“Au Naturel” artists from 2024, from left, are Robert Paulmenn, Jordan Manchester, Anna Lee Larimore, Buck Braden, Arnold Pander, Patrick Deshaye, Laura Ross-Paul, Bonnie Laing-Malcolmson, Drea Frost, Lando Valdez, Ghislaine Fremaux and Kristin Shauck.

Once a participant and juror, the late Henk Pander — the renowned Dutch artist who moved to Portland in the 1960s — is now the honoree for this year’s iteration of “Au Naturel: The Nude in the 21st Century” exhibit at Clatsop Community College.

“I really wanted to do a show in his honor and his memory,” said Kristin Shauck, an art instructor at the college and director of the Royal Nebeker Art Gallery, of Pander, who died last year.

Shauck co-curated this year’s show, which runs through March 14, alongside Ghislaine Fremaux, an associate professor at Texas Tech University and interim director of their art school.

The first “Au Naturel” exhibit took place in 2007, with Royal Nebeker, a prominent Astoria artist and teacher, serving as the first juror. Shauck recalls fondly how supportive Nebeker was when she first pitched the idea.

“He really helped get it off the ground,” Shauck said, adding that the show ran consecutively for 14 years until the coronavirus pandemic hit. After the hiatus, Shauck wanted to ease back into the annual exhibit with an invitational, rather than the usual juried show, and doing it in Pander’s memory was a natural choice.

Capturing the human condition

Both Shauck and Fremaux were acquainted with Pander. He took part in the show on several occasions and led two workshops at the college. Additionally, in 2017, he and Fremaux, through “Au Naturel,” were awarded the opportunity to have a two-person show on a separate occasion.

“It was so amazing to see how they connected and how their work played off of each other,” Shauck said.

Fremaux said it was an honor, not just to be in a show at the college, but also to be in a two-person show with Pander.

“He worked in so many mediums and had so many different kinds of subject matter,” she said, describing him as “an incredible technician and visionary.” For a renowned artist, she also felt he was accessible.

“He was just very generous with his time and knowledge,” she said, along with being “an incredibly interesting person to talk with and be friends with.”

Pander grew up in the Netherlands during World War II. He attended art school in Amsterdam before moving to Oregon in 1965.

Shauck and Fremaux reflected on Pander’s ability to seek out human experiences and historical events to capture them on canvas. For example, Shauck said after 9/11, he traveled to ground zero in New York City and would ride with emergency responders, creating paintings based on the experience.

Fremaux agreed he was interested in depicting “all the dimensions of the human condition,” adding that he was able to work with “harrowing subject matter and then beautiful, intimate, personal things.”

A rich tradition

One of the subject matters Pander explored was the human figure, a revered practice in art training for centuries.

“He really was a huge supporter of the show, because he really believed in working from life and the figure,” Shauck said. “That’s such an important training for artists to really learn how to see, and it makes you so versatile in every other subject if you have that confidence to work from the figure. It is, I think, the most challenging subject matter.”

There’s also an interesting and powerful encounter that takes place between artist and model, as the latter makes themselves vulnerable in a safe environment that encourages one “to be inquisitive and thoughtful in the way you’re looking at another person,” Fremaux said.

“It’s so unlike any other way you see another human being,” she added. She sees figure drawing as an activity that helps one build skill and sight as an artist.

Nebeker and Roy Garrison, another former art instructor at the college, established working from the figure as an important part of the institution’s art curriculum, and she “took it very seriously to carry on that tradition,” making it part of her introduction to drawing sequence for students.

“I don’t think it’s ever too soon to start,” she said.

In addition to Pander, the exhibit includes local talents Robert Paulmenn, Roger Dorband, Paul Polson, Jordan Manchester, Penny Treat, Anna Lee Larimore, Drea Frost and Carrie Williams.

Also represented are Arnold Pander, Elizabeth Malaska, Daniel Duford, Laura Ross-Paul, Patrick Deshaye, William Webster, and Buck Braden, all of Portland; Tom Jensen and Beth Kehoe, of Seattle; Ghislaine Fremaux, Lando Valdez, Devin Ratheal, James W. Johnson, Josie Del Castillo, Shannon Cannings, of Texas; and Chris Marin, based in Louisiana.

‘Au Naturel: The Nude in the 21st Century’

‘Au Naturel:

The Nude in the 21st Century’

Royal Nebeker Art Gallery, 1799 Lexington Ave., Astoria

On view through March 14

Regular gallery hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday