by Bev Crichfield
Seattle artist José Orantes, a former Burlington resident, brought his artwork to Skagit County schools in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s as an artist-in-residence for the Washington State Arts Commission. Several of his murals can still be seen in local schools.
When viewing artist José Orantes’ brightly colored paintings, it helps to dig deep and remember what the world looked like through the eyes of a child.
Objects seemed so much bigger — more vibrant and new.
A viewing of Orantes’ works reveals the imperfection of that youthful perception — the tires of the dump truck rolling down the road aren’t exactly round; the ferry at the dock isn’t quite straight in the water.
Call it whimsy, if you like, Orantes has a style all his own — appropriately called “urban naive” — that embraces that youthful vigor. After all, he’s had plenty of inspiration from the hundreds of students he’s worked with through the years as an artist-in-residence with the Washington State Arts Commission.
“Young students are not inhibited, and they are not polluted,” the 54-year-old Orantes said from his home in Seattle. “They give you their images just raw.”
Much of Orantes’ whimsy can be seen in the works that line the walls of the Burlington Public Library, on display through June 17.
Most of his paintings highlight everyday, ordinary items — churches, street lights, ferries, beach-front houses — with skewed shapes framed by organic, but well-defined, lines.
That ordinariness is what attracts people to Orantes’ art, said Larry Edwards, chair of the Burlington Library Art Committee.
“He plays with perspectives, but they’re transformative,” Edwards said. “They take ordinary themes, like a building, a street, a ferry dock, and make them much more interesting — there’s discovery there.”
And while Orantes may be known to art collectors and in galleries for his brightly colored paintings, he may be identified in Skagit County by the murals he helped students create years ago in local schools.
Those schools included Lucille Umbarger in Burlington as well as six murals in Anacortes schools.
Orantes lived in Burlington full-time in 1986 and then maintained a house there and in Seattle for years after. He loved the area, so different from where he grew up in Guatemala.
Orantes, an enthusiastic speaker and passionate artist, can’t remember a time when he wasn’t trying to draw something. One of his earliest memories was of copying a picture of Disney’s Pinocchio, and being lavished with praise by his supportive parents.
“My dad and mom made a big deal out of it,” Orantes said with a laugh. “They put it in a frame, and hung it on the wall.”
He excelled in art, and graduated from the National School of Art in Guatemala with an emphasis on painting and especially sculpture.
He married an American woman, and the couple moved to Seattle in 1978. At the time, he spoke little English and enrolled in language courses. He began learning how to weld, and wanted to use those skills to create sculptures.
But Orantes needed to work, and instead took his welding skills to a Seattle shipyard. He was able to continue creating his art during breaks between jobs, and made contact with people in the arts community through advertisements seeking art submissions.
That’s when he turned his artistic focus from sculpting to painting. His success quickly blossomed, with his paintings earning places in local art shows at colleges and government buildings, and soon at galleries.
He quickly garnered praise as one of the few up-and-coming Latino artists in the Pacific Northwest in the early and mid-’80s. He nabbed plenty of exposure in shows that focused on Latino events or causes, including the Fiestas Patrias Art Exhibit in Seattle and the Evergreen State College Chicano and Latino Artists of the Pacific Northwest touring exhibition during 1984-86.
His works became staples in art collections, including those for Seattle City Light, the Concilio for the Spanish Speaking Fiestas Patrias, the Washington State Art in Public Places, and Skagit Valley College.
In the late 1980s, Orantes began working with the Washington State Arts Commission’s Arts in Education program as an artist-in-residence. Artists working with the program sign on to travel to schools across the state and help students learn about a variety of disciplines, including dance, theater, visual arts and music.
His earliest stint with the program was in 1988 with the Migrant Worker Summer Program, which included time in Mount Vernon. He traveled across the state spending sometimes several months helping students explore their creative sides. Sometimes he worked with 10 schools in a year.
Orantes doesn’t consider himself an art teacher. Instead, he helps guide students through a mural project using their suggestions for themes and their small-sized drawings to help create the mural.
Many of the murals feature bright colors, and are reflections of the students’ natural surroundings — the beach, the waterfront, forests, cityscapes.
Orantes also has worked with inmates in prison and juvenile detention, hoping to inspire them with an artistic outlet.
Participating in the program has given Orantes a deep sense of satisfaction. He said students still recognize him years after they’ve graduated from high school.
“Sometimes it happens that they stop in and say, ‘Are you José?’ And they’re a 25-year-old and they say, ‘I worked with you,’” he said. “A Burlington girl, she worked with me on one of the first murals I did in the schools, and she said, ‘Thanks to you for teaching us to draw.’ It’s a very nice feeling.”
Orantes quit working with the arts commission about five years ago, but still works with schools independently. And his works are still featured prominently in public places in the United States and several other countries.
“It’s a pleasure to have somebody want my paintings,” Orantes said.
Beverly Crichfield can be reached at 360-416-2135 or .
