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Stumptown Art Studio Counts on Community

By Beacon Staff

WHITEFISH – Eight-year-old Molly Ragan knows exactly how to explain her love for art.

“It’s kinda like magic,” she said, sliding her paintbrush over the ceramic white elephant coin bank soon to be transformed into a colorful piece of pottery. “Something comes from a pencil and turns out to be a really good decoration.”

During an afternoon last week, Ragan joined a few friends at Stumptown Art Studio to create a little “magic” – which is the perfect word to describe Whitefish’s popular nonprofit community art center.

The studio, which began in 1995 under the roof of a small, donated house on O’Brien Avenue, functions solely through the efforts of its eight-member Board of Directors. Four members alternate working schedules to keep the place open every day.

“It seems to work out,” board member Shelby Powell said while working at Stumptown’s front desk in its current location on Central Ave.

Stumptown helps out local artists by providing gallery space, but the bulk of the studio’s operating income is provided by its paint-your-own pottery business.

“What a lot of people don’t realize – over half of our business is tourists,” Powell said. “Ceramics really keeps us going.”

All proceeds from pottery sales go toward workshops and classes in glass fusing, mosaics, painting and sculpture.

Because of this, the nonprofit depends on donations and volunteers from the Whitefish community, as well as memberships, grants and fundraisers to stay up and running.

In turn, artist and board member Melanie Drown said the studio gives back to the community in a variety of ways. Recently, it launched a community service project for local eighth-graders to decorate 3-dimensional clay tiles, which were donated to the Whitefish Bike and Pedestrian Trail.

In-house teachers, who are all certified to instruct in grades K through 12, also provide art classes to schools all over the Flathead Valley. While the gig is paid, Drown said the studio makes only about 5 percent, with 80 percent going to the teachers and 10 percent to art supplies.

“We’re not doing it to get rich – we’re doing it to provide quality experience for kids,” she said.

She said a lot of Stumptown’s programs are geared toward giving children healthy activities, especially during after-school hours. To fill in that gap between the end of the school day and when parents get home from work, the studio created an after-school art club.

Drown, who moved to Whitefish in 1991 from eastern Montana, teaches children’s camps and adult workshops in the distinctive art of glass fusing. She joined Stumptown’s board in 2000.

Before becoming a self-proclaimed “studio junkie,” Drown was an accountant with no previous art experience. She was delegated the task of learning about glass fusing about four years ago, when the studio decided to expand its offerings. She dove right into the learning process, reading books, researching on the Internet and “blowing stuff up in the kiln.”

After writing a grant and attending a five-day intensive class on the subject in Portland, Ore., Drown was ready to teach.

Glass fusing is considered a warm glass art, she said, while glass blowing requires hot glass. The kiln fires at 1,450 degrees, and it takes 24 to 30 hours to fire a piece because the glass has to heat and cool slowly.

Multiple layers of glass are heated to the point of fusion to create one piece. The studio purchases special, fusible glass from Portland and offers walk-in glass fusing for beginners. Drown said this is similar to the paint-your-own pottery, as pre-cut shapes of glass are available for purchase and can be fused with glass beads, crushed and powdered glass.

While Stumptown teachers are always happy to help, walk-in fusing is an independent venture. The studio also offers workshops where students can watch demonstrations, learn the science behind glass fusing and work with a specific theme.

The next adult workshop will be on July 15 and focus on fused jewelry. The cost is $50 for Stumptown Art Studio members and $55 for non-members, which includes materials and snacks. Drown said participants are welcome to bring wine. For more information, visit http://www.stumptownartstudio.org/.

“We want people to feel it’s a very user-friendly place,” she said, and added that the older people get, the more they become intimidated by art classes.

But art is a great thing for adults to try.

“It’s like cheap therapy,” Drown said.