COOS BAY, OR – The Southwestern Oregon Community College Library is now showing One World, Eight Billion Faces, a sketchbook exhibit by artist and author Shinan Barclay. The display runs through June 30, 2025.
As part of the exhibit, the public is invited to a free drawing workshop with Barclay. It’s called FACE IT and takes place Thursday, May 8, from 2–4 p.m. at the Southwestern Library. The event is open to all. No experience is needed, and all materials are provided.
“Sketching helps me value our diverse community and see each person’s unique beauty,” Barclay says. “Pen to paper is a conversation without words.”
A teacher at heart, Barclay spent her first year of teaching in a remote Inuit village in Arctic Alaska. She later taught in Pennsylvania, Vermont, and Arizona. Sketching and writing stories of multicultural peoples became her passion. Her memoir stories have been translated into French, Spanish, Japanese, Portuguese, Czech and Mandarin.
Wherever she went, she brought her sketchbooks. She sat down with people and drew their faces. Over 40 years, she filled more than 30 sketchbooks with scribbled notes, landscapes and portraits—each one a quiet moment of connection.
The exhibit features photocopies from her sketchbooks and simple text. Together, they reflect the heart of her idea: One World, Eight Billion Faces.
Barclay’s approach is simple: drawing faces doesn’t have to be hard. “It’s as easy as scribbling an egghead,” she says. The workshop is meant to be fun and low-pressure—a chance to slow down, try something new, and connect with others.
Southwestern’s library is offering this program to bring people together through art. It’s free and open to the community.
