Meet the Artist - Douglas Granum
"The opportunity to create a life-sized image of a silverback western lowland gorilla is one of those rare events in my life. This great gorilla, Ivan by name, was an icon in the South Puget Sound area, where he lived for over three decades, and then 18 more years at the Atlanta Zoo. Ivan’s representation is more than a bronze, it is portraiture of a living being who shared attributes with us all.” - Douglas Granum
Another visible piece in the area is The Big Catch Fisherman. Cast in bronze, the installation is a 6 ½-foot commercial dock worker holding an 80 pound salmon. The cast was created from a 1909 photograph taken by Asahel Curtis on the Bellingham, Washington waterfront. The work can be seen at the Harbor History Museum in Gig Harbor, Washington.
Creation is his way of life.
His inspiration is derived from his travels around the world and an appreciation of the unusual – trekking the jungles of New Guinea, enjoying plein aire painting in northern Urals of Russia, drifting down China’s Yangtze River, looking at the stars in a Serengeti night sky, and commercial fishing in the storm-tossed Gulf of Alaska.
Douglas Granum’s works works with and in various mediums including stone, metal, glass, wood, canvas, and of course, bronze. From creation in his studio in Southworth, Washington, his paintings, glass pieces, metal and stone sculptures can be found worldwide.