David Frykman / Wood Carver and Oil Painter
Heather Harle Frykman / Photographer
Lucas Frykman / Photographer
Steve Jorgenson / Potter and Sculptor
Heather Harle Frykman / Photographer
As I reflect on my first five years living in Door County, I find this place to be quite peaceful and inspirational. I am enjoying my career as a nature photographer and co-owner of a Sister Bay gallery. I didn’t quite understand when I moved here what a wonderful artist community we have in Door County, but over the years, I have realized this is the perfect spot to be an artist.
I show my nature photography at our family-owned gallery, the Frykman Studio Gallery in Sister Bay. Here we also show my husband Lucas’s photography, my father-in-law David’s woodcarvings, and pottery and sculpture by Winnipeg artist Steve Jorgenson. These three genres of art show well together in our gallery space, especially with the refined decorating touch of my mother-in-law Carole. We all showed our work previously at the David Frykman Studio Gallery in Ellison Bay from 2005-2007. We have been in our new location in Sister Bay since 2008.
I grew up in a small town called Platteville in Southwest Wisconsin. I became interested in photography at an early age when my father let me use his ancient Mamiya film camera. I went on to study at the University of Wisconsin - Green Bay where I received a BA in Communication Processes. Although I took a few photography classes and worked at a portrait studio for a year, I consider myself a self-taught photographer, as is Lucas. We both use Canon SLR cameras and lenses and a Mac as our “digital darkroom.” We have our photographs printed at a professional print company, then mat and frame everything ourselves at the gallery.
Living on the beautiful Door Peninsula, subject matter for nature photography can be found at any time of the year, but I find that it usually takes spectacular conditions to make spectacular photos. The morning after a snowstorm or early spring when the forest floor is covered with a bed of trilliums, a summer squall or a foggy day in autumn; these are the conditions when I can’t imagine wanting to do anything else. Generally, my husband and I find no need to leave the county to search out beautiful scenes, but everyone has to get off The Rock sometimes! We enjoy wilderness camping trips to places like The Boundary Waters and Sylvania in the U.P. There’s no better way to find that “right place and right time” than to spend a week alone in a canoe, hunting for great light.
My work has been shown at the Miller Art Museum in Sturgeon Bay, the Hardy Gallery in Ephraim, and published in some local and national publications. Notably, my photographs have been featured on the covers of Door County Living and Door County Magazine and in the pages of Nature Photographer Magazine. I was honored in 2007 to receive a People’s Choice Award for my “Road to Northport” photograph at the annual juried exhibition at the Hardy Center for the Arts. To view more of my photography, please visit our gallery in Door County at the Frykman Studio Gallery, located at 2566 S. Bay Shore Dr. (Hwy 42) on the south side of Sister Bay.
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Lucas Frykman / Photographer
Photographer Lucas Frykman is a fifth generation native and year-round resident of Sister Bay in Door County, Wisconsin. Always a lover of the outdoors and a product of an artistic family, Lucas spent much of his formative years exploring the natural areas near his home and developing his artistic eye. During this time, photography was a hobby, along with drawing and painting, but with the digital camera revolution, Lucas learned to use the camera to create visually the art he saw in his mind.
Is there anything more inspiring than the natural landscapes and rustic landmarks of Door County? This is where Lucas finds the inspiration to create works of art out of the raw beauty of this peaceful peninsula. Whether he’s hiding in a blind to capture the expressions of unsuspecting wildlife, lying in the dirt to photograph spring’s wildflowers, or walking little-known trails in search of a priceless landscape, Lucas’s joy is in finding his own, unique view of the natural world.
Lucas’s photography has been featured in the Miller Art Museum, the Hardy Gallery and in local and national publications.
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David Frykman / Wood Carver and Oil Painter
David Frykman and his wife Carole live and work amidst the quiet cedar trees on the rocky shores of Lake Michigan in beautiful Door County, Wisconsin. He has been creating his menagerie of characters since watching his mother sculpt small figures for department store window displays in the 1950's.
David's first career was as a potter, and it was with clay that he developed his facility for bringing life and vitality to his creations. While his choice of materials has now turned to wood, his high standard of craftsmanship...and his fascination with the unlimited potential of human expression remains.
David's highly original carvings have been reproduced by Coyne's and Company of Minneapolis as the "David Frykman Collection" and cherished by Santa lovers around the world since 1994.
In 2005, David and Carole, their son Lucas Frykman and daughter-in-law Heather Harle Frykman, opened an art gallery, David Frykman Studio Gallery, in Ellison Bay, Wisconsin. In 2008, they moved the gallery to Sister Bay, just 5 miles north.
Today, the Frykman Studio Gallery features David's wood carved art, his original oil paintings, Door County nature photography by Heather and Lucas Frykman, and pottery and wall sculptures by Steve Jorgenson.
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Steve Jorgenson / Potter and Sculptor
After many years of visits to Door County, Steve Jorgenson is pleased to bring his sculptural objects and functional pottery to Sister Bay's "Frykman Studio Gallery."
Originally from Seattle, Steve has made his name is Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada for thirty years where he has maintained his pottery and sculpture studio and been a member of "The Stoneware Gallery," a co-op of twelve potters.
A B.A. in art was earned at Bethel University in St. Paul, Minnesota studying pottery with Eugene Johnson and sculpture with Stewart Luckman. A teaching certificate in Art Education was completed at Seattle Pacific University. Various jobs including substitute teacher, construction worker, carpenter, and drug and art counselor filled the time prior to moving to Canada to work full time as an artist.
Initial interest in pottery began in an eighth grade ceramics class, and continued to develop through college pottery courses and then while substitute teaching art classes. Some very early design motifs from junior high have subsequently reappeared in his pottery and continue to develop and mature. Current daily studio work includes throwing stoneware clay, painting multiple clay slip colors on the wet pots, and then carving incised designs into the leather hard clay. Pots are glazed in glossy and matte glazes which allows carved designs and slip colors to show through. Glaze firing is done in a gas fired kiln.
"I enjoy the rhythms of the production cycle of making pottery, the repetition of the thrown forms, always striving for that perfect shape or curve, trimming and drawing designs on pots, followed by glazing, firing and anticipating what surprises will appear when the kiln is unloaded. In these endlessly repeated cycles one is always learning, changing and growing creatively."
"Creating sculptural objects has been a part of my life since I was young. Growing up in a family involved in the construction business and surrounded by woodworking tools and unlimited materials, I absorbed my carpentry skills from my father and was using all the major tools to construct all sorts of 3-dimensional objects from very early on."
Now sculptures evolve in a studio filled with random cluttered piles of materials, picture frame mouldings, and interesting odd bits of pieces of wood waiting to stimulate and be transformed into relief sculptures or free standing pieces. Most materials are regularly scavenged from friends, frame shops, my family's fire wood piles and cabinet shop remnant materials. The sculptures begin their growth and develop from some stimulating wood shape or from hand-made tile. Each piece remains unique due to a continually changing inventory of materials.
"Inspiration for my sculptures has always come from either the human form, or massive landscape shapes and the ways in which these forms interact. Playing with the relationships between shapes and forms has always been meaningful to me."
"I take great pleasure in creating beautiful objects from such basic materials as clay and wood, and it is always rewarding to see these objects out into the world to enhance lives."