In December of 2008 the late Johnny Winter, famous blues musician, appeared in Navarro to perform at the Navarro Store. That appearance was improbable bordering on the impossible. A man who played to thousands was in Navarro playing to one thousand? But there he was, the man himself, belting out Highway 61 under the redwoods at the Navarro Store, the unlikely made real by Dave Evans, local merchant and music impresario.
Just before Winter's appearance and, in its way, even more startling in its pure improbability, a larger-than-life wood sculpture of the rockabilly blues star, a sculpture so eerily resembling Winter it's as if the guitar man had somehow become a giant wood sprite, also appeared at the gate to the Navarro Store's neat little amphitheater.
Winter, when he saw it, was moved to tears.
When most of us see the Winter sculpture we marvel at the skill of the artist, Rabbani Kenyon, and come away reminded of equivalently striking sculptures of Kenyon's that we've seen at other Mendocino County venues, specifically at Noyo Harbor and, now, Elk. We've seen the meticulous wood reproductions of salmon and mountain lions when Kenyon worked at Noyo, and now we see his work at the Artist's Collective in Elk right beside Highway One.
Rabbani Kenyon's work has put more than a few crinks in the necks of passing motorists who strain to see it as they pass by, many of them returning for closer looks. His art is big and startling. At Noyo, where Kenyon began work on large pieces, he says he “carved just about anything — wildlife, sea captains, Johnny Appleseeds. At first I wasn't used to working in public so I kind of hid in the back of the place at Noyo. But then after about five years, I got used to people stopping by, and now I barely notice.”
The first bigger-than-life rock and roll pieces Kenyon did were of Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, and Jerry Garcia. The origins of the Winter piece, Kenyon recalls, was a PBS documentary where Winter belted out his inimitable version of Highway 61. “Then, when I heard Winter was going to play at Navarro, I got in touch with Dave and…..”
And Dave and the Navarro Store have a memorable piece of art right out front, a work of art that will last a long, long time, a landmark.
Rabbani Kenyon's artistic pedigree is unusual for a graduate of the California College of Arts and Crafts with a master's degree in painting with a minor in lithography. Kenyon, whose first name he adopted from Sufi friends, translates from the Arabic as “light of the heart,” worked at the Branscomb mill for the Harwoods, then pulled green chain at the G-P mill in Fort Bragg. His art now supports him and Mrs. Kenyon, and includes paintings as striking in their way as his sculptures. Kenyon describes his paintings as “more personal, dreamscapes” than the precise wood sculptures he's famous for.
Born in New Hampshire, raised in Southern California in 1948, Kenyon, now 74, arrived in Branscomb in the early 1970s, relocated to Fort Bragg in 1976, and now lives in Albion from where he commutes to the Artist's Collective in Elk where, among other of his stunning pieces, he has on display two spectacular hand-carved chairs.
“Recessions,” Kenyon says, “always have a negative effect on art sales, but for the more personal art there's less negative effect because people are taken by it and they buy it. They'll drive past, turn around and come back because they have to have it.”
The artist is almost reverential when he speaks of what he calls the “Albion-Elk-Navarro triangle,” the captivating natural aesthetic of redwoods and sea that has captured so many of us. He looks forward to doing more art at the Navarro point of the triangle, the tiny settlement already renowned for Dave Evans presence and becoming almost as well known for its arresting sculptures.
"We already have Skip Bloyd working here,” Kenyon says enthusiastically, "and it's a perfect spot for outdoor art.”
(Rabbani Kenyon's work can be seen on-line at redwoodsculptures.com)
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