Byron Birdsall - Byron Birdsalls Alaska

BYRON BIRDSALLS

Anchorage1909: Several years before the great influx of settlers would permanently put Anchorage on the map, the first pioneers set up trading posts in the wild.

by Dana Stabenow

North to the Future, Alaska Steamship Co. Pier 2, Seattlec. 1927: The Merchant Marine Act of 1920 forced out the Canadian shipping competition. The eighteen ships of the Alaska Steamship Company held a virtual monopoly.

No painting technique is safe from Byron Birdsall. Having made his bones in watercolor with his first solo show in 1967, by 1981 he had moved into oils, and as if that werent enough, by 1987 Byrons homage to Russian icons stepped out in all their gilded moodiness, transporting the viewer straight back to the days of the Russian czars and the Russian Orthodox Church. I remember a painting that I swear was channeling Rasputin.

One constant throughout Byrons work has been color, from the delicate washes of his early watercolors to the bolder hues of his oils to the glitter of gold in his iconography. In this collection, just to keep us on our toes, he is switching to pen and ink sketches in black and white. He writes

... in 2005 Billie and I were

on the St. Charles Bridge in Prague, and I saw a chap sketching away in black and white. I watched him for awhile, and then bought one of his sketches.

I was fascinated and decided to try it for myself.

In his artists statement Byron says that he is marrying his new-found fascination with pen and ink with his lifelong love of history, which I give you fair warning will rapidly become your fascination, too. Page through this volume once and youll appreciate his eye for choosing just the right historical photographs to inspire his evocation of times gone by. Page through it again and youll notice how the styles of the automobiles act as milestones on this journey. A third time and you find your attention drawn specifically to what changes over the years and, more importantly, what doesnt.

I love City Hall, Anchorage, c. 1947 () for the old bus, the older buildings, the styles of dress, including the uniforms that make you remember that we had just been at war, and that Alaska had been a vital part of the Lend-Lease route that ferried airplanes and war materiel to Russia through Siberia. But looming always in the background are the Chugach Mountains, Tikishla and Near Point and Wolverine. You cant see Flattop behind City Hall, but you know its there, and you know that when that particular City Hall building is gone, Flattop will still be there because you hiked it last solstice. If that doesnt qualify City Hall, Anchorage, c. 1947 as a time machine I dont know what does.

Byron says that most of his inspiration for these sketches comes from the online photography archives of the University of Alaska and the Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center. But a photograph only freezes a moment in time, it doesnt interpret it. In his sketches Byrons pen thaws these moments into a liquid reflection, a ripple of light and shadow connecting present to past.

My favorite in this collection is Beautiful Downtown Ketchikan, c. 1935. (), which exceeds its brief of historical nostalgia to stray into social and cultural commentary. Here we have a working dock in a panhandle port. At bottom right is a fisherman wearing one of those old Greek-style fishermans caps. Next to him looms a totem pole topped with a very stern-looking Raven. Almost directly across the street and dwarfed by the totem pole is a light pole, strung with many electric lines crisscrossing overhead. At the far end of the dock a steamer is moored, smokestack emitting a waft of smoke. Maybe it just got there, maybe its firing up the boilers prior to departure, we dont know.

But the dominant figure is the totem pole. It may have been debased by being set up as a come-on for a gift shop, but it hasnt lost one shred of its dignity. It was there first, and even if it was traditionally meant to dissolve over time beneath the onslaught of wind and weather, you get the feeling that in spirit at least it will always be there, the Raven from its lofty perch louring down on everythingand everyonethat comes after.

Or thats what I see. Byrons genius is that you may see something completely different.

Dana Stabenow, 2015

Ship Creek1915: When the railroad headquarters moved from Seward to Anchorage, a tent city quickly sprung up around it.

Round trippers on the S.S. Alameda, Port of Anchorage14 July 1923: The iron-hulled S.S. Alameda ferried tourists, settlers, and cargo from Seattle to Alaska for over twenty years. She would later be scrapped after catching fire at her Seattle pier in 1931.

I have wanted to be a full-time artist since I was eight years old, when my father handed me a sketch pad and pencil, the better to keep me quiet in church. It worked. I drew and painted every spare moment since my eighth year, even when I should have been doing other things.

And then, thirty-two years later, my dream was realized, and I have been painting and making a living at it for the past thirty-four years. Think of it, painting all day and having a roof over my head, with enough left over for groceries.

Such has been my happy lot.

My work has evolved over the years, influenced by extensive travel to Africa, Japan, New Zealand, Europe, and other countries. I work primarily in watercolor, but often turn to oil painting, stone lithography, mosaic, and iconography.

Happy as an artist, I nonetheless had other itches to scratch. I was a history major in college and then taught history in high school for several years. History is a passion for me to this day. I have always strived to go back in time.

I have also admired those who had a special talent for pen and ink.

Then I had a flash!

Why not combine my fascination with history and my interest in pen and ink? And what better subject than the history of Alaska, where I have made my home for forty years. So I tried doing one, and then another, and then another, and I couldnt stop. This modest volume is the result. It is my hope that it captures the special spirit and joy of The Last Frontier that I have called home for many years.

That said, I think my life could be summed up no better than by Pablo Picasso, who once said, I paint as I breathe. When Im working Im resting.