Oil Paintings & Family Coincidences
Life is always an adventure and you never know what you will run into around the next corner. I don't know which I find more fun, finding things at a good bargain or doing the research on them later?! Lately I have been very captivated by art pieces done by local artists. Those that put their names to their art are especially appreciated. In this trip to the 2nd hand store I was nearly ready to leave without having found anything of much interest, but decided I would take a look at all of the huge window displays. Was I ever glad I did.
As I was cruising the aisle around the perimeter of the store I looked up and saw the first oil painting by Renata Riess. The pictures my camera took just do not do it justice at all. The colors are so vibrant and painting so well done, it feels like you could just take that little lane right up to the barn and go inside an explore to your hearts content. I love old barn paintings and was so delighted when I saw this I could have jumped for joy. I thought $12.99 was more than a fair price, and I certainly wasn't going to let this one stay until half off day. It would have been gone for sure.
After reading the back and seeing how well Renata had labeled it, I remembered a smaller painting I had seen in the art aisle that reminded me of the barn picture. I hadn't picked it up to even look at, because I wasn't certain I wanted a landscape of a brown hill. I will admit my eye was attracted to the smaller painting I just, for some reason didn't pick it up to look at the back. The barn painting made me go back to the art aisle and pick up the smaller painting. Sure enough, it too was by Renata, but this one was an actual location I am very familiar with. In fact it is up the Klickitat river, and is a location I have driven by and looked at since my childhood. No wonder I thought that little picture looked so familiar. ha ha ha...it was $6.99 and a true bargain.
Here is where it all really gets funky. This wonderful artist, Renata Riess, has since passed away, but during her lifetime she lived in or near the small mill-town of Klickitat with her husband, Tony Riess. While doing research on her paintings, I found that her husband Tony had worked for many years in the Mill, (as a lumber grader), with my 2nd grt. grandma's brother, Frank S. Overacker, who worked there as an electrician. That just blew me away, they had to have known each other. Franks wife, Ida, was the census enumerator for West Klickitat in 1910. I found where she had written the names of both Tony and Renata, as well as her husband Frank, and herself, in that census. I also found they all attended the Klickitat Lutheran Church, and are buried in the Lyle-Bach cemetery. What are the odds of that happening?! I knew about my grt. grt. grandmothers brother Frank, through my grandmother, and genealogical research. She had told me of how her grandmother had died in Oklahoma in 1904 along with many of her children, in a measles epidemic. Frank came out West along with the some of the family, and worked to help support his younger siblings. If not for him they might have starved, times were so tough.
Not only is this artwork lovely, but it means that much more to me to have art from an artist who knew members of my family many years ago. It somehow makes me feel so much more connected to my roots, and attracted to these two pieces.
After reading the back and seeing how well Renata had labeled it, I remembered a smaller painting I had seen in the art aisle that reminded me of the barn picture. I hadn't picked it up to even look at, because I wasn't certain I wanted a landscape of a brown hill. I will admit my eye was attracted to the smaller painting I just, for some reason didn't pick it up to look at the back. The barn painting made me go back to the art aisle and pick up the smaller painting. Sure enough, it too was by Renata, but this one was an actual location I am very familiar with. In fact it is up the Klickitat river, and is a location I have driven by and looked at since my childhood. No wonder I thought that little picture looked so familiar. ha ha ha...it was $6.99 and a true bargain.
Here is where it all really gets funky. This wonderful artist, Renata Riess, has since passed away, but during her lifetime she lived in or near the small mill-town of Klickitat with her husband, Tony Riess. While doing research on her paintings, I found that her husband Tony had worked for many years in the Mill, (as a lumber grader), with my 2nd grt. grandma's brother, Frank S. Overacker, who worked there as an electrician. That just blew me away, they had to have known each other. Franks wife, Ida, was the census enumerator for West Klickitat in 1910. I found where she had written the names of both Tony and Renata, as well as her husband Frank, and herself, in that census. I also found they all attended the Klickitat Lutheran Church, and are buried in the Lyle-Bach cemetery. What are the odds of that happening?! I knew about my grt. grt. grandmothers brother Frank, through my grandmother, and genealogical research. She had told me of how her grandmother had died in Oklahoma in 1904 along with many of her children, in a measles epidemic. Frank came out West along with the some of the family, and worked to help support his younger siblings. If not for him they might have starved, times were so tough.
Not only is this artwork lovely, but it means that much more to me to have art from an artist who knew members of my family many years ago. It somehow makes me feel so much more connected to my roots, and attracted to these two pieces.
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