Milkwood Studio & Leo E. Osborne 2024
- The ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT II Exhibition
2024 will soon be half over and on May 24th the ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT II Exhibition that has toured the United States and a venue in Canada for the past six years will have its ending venue at the National Wildlife Art Museum in Jackson, Wyoming.
This was such a special exhibition and I am grateful that my two works in that show have toured with this event and have been at many museums and hopefully enriched the lives of people seeing them. I am very grateful to David Wagner, the Curator of this exhibit and the work involved in seeing this show go on the road.
My work continues to be viewed in Charleston South Carolina at the Kevin LePrince Gallery and in Maine with Harbor Square Gallery of Camden and The Blue Raven Gallery in Rockland.
Locally, I am excited to once again this year present work at the Scott Milo Gallery with Kathy Khile whom I have worked with for decades now, since moving to Guemes Island 31 years ago. There are several new paintings in the studio, with more being worked on for this September show.
Life is great and wonderful, living my later years here on this green isle with my honey Jane and doing ‘The Work’ that I have been mandated to accomplish in this lifetime.
Continue reading → - MILKWOOD STUDIO & LEO E. OSBORNE 2023
Do not text me….
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I still have a land line, no I-Phone, I barely know how to use this computer, but it does make a good writing tool, though I still miss the wonderful sound of keys typing on a non-electric typewriter.
Through it all, I have kept busy in 2023. I did 10 new paintings that were shown and sold at a September Show in which I was featured and to my own surprise I have completed a new large wood carving. It will soon be photographed and it will be shown on this website, PALACE OF THE GOLDEN PLOVER is the title, you can watch for it to see what it is. Ya, there is a plover in it!
I continue to send my work to the East Coast of the US though shipping has drastically increased as well as the cost of bronze. So, my prices had to increase to keep up with that change.
I had work in a number of fine exhibitions, though I did not travel to any of them. I am not flying and not going to large gatherings. I have not had covid and that is partly why I stay put on this little island in the Salish Sea of the great Pacific Northwest, being reclusive. Yup, the old reclusive artist, just doin’ his thing and watching the world go by, Sittin’ on the dock of the bay, hey!
I continue to work my gardens and look forward to springtime to do its thing.
Reviewing my last years MYSTERIES UNFOLDING AT MILKWOOD, where I had written about the horror of not being able to get from GOLDEN PAINTS the same type of sealer that I had used prior to covid as they could no longer get those raw materials. This sealer was the element needed to oxidize my composite gold leaf paintings. After many calls during months of time, and talking with many folks at GOLDEN, they somewhere found about 2 gallons of the old material and kindly sent that to me. So, I should have enough to last the rest of the time that I hope to be painting and I can continue to produce the style of work that I have become noted for, the oxidized paintings. I am truly grateful to GOLDEN in reconfirming to me that there are still good people out there in the world.
My quest, as always, remains: To share and to bring beauty into the world, for lifting the spirits of people… - And…another year passes.
And…another year passes. I am turning 75 and don’t realize it! Sometimes I really think I am much younger. This can be great for the mind, but it can cause problems when I overdo things, like wood carving, digging in my gardens, carrying too much bronze sculpture around = doctor, physical therapy, message, heat pads, ice, acupuncture!!!!
It’s a pain in the arse and other places too! But, I still work at my art. Something like 20 new paintings came out of me and I became fascinated with using ferns as forms for trees in my paintings on gold leaf. This unique technique of mine has been an evolution for 23 years. I have used composition gold leaf and oxidizing it with coats of polymer varnish, which turns some of the gold shades of green. The acrylic has been a product of Golden Paints. However, due to the friggin’ covid 19, the company has not been able to get its raw ingredients to make this UV protective coating. They still are not able to produce the product….so….I will now be forced to begin another process for my painting style.
Adjusting, reinventing, exploring once again into my life as an artist. This year too saw a 20% increase in the cost of producing limited edition bronzes sculptures. This is also causing a need to reconsider what I will cast in bronze. The economy of this world is in the toilet and it appears that it may go down the drain soon, as it is getting worse. There is a great need to be grateful, to bring beauty into the world through art, so I am still under my mandate to create.
