Artist presents retrospective at Bainbridge Arts & Crafts | Kitsap Weekly

By JESSICA SHELTON
Bainbridge Island Review

If Sally Robison were an animal, she would definitely be a cat — although it’s doubtful that nine lives would be enough to contain her creativity.

This is a lady who can transform canceled stamps into art (in “Feathered Friends,” Thomas Jefferson’s 1-cent mugs become bird mother; Frederick Douglass and FDR, Jefferson’s intellectual relations, her chicks) and then turn around, fire up Photoshop and whip up a digital painting of a chaotic market like she was born with a computer rattle in hand.

Which, considering that she is 83 and was raised in Aberdeen, Mississippi, is quite an unlikely scenario.

For more than 35 years, the artist and activist has called Bainbridge home. She moved with her husband Merrill, a former Weyerhaeuser vice president and long-time city councilman, from Seattle after “10 years of rhapsodic traveling” in 1979. (He wanted a domain in front of which he could dock his boat.)

With a deep appreciation for the imaginative life — and so many ideas! — Robison became a critical cultural advocate, first joining the board of Bainbridge Arts & Crafts, then going on to become its president.

In 1986, she help founded Bainbridge Island Humanities Council, now called Arts & Humanities Bainbridge, whose purpose was to “inspire the island community with extraordinary and creative experiences,” and for eight years, she wrote bi-monthly columns for the Bainbridge Island Review, later published in “A Permanent Guest’s Illustrated Guide to Bainbridge Island.”

Now, Robison leads a weekly writing group, going 15-years strong, and when she’s not caring for Merrill, she pursues her own artistic reveries.

She works in about a million mediums, a fact that is reflective of her persistent, inventive nature, which has always met obstacles, particularly illnesses, with creative energy.

A few examples: Although Robison was initially a painter — she has an MFA from the University of Florida specializing in intuitive design — she suffered from an eye condition called keratoconus, which made it difficult for her to draw. So when her eyesight began to fail, she turned to writing.

Then, 22 years ago, she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

“It was very small and I’ve been clean and clear of it all these years, but I had said to myself, ‘Well, what do you really want to do with your life?’” she recalled. “And I said to myself, ‘I want to draw and play bridge.’”

With her vision restored after corneal surgery, Robison discovered a new easel in the MacBook. She says it was love at first sight, but she’s already well on to machine No. 5.

With a passion for teaching, Robison has worked hard to bring technology to the forefront of BAC’s programming. She described how a class she developed with photographer Art Grice, “Introduction to the Computer World,” helped to shake things up at a time when BAC was floundering.

“I thought, ‘The world is changing, and the computer is here to stay; and if it’s here to stay, we have to embrace it,’ ” Robison explained. “That’s what the role of all these art institutions is — looking to the future.”

The one-time Southerner is grateful to the community that’s nourished her — she hails BAC as the keystone for the artist and raves about her writing group for giving her “divine friendships” and a setting to share her wisdom.

“You have to trust your instincts,” she said she tells the ladies. “That doesn’t mean you have to trust the market or you have to trust the next exhibition; you have to trust your instincts. And the closer you get to your instincts, the more wonderful the paintings are.”

Quipster that she is, Robison would probably prefer a final note of funny, rather than sentimentality, in her profile. So I’ll direct you to her quirky masterworks and their tongue-in-cheek titles; there’s “Ambivalent Voter Bombarded by a Progressive Idea,” “Woman Attacked by Birds on Her Way to Church,” and “Flying Garter Belt,” among others.

Bainbridge Arts & Crafts, 151 E. Winslow Way, will present 25 of Robison’s pieces — a mix of watercolor, drawings, digital paintings and acrylics spanning nearly 50 years — from Oct. 2 through Oct. 25.

Show up for the artist’s reception 6-8 p.m. Oct. 2 and you might be able to meet the witty wonder herself. Otherwise, peruse the exhibit during visiting hours, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.