By John Pluntze
The last "Where ART Thou?" column I posted here was on July 9, 2010 -- which is more than a little ironic since that last "WAT?" column I wrote talked at-length was about James Bourret's always-dazzling Mountain Images Gallery ( http://jamesbourret.photoshelter.com/ 400 E. SV Road/ 725-5801 ), one of several galleries here in Ketchum that I verrry eagerly and happily returned to a few weeks ago, during the November Gallery Walk. (James Bourret, by the way, has a heaps of new jaw-droppingly beautiful color and black-and-white photographs on display at his gallery that I can't recommend enough -- including a truly remarkable, and very long, horizontal shot of the Sawtooth Mountains he took last winter that's well worth a visit to his gallery all by itself!!).
However, the art gallery that I want to talk about today isn't James Bourret's, but rather another one that's likewise very much worth making time for -- a gallery located further west on Sun Valley Road (next to the Ketchum Pawn Shop and also Smoky Mt. Pizza): Kathy Coy-Hansen's gallery (210 Sun Valley Road Road/ 720-2563/ 726-9140) ... a gallery that is ALSO a floral shop, as well as a nail salon (talk about your multi-taskers!!)
Now, anyone who has read any of my previous "Where ART Thou?" columns (type "Kneeland Gallery,""Gail Severn Gallery,""Gilman Contemporary Gallery,""James Bourret,""Gay Odmark,"Green Antelope Gallery,""Friesen Gallery,""DeNovo Gallery" or "John Pluntze" into the SVO search engine here to see examples of some of my many previous ones that I posted back in 2009 and 2010) knows already that I am always, ALWAYS ALLLLL about taking "copious notes on my yellow legal-sized pad" and also "full disclosure."
(Not quite sure how or why "copious notes" and "full disclosure" became my ongoing mantras of choice early on after I began writing my "Where ART Thou?" column -- but they did -- so just deal with it, because God knows that I have to!!)
If Kathy Coy-Hansen's name sounds familiar, it SHOULD. Known for many years here in the Wood River Valley as the "Queen Of the Weddings," Coy-Hansen was born and grew up in Boise, but moved to the Valley at age 19 -- a year after which she began working as apprentice florist, before later opening what was then the very first floral shop in the Ketchum-Sun Valley area.
"I used to average 24 to 28 weddings every summer," she told me recently one morning. "I've been working with flowers for some 42 years now -- I ran Sun Valley Floral up at the resort for many years, I owned a shop in Hawaii at one point, and I think, counting this current shop of mine, I've had seven or eight different locations here in the Ketchum-Sun Valley area since I first moved here.... I worked alongside Penny Mazzola and several others for a number of years, before I struck out on my own. It's been a pretty incredible adventure."
It quickly proved to be a genuine "adventure" for ME as well the morning that I began taking those copious notes of mine about Hansen's genuinely cool and eclectic shop -- partly because Coy-Hansen's Boise-based brother, Venture Coy ( http://www.VentureCoyFineArt.com ), isn't exactly a slouch in the creativity department, EITHER. A former commercial artist in various capacities for Albertsons' Markets for some 15 years, Coy's beautiful and varied paintings (primarily oils, but also a number of watercolors and knife-palette ones, too) are the very first thing that people see when they open that glass door on SV Road that serves as the entrance to Coy-Hansen's Sun Valley Flower Designs floral shop/Nails By Kathy nail salon/Venture Coy art gallery -- and Venture Coy's paintings had EVERYTHING to do with me the night of the Gallery Walk unexpectedly, but eagerly entering that small building and lingering in its brightly-lit hallway adorned with eye-catching art works.
Coy, like his sister, is an avid traveler in his own right (he's also been to Hawaii, various part of Europe, the United Kingdom, as well as to a wide assortment of very inspiring places right here in the United States -- Glacier National Park, most recently ... a trip which has inspired an impressive assortment of gorgeous, new art works). And much like Coy-Hansen, Venture Coy's unabashedly-infectious love of Life is fully and vividly in evidence in much of what he creates.
Whether it's various paintings of famous, iconic Sawtooth National Recreation Area locales (Coy is especially fond, it seems, of light filtering through aspen or evergreen trees, as well as mountains, rivers and lakes), wildlife (the one of the grizzly bear is downright unnerving) or scenes of Italy (villas bathed in warm sunlight, a nighttime shot of Venice, the Cinque Terra region of Italy and many other similarly-memorable land- and city-scapes that had me longing for another trip to Europe myself), Coy has an undeniable gift for capturing not only moments in time, but also details in the environment that many other artists either don't seem to notice, or else don't bother acknowledging in their artworks.
