The Artist's Loft: Lee Anne Park - A Peek at the Peak Magazine

Posted By Natalie Keller on Jan 27, 2016

By Natalie Keller

Artist Lee Ann Park at work.

A few months ago, I met an artist at an exhibition sponsored by the Arizona Art Alliance. She was in charge of the Outreach program and was displaying a group of veteran’s artwork. She has volunteered in schools helping with the art programs and with veterans for many years in Virginia and now in Arizona. Lee Ann Park is a very special person who not only is an artist but shares many hours with those who want and need the opportunity to create art. She has a quiet soft-spoken friendly manner with a captivating smile. Lee Anne has been an artist all her life along with taking time to raise a family and work as a manager for Honeywell Federal Systems just outside Washington, D.C. Although art has always been her focus…in Arizona as an artist and as long-time President of the Desert Artists, she has organized and provided art experiences for special-needs and mainstream students on a volunteer basis for over twenty years.

Arizona Art Alliance

Lee Anne is Director of Community Outreach for the Arizona Art Alliance. Her responsibilities includes Outreach Programs for special-needs students in the Cave Creek Schools, seniors and residents of Life-Care in Paradise Valley, At-Risk elementary students in the Avondale area and five or more Veteran Outreach Programs across the Valley. Various Arizona Art Alliance member art groups offer these programs. “Enriching Life through Art” is a call taken quite seriously by thousands of artists who participate in the member art leagues and organizations of the Arizona Art Alliance. There are numerous volunteers dedicated to sharing art with others who may not have the opportunity or otherwise participate in art and its many facets. You can see more about the Arizona Art Alliance programs on their website listed at the end of this article.

Lee Anne’s Art

“Apache Trout” by Lee Anne Park

Lee Ann composes her paintings, drawings and scrimstones with predominantly “wildlife art”. She covers a variety of subjects and even wider variety of media. Her “Scrimstones” are a featured medium that is often overshadowed by her paintings in pastel and acrylic.

“Tiger’s Eye” by Lee Anne Park

Scrimstones are cut pieces of Howlite, with the subject scratched into the surface of the stone in great detail, then inked and dyed to enhance the piece. If a large stone is done it is usually set on Manzanita Root or mounted on a stand as a sculpture. If the stone is small, she has them worked into jewelry with wire-wrap and a variety of other settings. Recently, she began showing her stones set into the lids of handmade boxes at The Gallery at el Pedregal. You will see an animal or bird on each individual piece of Scrimstone on the lid.

“Look What I See” by Lee Anne Park

The art that inspired this method comes from the original American Whaler’s art of “Scrimshaw”. Sailors would take the teeth and bone of the whale and inscribe an image into the surface with a sail needle, then rub in the soot from the fires to blacken the inscribed lines. Lee Anne’s family is old New England and her aunt was a docent at the New Bedford Whaling Museum. Back in the 60’s, before the ban on ivory, her father would purchase whale’s teeth from the Mariner’s Museum in Virginia. In Scottsdale she found a slice of the Howlite in a shop while on business from her home base in Washington, D.C. (in 1980’s) and “Scrimstones” then became part of her art.

“Eagle” by Lee Ann Park

Howlite Stone

The rough Howlite looks like a dirty grey lump of stone but when rough cut, by a miner in Cave Creek or by a professional jeweler in Prescott, it reveals the beautiful white surface with natural grey webbing along with hints of other minerals. The stone can absorb dyes and watercolors and is sometimes commercially dyed to imitate turquoise. Lee Anne uses a carbide point to work the design into the surface, adds color and then sprays the piece with a professional jeweler’s coating to preserve it.

“Blue Butterfly” by Lee Anne Park

Visit The Gallery at el Pedregal and see some of her unique pieces of Scimstone along with her other art. Lee Anne’s work, both 2-D and the 3-D Scrimstones can also be viewed on her website, leeannepark.com, and the Arizona Art Alliance website, azartalliance.com. Visit azartalliance.com to learn more about their outreach Programs including the locations for all the veteran art classes.

Credits: Information and photos provided by Lee Anne Park. Organized and written by Natalie Keller