James, Jerrald
Artist Statement
Jerrald ‘Jerry’ James
Oregon Artist and Craftsman
Sculpture Paintings & Intricately Carved Candles
Art as a philosophy and a path
Artist and writer Elbert Green Hubbard said, “Art is not a thing, it is a way.” This way has not always been perfect, but being able to own what I do is a philosophy of life and a path to produce a life I believe in.
In all the twists and turns in my life, none has been more surprising than becoming an artist. Art, and its handmaiden craft, has provided me not only with a living but a sense of accomplishment as the winds of success and failure came and went.
There is a basic simplicity to creating the means to sustain your life using your own hand and eye. I experience great joy in sharing my artistic creations directly with others who appreciate and admire it. Living my life as an artist instills in me a real sense of honesty and self worth about what I do.
Constant Decision Making
Creative ideas can appear anytime and can be inspired by almost anything. However, once conceived the hard work begins—the hard work. The craftsman takes over from the artist and it is in the skill at manipulating the medium that the inspiration from a spark coverts to the tangible. Every aspect of the process requires decision making, from selection of the idea to pronouncing a work finished.
Frequenting art galleries and craft shows or just thumbing through magazines and books on art and nature helps stimulate my creativity. I also keep a notepad or drawing book close at hand for sketching out reminders. The basic ideas are the easy part of the process to be followed by the hard work of making a touchable reality. Within the process of this work is additional inspiration from the attention to both the accidental and purposeful events of creation. As the artwork moves from the ethereal to the solid it, in itself becomes the source of many further ideas.
About Artist Jerry James
Relocating from Santa Rosa California in 2000, I currently work from a workshop and studio just outside the small town of Leaburg in the McKenzie River basin of Oregon. My home and studio are located on a very peaceful six acres of forested country property. Two adjoining workshops provide plenty of space for a variety of art and craft enterprises.
Although I was born in Oregon, I have lived in California for most of my adult life. In the early 1970s after military service, I returned to Oregon and lived in Ashland for a short time working as a craftsman at Richards Candles, Merry England Crafts. Leaving Ashland I attended the University of Oregon in Eugene before returning to Oakland where, with a friend, we contracted with Northern Light Candles to promote their line of products in street fairs. In a short time four of us formed a general partnership, Karis Candles, for the manufacture, distribution and sale of carved candles. As a retail sales company, we used a demonstration sales technique, the making and carving of custom-designed candles, on the spot, before our mesmerized customers. We specialized in this venue and worked throughout the western US for twenty-five years, eventually incorporating as Karis Candles Inc. We continued to participate in hundreds of craft venues, art shows, and kiosk locations in shopping centers until we split up territories in 1984.
During this time Karis Candles, Inc. invested in Auric Enterprises Inc., a real estate management and renovation company. My position with this company was, after obtaining the proper state real estate licenses, vice president and renovation manager from 1980 and 1984. Still maintaining full participation in Karis Candles, I also opened Observe Gallery in Monterey California. This gallery, from 1984 to 1987, was one of California’s first art galleries specializing in both art and craft and representing the works of over fifty fine artisans and craftsmen.
After becoming sole owner of Karis Candles, Inc., I relocated the company to Santa Rosa and continued candle making. During this time, on advice of a friend, I had taken up the art of metal sculpture as a hobby. Karis Candles continued to be the main focus of my career, but other enterprises and raising a family added to my responsibilities during this period. Candles and art shows with sculpture as well as the Observe Gallery in Monterey were all based in my Santa Rosa workshop. Additionally, with my real estate licenses, I joined several Sonoma County brokerages as a sales agent in Santa Rosa and sold residential and commercial real estate, although this work was never a good fit for my artistic nature.
In 2000, for many personal reasons, I relocated to Leaburg, Oregon and built a working studio, shifting all my focus on becoming a full-time artist-craftsman. With the intensity of this focus, I have brought together my thirty-five+ years experience as a candle maker and twenty-five+ years as a metal sculptor, and a lifetime of acumen in business. While Ribbon Candles, because of their delicacy, can now only be ordered from my web-store at www.etsy.com/shop/RibbonCandles, my other work is now found in regional galleries of the Pacific Northwest.
Recently I have begun creating “boutique candles,” for galleries. These are a new line of sculptural forms under the title of “Un-feathered” bird candles. Produced one at a time, these candles are hand-carved and color-textured in fanciful bird and (occasionally) other animal shapes. Only occasionally offered in my on-line store because of their limited numbers, “Un-feathered” sculpture candles are now available in select galleries that carry my sculptures.
Metal sculpture has become a significant part of my artwork over the years, although metal sculptures are much slower to create. All of my sculptures are rendered as simply as possible. I use steel, copper and brass to make a wide range of subjects from the real and recognizable to the whimsical. A stretched canvas painting as a background allows the sculptured artwork to be framed separately in a unique way. These “sculpture paintings,” along with wall hangings and free-standing metal-sculpture subjects, are found exclusively in galleries around the Pacific Northwest. Sculpture-paintings are an original and exciting way for me to express a variety of subject matters that live within their own background settings.
Artist Code: JJC
