Check Out Ripple River Gallery

Ripple River Gallery Feature: "Northern Flight"—woodcut print by Charles Beck

Exhibit features new work by Charles Beck

Once you’ve seen a woodcut by Charles Beck, you’ll never see the Minnesota landscape the same again.

New paintings, woodcut prints and bird forms by Fergus Falls artist Charles Beck will be featured in an exhibit at Ripple River Gallery, Aug. 12 to Sept. 13. A reception for the artist is planned from 2 to 4 p.m. on Sunday, Aug. 16.

“This is the fifth exhibit we’ve hung of Charlie Beck’s work since we opened the gallery in 2000. Each new body of work reveals more about the environment and the artist’s relation to it,” said Bob Carls, co-owner of the gallery.

Best known for his woodblock prints depicting the farm lands and forests of northwestern Minnesota, Beck also “sketches” small oil paintings to capture the landscape and brief moments in time. Beck’s carved bird forms, which he considers an extension of the landscape, are a sculptural distillation of the animal’s essence.

From his studio outside of Fergus Falls, Beck looks out on the edge of the Red River Valley, with its horizon and sunsets and feeling of vast space. To the east Beck can turn to the woods and lakes for inspiration. “I suppose I’m influenced most by the horizon, the separation between the sky and what I call vertical space and horizontal space,” Beck said. “I seem to always need that in my landscapes.”

“We live in an area where there is great variety over the course of a year,” Beck said. “That’s what makes it so exciting.” While some artists might seek the awesome majesty of a mountain peak or a crashing waterfall, Beck finds as much to discover in an old barley field in Minnesota. “It depends on how you look at it and what you see.”

Following his service in the Naval Air Force, Beck received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Concordia College, Moorhead, in 1948. In 1950 he received his Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of Iowa, Iowa City. He began his exploration of woodcut prints at the University of Minnesota in 1953.

Beck and his wife, Joyce, returned home to Fergus Falls where he served on the faculty at Fergus Falls Community College for 27 years. In 2006 the college (now Minnesota State Community and Technical College - Fergus Falls) honored him by naming the school’s new gallery the Charles Beck Gallery.

Beck’s work has been exhibited at museums across the country and at colleges and universities around the region. A pair of his life-sized carved turkeys are included in the permanent collection at the Minnesota Historical Society in St. Paul.

“One must only look to experience the patterns, textures and colors of the land and sky, the hills and woods, the weeds and flowers,” Beck says. “My hope is that in some small way I have helped open the eyes of others to this diversity.”

Ripple River Gallery is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday; and from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Sundays. The gallery is located five miles south of Deerwood on Highway 6, then 3 miles east of Ruttger’s Bay Lake Lodge on County Road 14 to Partridge Avenue; or south of Aitkin on Highway 169 to Bennettville, then 3.2 miles west on County Road 11 to Partridge Avenue.

For more information call 218-678-2575 or e-mail ripriv@mlecmn.net.