A Creative Excuse

This is a re-release of episode 14 from 2019 with Les LePere. Les passed away last August and we just found out about it. We thought it would be fitting to re-release the episode.
The following was published by Spokesman-Review on Aug. 18, 2024.
He always had a good story to tell: "stop me if I've already told you this, but even if I have, a good story is worth hearing again". His story was often accompanied by a pencil drawing to help expand the narrative.
After taking a photo of Leslie in his studio, Del Lusk notated the print with: "Out in the rolling wheat country near Harrington Washington, Leslie LePere lives and works at the job he was born to do, tending the 3000-acre wheat ranch that has been in the family for 80 years. He enjoys the work and the challenge. He calls it playing in the dirt. But in his off hours he'll be in his studio in the home his parents built, living his alternate life as an artist, playing with pencils, probably colored ones."
In the autumn of 1964 "I started early, left the farm, took my pencils and went to WSU".* While there Leslie met fellow art student Ken Cory. The pair adopted the moniker "Pencil Brothers". They engineered elaborate art-related shenanigans that produced laughs as well as awe. Their serious art collaborations were often champlevé enamel and pencil drawings. They produced pins, light switch plates, frames, belt buckles, necklaces, and a set of silver self-portrait salt and pepper shakers, to name a few.
Leslie earned a Master's degree in fine arts and headed north. "All signs pointed clearly to a fork in road".* He took the road to Seattle, where he began his series of 4 x 4 drawings in ink and colored pencil, completing over 50. All of his work was intricate, provocative, and told stories. He illustrated numerous posters and pamphlets including the first Seattle Bumbershoot poster, Fat Tuesday festival in Seattle, an Olympic Music Festival, a musical event at Chateaux St. Michelle, and covers for the Seattle Weekly. He also began creating book covers for Tom Robbins, beginning with "Still Life with Woodpecker".
"Followed the dotted line, collected objects, worked magic."* in 1981 Leslie returned to the family farm to work with his father, uncles and cousins. He farmed by day, made drawings at night. He illustrated posters for Inland Craft Warnings, a Spokane Symphony concert in Manito Park, concerts at the Mielke barn, a cover for a community cookbook (Harrington Cooks), labels for Buckeye Beans, Aunt Patsy's Pasta, Four Seasons Coffee and later Roam Roasters, the Electric Hotel, the Post & Office and countless letterheads, logos and stationery for friends and businesses. In 2013 he had a retrospective of his work at the Jundt Art Museum on the Gonzaga University campus. He partnered with his dear friend Charlie King to establish Sandy Parr, where they collaborated to design commemorative pins, and ball markers for golf tournaments and courses, and special events such as the grand reopening of the Fox theater and an Inland Craft Warnings anniversary.
In 1990 he met Eva Simova. They enjoyed redecorating the farmhouse together, cooking elaborate meals, laughing with abandon, and traveling. They travelled to Eva's birthplace in the Czech Republic to be married and wandered around Italy together. Their travels inspired many pieces in his later series of 6 x 6 works. Eva died in 2011.
Ten years ago, Leslie retired from farming, leaving the working of the family farm to great friends and great farmers, Ron and Linda Mielke. This gave him more time to hone his cooking skills, enjoying time in his country kitchen cooking with, and for friends.
Poor health slowed his studio and kitchen work down the past year but note that the day before entering the hospital for the final time, for his own enjoyment, he made a batch of manicotti, from scratch.
Many generous Harrington friends gave their time and transportation to help him in his last months of living at home. Some of his closest friends travelled from far and wide to see him when it became apparent, he was declining. The final 2 months of his life were spent in the home of his niece, Chemyn Kodis, his time guided under the expert support of Hospice of Spokane.
His way with words, his ability to hold a pencil, enjoy a good meal and give a firm handshake stayed with him to his final day.
His ashes were scattered on the family farm, with all the airdales he had so dearly loved.
Leslie William LePere was born on May 26, 1946, to Alice and Eldon LePere, joining his sister Louise to complete their family.

Carson Elliott (b. 1976) lives and works in Santa Fe, New Mexico with his wife, son and two dogs (Milo and Sopaipilla).  He prefers to work with colored pencils, graphite, pen and ink, acrylic and watercolor.  Carson creates images of fantastical memories, psychedelic landscapes and phantasmal beings.  These dreamlike images explore ideas about time, space, memory, distance and the natural world.  He received a Bachelors of Fine Art from the University of North Texas and enjoys riding his bike long distances.

Zahra grew up in two deserts which vary drastically and have many similarities in culture. One close to the sea (Kuwait), the other close to the mountains (New Mexico). She studied the visual arts in France, and continues various pursuits to further educate herself. She currently lives in the Barelas neighborhood of Albuquerque, New Mexico, and works in her studio at the Harwood Art Center, where she incorporates Kuwaiti tendencies into her daily life. Her 2022 children's book, Where Butterflies Fill the Sky has topped many year-end book lists including that of the New York Times, NPR, and the Chicago Public Library. Zahra is the 2022 Society of Illustrators’ Dilys Evans Founders Award Winner and a recipient of the United Nations Minority Artist Award on Statelessness.

