ou can take the girl out of the city, but as Marjorie Scholl's new body of work shows, you can't always take the city out of the girl. Scholl has come to be known for her vibrant, colorful paintings of Kachemak Bay scenes as well as her intimate portraits of children and working men and women. Whether landscapes of wilderness or of the human body, Scholl has an unerring eye for the essential.
For her show opening Friday at Fat Olives, Scholl looks at the urban landscape, particularly of her childhood home of San Francisco. With the open walls of the converted bus barn at the corner of Ohlson Lane and the Sterling Highway, Fat Olives has been Scholl's gallery for several years. She's been working since 2005, with a big push since last June, to do her "Cityscapes" show.
"Fat Olives has been a perfect venue," Scholl said. "No politics, and big, with room for hanging."
Born in Augusta, Maine, Scholl, 37, moved to the San Francisco Bay area at age 4, living in Walnut Creek near Oakland. She got her bachelor of arts degree at the San Francisco Art Institute, one of the last fine arts colleges in the United States.
"It was fun to have this solo, really raw experience there," she said of SFAI.
Scholl had painted portraits in San Francisco, but after moving to Homer in 1997, like so many other artists, the land inspired her.
"I always painted people," she said. "When I moved up here, I started doing landscapes. What a gorgeous view."
A 2006 work, "Volcano Ocean," for example, captures the bay in all its power. A volcano on the horizon spits a roaring cloud of ash while towering waves and swirling gyres reflect in the sea the energy of the earth. In that work, Scholl uses thick, textured paint that makes the work almost sculptural.
That same energy comes out in her "Cityscapes." These are sometimes mean, sometimes friendly, but always lively streets -- streets filled with people.
"I wanted to call it 'Cityscapes and Their People,' but it's too literal," Scholl said. "Cities have people. It had to be about people. People in the city tell the story more than the buildings."
In some paintings she combines portraits with place. "Bus Stop," one of two large paintings, includes what Scholl calls a romantic scenario. It shows people waiting for the bus on a steep San Francisco street. At the top of the hill "stop" is painted on the road; there's also a stop sign.
The group includes the multicultural mix of a big city like San Francisco. One boy is Scholl's brother. A gray haired man bows his head as if prayer. An Asian man anchors the left side of the painting. In the street, a man dances.
Marjorie Scholl
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The 1955 Montgomery, Ala., bus boycott that launched the modern civil rights movement inspired "Bus Stop," Scholl said. Over on the right of the painting, a black woman in pearls and fine hat looks up -- Coretta Scott King.
"She was a strong woman who lived years with loss," Scholl said. "It's just a tribute to that movement. One of my main concerns is fighting racism."
Scholl met her husband, Mike Hiller, in Homer. Hiller is an award-winning chef who runs the Spitfire Grill on the Homer Spit. Hiller and Scholl have two children ages 9 and 10.
"It's fun to be in the city, but this place is made for healthy kids," she said of Homer.
Scholl's other artistic love is dance, and she teaches classes in tap and hip-hop for children and adults. She learned to dance in college.
"I taught myself waiting at the bus stop, just getting my feet to match the rhythms I wanted to play," Scholl said.
After teaching her adult friends to dance, they began asking her to teach their kids. Longtime dance teacher Lorraine Haas guided her into teaching, Scholl said.
"Now, it's going great," she said. "It's easier on my stress level. I just feel it's something great to have in my life."
Her dance students and children she's known have often been subjects of her portraits. Scholl also does private portrait commissions. One of her "Cityscapes" works, "Kid Crew," puts those Alaska kids in the city -- a fantasy scenario reflecting the artistic opportunities in Homer.
"Sometimes you marvel about what kids experience here," Scholl said. "It might as well be big huge skyscrapers surrounding us. I just wanted to pretend we had that excitement in our lives."
A reception for Scholl's "Cityscapes" is from 5-7 p.m. at Fat Olives.
Michael Armstrong can be reached at michaelarmstrong.@homernews.com.