Indeed, as I was busily thumbing through the various photo-filled binders of her brother's voluminous artworks that Kathy Coy-Hansen was kind enough to show me the day I was touring her gallery/floral shop/nail salon (she's been toiling away at THAT craft, by the way, for some 22 years now here in the Valley), I was repeatedly struck by the various nuances that Coy often adroitly captures in his paintings. Whether it's vineyards, courtyards or villas in Italy (the large, breathtaking painting of Tuscany that used to adorn Coy-Hansen's house, but which is now located in her shop is more than enough reason all by itself to visit that easily-overlooked SV Road location!!), the teal-colored Mediterranean Sea, a popular North Valley trail, or one in Santa Cruz, California, it's verrry easy to see verrry quickly why Coy has racked up so many prestigious accomplishments over the years -- ones that include five one-man gallery shows (with Boise's Brown's Gallery, Eagle's First Street Gallery and also its Galerie Belle Ame, and Pocatello's Idaho State University Gallery) -- and also many highly-coveted awards as well (2006 Top 50 Min-Paintings winner In Paint America Contest, 1st Place winner in Idaho Bluebird Design License Plate Contest, 1st Place winner in Brown's Gallery Boise River festival Contest, five awards from Ducks Unlimited in both Idaho and also in Oregon, and the Western Idaho Fair Purchase Award).
A number of Coy's paintings hang in various Ameritel Inns across the country -- as they do also in buildings here in Idaho (and elsewhere) for corporations such as Key Bank, Idaho Independent Bank, St. Luke's Regional Medical Centers, the Boise Heart Clinic, the Boise Arid Club, Blue Cross of Idaho and United Heritage Life Insurance.
Coy was also a featured artist in the September/October 2012 issue of "Skywest" magazine.
"I've always been interested in art from age 12, on; I even sold some of my art back in high school," Coy told me recently, from his working-art studio in Boise. "When I was younger, I wanted to be a magazine illustrator. I really admired Norman Rockwell's glorious illustrations for the 'Saturday Evening Post' and I think HE had as much to do as ANYONE with me wanting to pursue Art full-time, as a livelihood."
It didn't surprise me AT ALL when Coy mentioned Norman Rockwell during our phone conversation last week because one of the lovingly hand-painted, all-occasions greeting cards ($4.25 each, or eight for $30) that his sister sells in her shop that caught my eye IMMEDIATELY the second I saw it is a wonderfully warm and inviting card titled, "Serenade In the Snow," which depicts his granddaughter and her new husband standing arm-in-arm in front of a two-story, snow-covered house in Canada that's bracketed by several snow-filled evergreen trees. It's easily one of the many standouts I saw that morning at his sister's beautifully-decorated shop (which, by the way, also has for sale scores of lovingly-decorated Christmas wreaths, Christmas trees and plants and other seasonal offerings that Coy-Hansen designed and adorned herself recently), and one that, without a doubt, conjures up images of many of those classic and deeply-poignant Norman Rockwell illustrations that people even today still look back on with great fondness and great admiration.
I'd be extremely surprised if anyone who wisely visits that shop on Sun Valley Road anytime soon doesn't come away feeling a great deal of fondness and admiration for both Kathy Coy-Hansen and also for her brother, Venture Coy -- two obviously-gifted and inventive artists who don't show ANY signs AT ALL of slowing down anytime soon, where their respective artistic bents are concerned.
Contact Kathy Coy-Hansen (720-2563/726-9140) for more info on her Sun Valley Road art gallery -- as well as about her (Sun Valley Flower Designs) floral shop and her (Nails By Kathy) nail saloon. Venture Coy ( http://www.VentureCoy.com ) can be reached at his Boise art studio, at 830-7739.
The ongoing goal of this "Where ART Thou?" column is to make Art more accessible to people here in the Wood River Valley who, for whatever reason (s), tend to SHY AWAY from it, and both Kathy Coy-Hansen as well as Venture Coy seem to genuinely and proudly embrace that ongoing goal, which makes me very happy that I as able to feature their work here today for you.
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Questions or comments regarding this "Where ART Thou?" column can be sent to John, at: lovesbiking2001@yahoo.com. And to read any of John's many previous "WAT?" columns -- which include write-ups on local artists such as Narda Pitkethly, Tessa Bradley, Thia Konig, Kirk Anderson, Gay Odmark, Brent Haleen, and (then-11-year-old) Ashley Dreyfus, and on local galleries such as the David M. Norton, the Kneeland, the Gail Severn, Tribes Interiors and (the now-sadly-defunct) The Loft in Hailey -- simply type the name of the artist (or the art gallery) into the SVO search engine here.
