Belfair Self-Storage showcases Alice Durrie

Artist Alice Durrie has embraced an eclectic variety of media in her attempts to capture and convey the beauty she sees in seemingly insignificant and naturally occurring phenomena around her.

Belfair Self-Storage manager Barbara Treick said she looks forward to sharing Durrie's visions and handiwork with appreciative audiences in April.

Durrie traces the origins of her 25-year professional art career to influences that include her father, an interior decorator whom she watched create domestic art and who introduced her to art from other cultures, and to her wife and "muse," Teresa "Tree" Smith, a professional photographer.

Durrie said she is particularly moved by Japanese art, with its techniques of layered "underpainting" and bonsai miniature tree cultivation.

After living along for several years after retirement, Durrie credits Tree's arrival in her life with making her even more aware of beauty, from the mix of colors in a load of laundry to the mix of sunlight and shadow that falls on the bamboo in her backyard.

Durrie has created a series of torsos out of mortar, rocks, shells, jewels and driftwood, which Shelton's Museum Contempo featured in a "Body of Work" exhibit, but she's also worked with paper-mâché, Japanese inks on rice paper to create sumi-e paintings, and kelp, seaweed and driftwood to create wall hangings.

Durrie has created orbs of varying sizes from cloth and ribbons, and handmade dolls, repurposed books and collages.

The results of her genre-spanning experiments have earned her exhibits (plus ribbons and cash prizes) at Museum Contempo, the Peninsula Art Association's annual spring shows, and San Juan and Kitsap island fairs.

Durrie's more abstract work comes after years of employing her skills in more practical ways, as a structural painter for Tacoma schools and by working on the brightwork for schooners, which gave her opportunities for travel.

"It's like I've lived five complete lifetimes," Durrie said.

With Museum Contempo owner Andrea Mastrangelo coming up with two subject-themed shows per year, Durrie has no shortage of outside inspiration if she needs it.

When Durrie saw an exhibition of Treick's artwork, "I realized I wanted my artwork on her walls, too."

Durrie said people who stop by Belfair Self-Storage's art wall in April will be treated to "a lot of cloth collages, beading and combinations of other materials, with abstract depictions of flower petals to catch the edges of the light."

Durrie and Treick are still discussing the date of her reception. The business is at 23270 NE state Route 3.

Durrie said she never knows when or where artistic inspiration will strike, but regardless of when her hands start itching to create, she has an understanding spouse.

"The ingredients of art are everywhere," Durrie said. "It could be 2 a.m., and the way the colors bounce off each other on the walls might inspire me. It's a wonderful adventure, and fortunately for me, my wife says I'm never as beautiful as when I'm creating."

Author Bio

Kirk Boxleitner, Reporter

Shelton-Mason County Journal & Belfair Herald
[email protected]