News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
Gary Cooley with his sculpture depicting the legendary mountain man Liver-Eatin’ Johnson.
A passion for the West and the natural world runs through the art of Gary Cooley.
The painter and sculptor, who has lived in Bend for the past nine years, has opened a new gallery in Sisters at 352 W. Hood Ave. (in the big white building at the corner of Hood Avenue and Pine Street).
"A friend of mine bought this building and he said, 'I want you to be part of the building,'" Cooley said. "He wanted me to open a gallery here, so I did."
The gallery displays the African wildlife sculpture that has earned Cooley artist of the year honors from Safari Club International. Professional hunters praise the work, noting that Cooley "gets the eyes right" - one of the great challenges of wildlife sculpture or taxidermy.
Cooley has an artistic trick to get that to happen: At the end of the day, he positions a sculpture so that he looks it full in the face when he sees it in the morning. That instantaneous impression lets the artist know when something is off.
"You see your mistakes instantly," he said. "I'll spend maybe three, four days making sure the eyes are where they've got to be."
While he has had great success with his African sculptures, including a series of the African "Big Five," his heart is in the West. He particularly loves mountain man and Native American themes. His work includes a commissioned sculpture depicting the notorious "Liver Eatin'" Johnson and another commission of an eight-foot-tall Pawnee warrior.
"I'm probably going to do even more Western," he told The Nugget.
Cooley has always loved art, and he's got confidence in his abilities. Visiting a friend's gallery in Eugene, he studied the bronze sculptures.
"I was looking at some bronzes and I said, 'I could do that.' And I did," he said.
Cooley committed to his art full-time in 1985, after growing up and spending his early working life in the auto parts business. That experience has stood him in good stead in an area that can be a blind spot for artists. As his wife, Karen, notes, "Not every artist has business sense, and Gary has that."
The gallery owners appreciate the welcome they've received from the community and noted that the chamber of commerce's holiday events helped bring crowds into the new storefront.
The gallery also represents highly regarded watercolorist Cindy Briggs.
For more information on Cooley's work, visit www.garycooley.com.
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
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