I created a new bronze using a pair of birds as subjects and this was inspired by a flock of Eurasian Doves visiting our island neighborhood. With my constant urging of the planet towards peace, I took the words from an old protest sang by Pete Seeger and sculpted the piece, RING THE BELL OF FREEDOM, from the song, “If I Had A Hammer”. I will be submitting this sculpture into several juried exhibitions this year coming. There are already two exhibitions scheduled for the coming year and I shall be working on new works for them soon, as ideas are now forming for that to happen.
So, we shall see what appears from my studio in the weeks and months ahead and I know it will be a surprise to not only my collectors, but also to myself.
Continue reading → - MILKWOOD STUDIO & LEO E. OSBORNE 2021-2022
As we near the winter solstice and turning of the sun to give us more daily light, I feel grateful to be alive and living peacefully with my wife Jane Lane, love of my life, on a small island in the great Pacific Northwest, and still doing my work.
2021 has been a great year for me, in having been included in several museum exhibitions and shows at the galleries that represent me. I will continue to submit work to international shows as I have two new bronze editions about to come out at the turning of the year. My work shall be again included in the Environmental Impact II Exhibition tour which begins in February2022 at the Bateman Centre of art in Victoria, BC. I can only hope that the border can be crossed at the time of the opening at the centre, which as the raven flies is only a few miles across the waters of the Salish Sea, but governmental regulations with the Covid Pandemic means that borders may yet again close and the inability to be in groups may not allow for a proper opening of this fantastical exhibition of international importance.
There are two shows scheduled for my paintings in January and in October of 2022. This year, my 74th, saw me complete another wooden burl original sculpture, this time with snails as the subject. The Fibonacci Spiral, The Golden Ration has influenced my thinking in that dimension and the love of snails, AMOUR D’ESCARGOT is the completion of this idea. My new paintings have been most stimulating to create for they embrace yet again the 20-year evolution of my discovered technique of oxidation with leaf and the use of acrylic paints ;and mediums. This group of works are in the theme of The Mystical Light of the Pacific Northwest. I am very excited to see the public response to this re-inventing of myself and this medium of choice.
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- HOW DO I KEEP SANE IN THIS WORLD OF PANDEMIC FRIGHT AND DISASTER?
As the seasons change, as another year appears, may we see a change in all of us to protect and love our planet and ALL life upon it.I am grateful for the many years that my work has toured in The Environmental Impact Exhibition traveling around the United States and Canada. It was this connection to Stanford University that I became an artist being shared on the attached Stanford University Blog MAHB.How Do I keep Sane in This World of Pandemic Fright and Disaster?
| MAHB (stanford.edu)
Continue reading → - TOGETHER AS A PLANET
So….here we are….together, as a planet
Everyone has to deal with it, we have been directed to stay home, be still, think about what we have done to the planet and animals that we share it with and let us not forget the people, black, red, brown, yellow, white, blue/purple, copper, bronze, pink any green ones out there?
I have named and associated this virus as the CORVID #9#9#9 Virus…..picking up the theme from Alfred Hitchcock’s, The Birds, black carrion and The Beatles White album, number 9 number 9, number 9…….black & white together….hmmmm, seems to be a theme there too!
So, here we are in this together and with the question of when will it change? Will it? Ever? We don’t know and therefore we must wear masks, so we can’t tell who each other is, but we call that being safe. Trying to keep this virus under cover, under wrap, under world, but it is right under our noses and we are in it’s presence, this pandemic.
But ya know what…some days I think we deserve it…we have done so much wrong, we continue to support government leaders to warring, to not heeding the intelligence of scientists and intellectual people to STOP this damn polluting of the Earth and the Atmosphere. How long before we have a Universal Revolt against these criminals, who are not intelligent, but as a great writer of our time Wendell Berry calls the brains of the corporate world, not intelligent minds, simply clever ones. Their cleverness is used for their gain and profits of the Capitalist System that has now totally overturned Democracy.
