A relative newcomer to gourd art, Colleen recently left a career in landscape architecture to explore new directions and challenges. An early love of “functional art” was re-kindled while experimenting with hard-shell gourds. “Gourds are a great art medium!” she says. “They are endlessly variable, fascinating, and lend themselves to whatever creative path you want to follow. I enjoy the fusion of art and nature, and the challenge of adapting two-dimensional designs to three-dimensional objects. Nearly any technique used in arts and crafts can be used on gourds.”
Depending on each gourd and its inspiration, Colleen’s work ranges from realistic line drawings to stylized designs with geometric, botanical, or abstract patterns. Pyrography, carving, inlay, and leather dyes are her primary techniques. Symbols of the natural world such as plants, animals, birds, natural fibers and found objects are incorporated in designs and embellishments. A year living in American Samoa as a child and her parents’ tapa cloth collection sparked her interest in primitive and ethnic art styles. Native American, Polynesian, and African motifs are often included in her art work.
For inspiration, instruction, and support, Colleen is involved with Foothill Gourders in El Dorado Co., the California Gourd Society, and the American Gourd Society. She won a blue ribbon for her "Warrior Gourdess” mask in the California Gourd Society 2003 Gourd Art Competition, held at Welburn International Gourd Art Festival in southern California, and another ribbon for “Starbird Spirit Vessel” in the 2004 CGS Gourd Competition. She has contributed to two design panels on the Traveling Gourd, a statewide collaboration of California Gourd Society artists. Her gourd art has been displayed at the Firehouse Gallery in Murphys, Gallery 10 in Sutter Creek, and at two shows in the Calaveras County Art, Council Gallery in San Andreas, California. Colleen Platt was a Featured Artist at the Welburn International Gourd Art Festival in Fallbrook in 2005, and will also be a Featured Artist in the soon-to-be-published 'Beyond the Basics: Gourd Art' book by Sterling/Chapelle Publishers. Her work can now be seen at the Tidewater Gallery in Stockton, California (www.tidewaterartgallery.com).
Colleen works on her gourds in Valley Springs, where she lives on a hilltop with her husband Ron and rescued dog companion Sweetie (thanks to the Calaveras County Humane Society).
More of her art can be viewed on her web site C W Platt Gourds
www.cwplattgourds.com