Brandon Maldonado was born in 1980 in Denver, Colorado and raised in Albuquerque, New Mexico where he grew up on the graffiti art of his barrio surroundings. He rejected the academically painted southwestern landscapes which seemed a far cry from the graffiti filled streets of his personal reality. However, the culturally rich environment of New Mexico made a lasting impact on Maldonado's work, which often explores themes associated with Mexican culture. Being primarily of Northern New Mexico descent, Brandon has a fascination with the history and culture of the land, as well as its living and historical ties to the story of Mexico and its mestizo legacy.
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Brandon's work can be viewed at hechoamano.org/artist/brandon-maldonado-nm-b-1980
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Intro music by watson. Listen and download all albums free here: watson.bandcamp.com

Jamison Chās Banks is a multi-disciplinary artist who creates films, paintings, performances, and installations. His works often explore the history of war and territorial expansion, both literal and psychological. Banks appropriates and alters symbols employed in propaganda and popular culture and redeploys them in contexts that subvert their original meanings. He usually begins with an area of investigation that spawns a series of interrelated artworks in different media.

Grammy-nominated pianist Adam Tendler is a recipient of the Lincoln Center Award for Emerging Artists, the Yvar Mikhashoff Prize, and "currently the hottest pianist on the American contemporary classical scene" (Minneapolis Star Tribune), a "remarkable and insightful musician" (LA Times), and a "relentlessly adventurous pianist" (Washington Post) "joyfully rocking out at his keyboard" (New York Times). A pioneer of DIY culture in classical music, at age 23 Tendler performed solo recitals in all fifty states as part of a grassroots tour called America 88x50, the subject of his acclaimed memoir, 88x50. He has gone on to become one of classical music's most recognized and celebrated artists, commissioning major works from composers as diverse as Christian Wolff and Devonté Hynes, and appearing as soloist with the London Symphony Orchestra, LA Philharmonic, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, and on the main-stages of Carnegie Hall, the Barbican Centre, Sydney Opera House, Lincoln Center and BAM. As a recording artist, he is featured on Wild Up's Grammy-nominated third volume of Julius Eastman's music, and has also released  albums of music by Liszt, Robert Palmer, and of his own original work. He recently commissioned 16 new pieces using the entire inheritance left to him by his father after his unexpected death, with works by Laurie Anderson, Nico Muhly and Missy Mazzoli, among others, as part of a program called Inheritances, a New York Times Critic Pick described as "not only a display of contemporary compositional force, but also a true show...emotionally involving...with a sense of true dramatic stakes." Inheritances will appear on a forthcoming album on the New Amsterdam label. As Green-wood Cemetery's 2023/2024 Artist-In-Residence, Tendler has a site-specific installation, Exit Strategy, open through summer 2024. He also recently published his second book, tidepools. Adam Tendler is a Yamaha Artist and serves on the piano faculty of NYU.

Chris Casey is a ceramic artist based in Albuquerque, NM. His work has been shown widely across the US and his Instagram page is a rich resource of ceramics process videos.

Under the alias Daedelus, Alfred Darlington has been an instigator of electronic music culture for the past 20 years. A fore-figure of Los Angeles' Beat Scene they have released over 20 LPs, countless EPs, remixes, and additional productions on labels such as Ninja Tune, Brainfeeder, and Anticon. As a performer they're synonymous with performative controllers, from working with the Monome to current explorations of modular systems into DJ metaphors, and have played over 1,000 shows on 6 continents at venues ranging from the underground Low End Theory to festival mainstages such as Coachella.
Now a founding faculty member for the Berklee College of Music in Boston of their new EDI (Electronic Digital Instrument) program.
Daedelus has begun to live up to their Greek mythological namesake.

Diego is the Graphic Designer and co-founder and Director of Innovando la Tradición and has been interested in the social and ethical dimension of design and its power as an agent of change. Diego holds a Master in Type Design from one of the best schools in world for Typography, The Konickleink Academy of Art The Hague in The Netherlands. In addition, Diego holds a Postgraduate in photography by the School of Active Photography in Mexico, a Fine Arts Postgraduate Diplomaet by Konstfack University in Stockholm, Sweden and a Diplomaet in Narrative Techniques by Colectivo Practicas Narrativas in Mexico City. Diego also teaches across many universities in Mexico and previously ran the Workshop of Utopias at the Universidad Iberoamericana which prepared students to challenge the conventions of contemporary society and design practice.

Bianka Groves is a potter in Santa Fe & her work is represented all across the United States. She is a graduate of George Washington University’s Corcoran College of Art & Design in DC. Bianka has studied all over the country & taught ceramics at Baltimore Clayworks, Northern Clay Center in Minneapolis, & Santa Fe Clay. Her pottery is thoughtfully functional and has the ability to complete the elegance of any interior space. The polished composition of her porcelain surfaces are an ode to the simplistic repetition and studies of simple design, architecture, and landscapes. When she’s not making pots out of her home studio in Santa Fe, you can find her teaching ceramic classes or out hiking in the desert with her dogs.