, the artists’ cooperative at 1012 Water St., is celebrating its 10th anniversary throughout April with a show titled “Art Journey.” The featured artists are Mitch Poling, maker of Alaskan baidarka kayaks, and his wife Sandra Smith-Poling, painter of Port Townsend scenes. A party with the couple — and the whole co-op — is set for 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday with birthday cake and other treats.
■ The Red Raven Gallery, in the Undertown shops at 211 Taylor St., is placing Quilcene-bred artist Braden Duncan’s art in the spotlight. Duncan, a cofounder of the Seattle Arts Coalition who shows her art and curates shows around the Northwest, has brought to Port Townsend a show titled “Clockwork Coterie.”
■ The Northwind Arts Center, 2409 Jefferson St., presents “Wood x 2,” a show starring Michael McCollum and Mare Tietjen and their “rescued” wood creations.
The show runs through April 28 at Northwind, and has its opening party from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Saturday; then the artists will give a free talk on their work there at 1 p.m. Sunday.
For more information about these and other activities at the center, see www.NorthwindArts.org.