Basalt gallery hosts miniature art exhibition

MOSES LAKE — The first thing you notice when you step into Basalt Art Gallery in downtown Moses Lake is the sharp smell of disinfectant.

But it isn’t from the hand sanitizer gallery owner Nate Ullmer has available.

“I’m making soap, which is why it smells like disinfectant,” Ullmer said. “I can’t actually smell it. It all forms a miasma, and when I get here in the morning I can smell it for five minutes and then I can’t smell it.”

A glass display case holds cakes of soap, some cut into simple bars, and some pressed into various shapes and forms, such as the Venus of Willendorf, a Stone Age statue of a woman nearly 30,000 years old.

“I can just feel it in my forehead,” he added.

The soap making is one of the ways Ullmer said he has adapted to running his gallery during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Another is to host the Desert Artists group’s 14th annual Miniature Painting exhibition. Ordinarily hosted by Umpqua Bank, the exhibition of tiny paintings – none can be more than six inches long on any side – had to be held somewhere else because of restrictions on public gatherings imposed as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Umpqua said they are not opening their doors for gatherings or a show in the lobby,” said Judy Kalin, one of the miniature exhibition’s featured artists. “I reached out to Nate, and he was very gracious.”

“I talked with the artists and said, just do it here,” Ullmer said. “I’ve got wall space and I need to change up my walls.”

The tiny little paintings from the dozen or so artists hanging on Ullmer’s wall depict a wide variety of things – nature, landscapes, still lifes, animals, people and even the abstract color jumbles of poured acrylic paint. One artist even painted on bird feathers.

Kalin, who also has some of her work on display at the Moses Lake Museum and Art Center, said she started painting miniatures when her husband was sick.

“It’s just nice,” Kalin said of the challenge of miniature painting. “It’s a fun venue. Everybody’s got room for at least a miniature on their wall.”

Ullmer said the miniature show will be up until the week after Thanksgiving, when it will be replaced by his own curated winter art show.

“But I will gladly keep these if they left them,” he said.

Besides, Ullmer said the little paintings have been selling.

“They sell okay. They’re smaller and they’re at a lower price point, so they are easier to sell,” he said. “It’s easier to sell a $25 painting than it is a $200 or $200 or more painting.”

Charles H. Featherstone can be reached at cfeatherstone@columbiabasinherald.com.