Walking Clouds by Jeanne Toal

Artist Jeanne Toal’s work has sparked an unprecedented response at Jeanette Best Gallery. Works filled with light and color, on view in the show titled Elemental, drew an extraordinary number of visitors in the six weeks the exhibition was on view in our downtown space.

"I haven't seen anything like this," said Northwind Art executive director Martha Worthley, who last spring invited Jeanne to show her work in Northwind's gallery.

Toal's works, with titles such as “Cloud Gate,” “Morning,” “Sea Light” and “Sky Light,” were part of “Elemental” together with sculptures by the well-known Coupeville artist Jan Hoy. The show came to a close Monday, November 18.

Jeanne, who moved to Port Townsend six years ago, set up her art studio in a snug garden shed in her backyard. In an artist talk she gave at the gallery last month, Jeanne spoke about working in that tiny space, and about the life events that got her to this point.

She grew up in Reno, Nevada, where she fell in love with the high desert, the high mountains and the endless horizon. As a young woman she took an art class at the local YMCA; Jeanne vividly remembers her first mentor.

She had the perfect name: Betty Bliss. And this art teacher was "like a mischievous 11-year-old in an 85-year-old body,” Jeanne recalled. And when Jeanne mistakenly bought watercolors for this oil painting class, she and Bliss just laughed together and got on with it.

Later Jeanne moved to California and began her first career as a medical writer. She’d wanted to be a doctor, but didn’t have the means for medical school.

"I did pretty well," as a writer, Jeanne said. But then came a day that changed everything.

After five years in the medical field, she happened to see a flyer for a drop-in center where she lived in Palo Alto, Calif. There, breakfast was served to people who were living on the street. Jeanne went for a visit, met some of the men there, and decided there and then to quit her writing job. She became a volunteer at the drop-in center — and stayed for about 15 years.

When it came time for a change, Jeanne pursued her interest in bodywork.

“I grew up in a family without touch. So that was a whole new world,” she recalled. Jeanne went on to serve as a bodyworker in hospice settings and at Children’s Hospital at Stanford in Palo Alto.

She later moved on to her third career, working in refugee resettlement in Portland, Ore. Jeanne remembered visiting refugees who had almost nothing in their kitchens — but would bring out a single can of cola and share it with her.

Jeanne, 75, has coped with illness and loss in recent years, including glaucoma and multiple eye surgeries. She is nearly blind in one eye.

In her studio, the artist pours her passion into her paintings. She never sets out with a plan, though. Using oil paint sticks and imitation gold leaf, she works on several paintings at a time.

And Jeanne’s art is infused with light. She is fond of a quotation from the writer Lucille Clifton: “The light insists on itself in the world.”

These days, painting feeds her. That feeling of knowing when a piece is finished, she said with a smile, "is like good sex."

People who came into the gallery, whether or not they knew about the "Elemental" show, found themselves enchanted by Jeanne's art.

"I just resonate with her paintings, and from the sound of it, many others do too ... her work is mesmerizing and so very beautiful," said Lonna Richmond, an admirer from California.

“Jeanne is a soulful, empathic person,” added Worthley, “and that comes through in her paintings.”

Visit again soon!

This season, we will feature short articles about Northwind Art's exhibiting and teaching artists on this page titled A Closer Look. We invite you back to this space to learn more about the brilliant makers in our midst.