So, let’s hear it for THE BLACK BIRDS, they will await the time for devouring the remains of humans, an avian feast-a banquet for the rulers of the sky, for the intelligence of the birds, who are truly more intelligent than humans..I mean look at the facts…look at what we have created with our minds..and now we are seeing the results of our foolishness.
Continue reading → - John Doyle Gallery
In 1988 I went to Charleston, South Carolina for my first time at the Southeastern Wildlife Expo. I attended for several years after and at one show was awarded Best In Show as well as the honor of having my work selected for their Purchase Awards.
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In 1994 Candace Martin, a friend of mine from Maine opened her Martin Gallery and I remained with Martin Gallery for 20 some years until it recently closed.
NOW, in 2020 I am thrilled to announce that my work continues to be represented in Charleston, South Carolina at The JOHN C. DOYLE GALLERY on 125 Church Street in the fabulous historical French Quarter of the City. - My 1970 Winter and the L. L. Bean Story
By 1982 I had established myself as a bird carver living on the Maine Mid Coast in the Rockland area, and as years went on I won such notoriety as Best In World Interpretive Bird Carving with the Ward Foundation in Maryland and had begun to show work at various museums.
During that year of 1982 I also had a long display of my bird carving work at the “Old” L. L. Bean Store at the second level of the old wooden staircase, behind a glass window display area.
However, this story occurred in the wild and fierce winter of 1970, one of the biggest snow years in Maine’s recorded weather history.
My wife and I were in our early twenties and one year prior had built a geodesic dome two and one half miles into the woods on a closed road, deep in the interiors of Warren, Maine. We had parents still alive in the Boston area and we would hitch hike there every six weeks or so to visit. It was then, and still is, about a four hour drive and to hitch hike it could take many hours of road standing and thumbs out! It amazed us though that at times we made the trip with various drivers in 4.5 hours, that was a treat!
On one of these visits we headed back to Maine and had done pretty well until it started to snow. And it snowed BIG and it was a severe Nor’easter blowing hard into our faces as we headed north. We got dropped off at Freeport by a driver and we knew that L. L. Bean would be opened all night and we made our way there to get warmed and have a cup of coffee before heading back to the highway and in hopes of someone being on the road at this time of night, which was in the later hours of the evening, like maybe 9-10 pm to venture a guess.
At the store, we realized that we had a very intense night ahead of us and we were cold….freezing cold!!! So, not having any money, we were just a couple of long haired hippies, living off the land, I took it upon myself to help myself to two sets of mittens, scarves and hats, placing them into my backpack…then we left the store!
We did get picked up by a generous man driving a big freight truck. It was slow going, but he was able to take us to the road that led into the land that we owned and where our dome was located. We still had that 2.5 mile walk into our dome and it was snowing and had accumulated to about 2 feet by the time we headed into the woods. There was also the intense winds that were whirling snow upon us and blinding us so that we could barely see and it was by now after midnight. It was rather scary!
We had gotten just over half way there when my wife so dear, just fell into a snow bank and said she just had to sleep for a bit. I knew we could not survive that, so I half carried her staggering the next hour which it took us to walk what should have been no more than 15 minutes to our shelter. Of course it was super cold in the dome where no wood fire had been for several days. I managed to get a fire going and we hunkered down into quilt after quilt and made it through the night, at home, in our dome, safe and sound. That spring, we saw where dear had eaten bark off trees some 20 feet up, that is how much snow we got in that winter of 1970!
Yes, I did steal those garments from L. L. Bean, but doing so might have saved our lives that night. So, finally, now, in 2019 I am personally thanking L. L. Bean for that gift, on that night so fierce!
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MILKWOOD STUDIO & LEO E. OSBORNE 2023
Do not text me….
I still have a land line, no I-Phone, I barely know how to use this computer, but it does make a good writing tool, though I still miss the wonderful sound of keys typing on a non-electric typewriter.
Through it all, I have kept busy in 2023. I did 10 new paintings that were shown and sold at a September Show in which I was featured and to my own surprise I have completed a new large wood carving. It will soon be photographed and it will be shown on this website, PALACE OF THE GOLDEN PLOVER is the title, you can watch for it to see what it is. Ya, there is a plover in it!
I continue to send my work to the East Coast of the US though shipping has drastically increased as well as the cost of bronze. So, my prices had to increase to keep up with that change.
I had work in a number of fine exhibitions, though I did not travel to any of them. I am not flying and not going to large gatherings. I have not had covid and that is partly why I stay put on this little island in the Salish Sea of the great Pacific Northwest, being reclusive. Yup, the old reclusive artist, just doin’ his thing and watching the world go by, Sittin’ on the dock of the bay, hey!
I continue to work my gardens and look forward to springtime to do its thing.
Reviewing my last years MYSTERIES UNFOLDING AT MILKWOOD, where I had written about the horror of not being able to get from GOLDEN PAINTS the same type of sealer that I had used prior to covid as they could no longer get those raw materials. This sealer was the element needed to oxidize my composite gold leaf paintings. After many calls during months of time, and talking with many folks at GOLDEN, they somewhere found about 2 gallons of the old material and kindly sent that to me. So, I should have enough to last the rest of the time that I hope to be painting and I can continue to produce the style of work that I have become noted for, the oxidized paintings. I am truly grateful to GOLDEN in reconfirming to me that there are still good people out there in the world.
My quest, as always, remains: To share and to bring beauty into the world, for lifting the spirits of people….
NEWS FROM MILKWOOD
Hey folks, a lot has happened and more is scheduled for the remainder of this 2019 into 2020…..
The year started with the Smith &Vallee Gallery and their Bird Invitational Exhibition, then onto the Scot Milo Group Painting Show which went great. The Skagit Land Trust had its auction with another year of having an Osborne SOLD at their event to raise money. The Anacortes Madrona Grove Sculpture Garden juried into this years event my EAGLE SONG of two embracing Eagles and THE ILLUMINATED ONE, the bronze of my Cormorant. There was the MONA Auction which I sent a work to this year and SOLD to my wonderful friend and collector of many years and many works of my art, Marge Bickel. Another auction that I shall be a part of is The Loyalhanna Watershed Association in Ligonier, Pennsylvania , held at the wonderful Rolling Rock Country Club of the noted golfer Arnold Palmer.
Coming up for the remainder of this year, I will again have a work with the 59th Annual Society of Animal Artists Exhibition, I will again be participating in the National Wildlife Art Museum in Jackson, Wyoming for their WESTERN VISIONS SHOW and I am pleased to announce that they installed my 13 foot bronze, MAGINATION in a perfect and sweet location on the museum grounds.
With the National Sculpture Society I have again been juried into the exhibit at the PERFORMANCE IN SCULPTURE EXHIBIT at the Straz Center for the Performing Arts in Tampa, Florida.
Another very special event that I shall be a part of with six bronze sculptures exhibited, is IN THE TRADITION OF AUDUBON, held at The Cincinnati Museum Center, Cincinnati, Ohio,
September 13 – January 5.
On December 6th, I will participate in a group show of a small painting opening at Scot Milo Gallery here in Anacortes, WA.
And….I must mention that THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ‘II’ EXHIBITION begins its three year museum tour of the United States. I am especially proud of this exhibit as it was through a phone conversation with curator David Wagner during the Gulf Oil Spill, that we together began the organizing of the first Environmental Impact Exhibition which toured a few years back to a number of North American Museums.
Very soon now, my first written and illustrated book, THE CAT & THE CORACLE will be published, printed and released. I will be showing the 24 colored illustrations and the 15 black & white drawings at the opening for this book, all pieces being for sale.
So, it has been a busy and exciting year, even though now nearing 72, I said that I was slowing down..well guess what, I still have the spunk and the juice to go on with….yes, doing more paintings than sculpture which is so very physically exhausting, but moving ahead with my journey in a life as an artist…….and another book is starting to find its way into my journaling and writing!
