COEUR d'ALENE - The artists presently featured in North Idaho College's Corner Gallery use a variety of artistic media to create colorful experiences for those who view their works.

Wendy Franklund Miller, Karen Lohrke Kaiser and Melissa Lang, all of Spokane, have several pieces on display in the "Drawing and Painting" exhibit, ranging from watercolors to acrylics to encaustic paintings. Boswell Hall Corner Gallery coordinator and retiring NIC instructor Allie Vogt said the ladies are a "really solid group of artists" whose works inspire and provide moments of clarity for students.

"Students can come right up to this work and say, 'Look at these juicy paintings,'" Vogt said.

Vogt, who knows the artists personally, said they all have ties to NIC. Miller's work was the first on display when the gallery in Boswell opened in the late 1980s and Kaiser was a fine arts instructor at NIC for 16 years. All three of the artists have extensive backgrounds and education in artistic studies, including printmaking, sculpture and painting.

"I just respect all of them so much as artists," Vogt said. "They're all working artists."

In her artist's statement, Lang said she uses drawing as "an expressive tool to think and feel."

"I draw with both paint and charcoal to discover and reveal the complexities between thought and emotion, between the mind and the senses and between observation and imagination," she stated.

Miller said in her artist's statement that her influences are the "changing attitudes of our society and their effects on the world around us."

"For me, making art is a delicate balance of pushing ahead and then dropping back to look and to listen and to see," she stated. "It is a balance of knowing and not knowing and trusting that."

In Kaiser's statement, she explains her "Tree of Life" painting.

"Using the simple form of the 'tree of life,' derived from a piece of sculpture/furniture designed by Diego Giacometti as a starting point, I had hoped to explore the 'lone tree' as a simple design idea," she stated. "It occurred to me while drawing that the tree of life is such a common symbol in so many cultures, philosophies, mythologies and theologies, I couldn't help but describe a kind of personal cross-section of all it might symbolize for me, too."

The "Drawing and Painting" exhibit provides a rich experience for visitors, Vogt said, and the students really enjoy it as well.

"This is the emphasis we have for every show, to bring that depth and breadth to the experience of the students," she said. "They use this. These things springboard for them. From our own experience as teachers in art, we know that five years down the road or 20 years down the road, we might say, 'That was the piece that was integral to a moment of clarity.'"

"Drawing and Painting" will be in the gallery until Feb. 6 with a gallery walk and conversation with the artists at 1 p.m. Feb. 4, followed by a closing reception from 3-5 p.m. that day. The Corner Gallery is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. Admission is free.

Info: www.nic.edu or 769-3427