There is work that enchants us for a moment, we think, “oh, that’s very nice!” but then move on, maybe occasionally coming back to it. But then there is work that is completely mesmerizing from the moment we see it, drawing us in and nearly drowning us in its magic. These watercolors by Seattle artist Jeffrey Simmons have me utterly hypnotized with their radiating forms and precisely blurred lines.
These pulsating forms have an incredibly cosmic quality, like stars shining brightly in the blackest night. The shifts in color are so incredibly subtle, that I find my eyes moving almost imperceptibly between forms, diving down into the depths and then emerging to the feathery banks. This is watercolor taken to another universe, devoid of tradition and full of possibility.
To see more of Jeffrey Simmons‘ work, please visit his website. You can see his work in person at Greg Kucera Gallery in Seattle, one of my favorite spots in my favorite city.
There comes a time in this life when we come to the realization that we are, indeed, not going to be here forever. For some, this revelation takes longer than for others, but its definitely taken its hold on me recently. This series, Impermanence, by artist Seung Hwan Oh emphasizes the balance between creation, life, and destruction in these ephemeral photographs.
From the artist’s site– “The process involves the cultivation of emulsion consuming microbes on a visual environment created through portraits and a physical environment composed of developed film immersed in water. As the microbes consume light-sensitive chemical over the course of months or years, the silver halides destabilize, obfuscating the legibility of foreground, background, and scale. This creates an aesthetic of entangled creation and destruction that inevitably is ephemeral, and results in complete disintegration of the film so that it can only be delicately digitized before it is consumed.”
My mom’s illness has definitely caused Mr. F and I to think more closely about our own physical, emotional and spiritual health and what that means for our future. There are no guarantees, of course, but we’re trying very hard to move through each day with a focus on not only on cultivating our all too quickly approaching future, but more importantly, to be fully present in the now.
When we’re out hiking, I always notice something that seems so contradictory. One would assume that most people who hike are doing so for the enjoyment of the outdoor world. So why in the world would they think it is OK to leave their trash all over the trail? Man in general seems to have this sort of dysfunctional relationship with nature and in this series of photos by artist Jessica Tremp, I see the drama being played out.
Nature, in its ineffable beauty calls out to our spirits and our souls. We long to not just see it, but experience it, for it to become a part of us. But inevitably, our selfishness gains the upper hand and we do the very thing we hate– we become part of the problem. We drive our car too much, we let the water run while we brush our teeth, we throw away what we no longer want and so that our garbage fills what was once pristine. And then we cry over what we have done, cursing ourselves, only to continue the cycle day after day.
On the way back to the Coast from Yosemite, Mr. F and I decided to spend the day in Napa Valley to do a little wine tasting. Serendipitously, we happened to pass through St. Helena where there were a few galleries I couldn’t wait to peruse. As we walked into Caldwell Snyder Gallery, Mr. F and I were both immediately drawn to the enigmatic work of Cole Morgan.
One of the best things about gallery hopping with Mr. F is when we’re both intrigued by the work of the same artist and share what we love about it. Morgan’s use of circles and shadows, along with carefully crafted yet spontaneously appearing layers give his work an interesting crypticness. Spheres seem to float yet are grounded with shadow, so which is their reality?
“I love going out of my way, beyond what I know, and finding my way back a few extra miles, by another trail, with a compass that argues with the map…nights alone in motels in remote western towns where I know no one and no one I know knows where I am, nights with strange paintings and floral spreads and cable television that furnish a reprieve from my own biography, when in Benjamin’s terms, I have lost myself though I know where I am. Moments when I say to myself as feet or car clear a crest or round a bend, I have never seen this place before. Times when some architectural detail on vista that has escaped me these many years says to me that I never did know where I was, even when I was home.”
I arrived in Toronto, ON at well past midnight. The nights have become my most favorite times both on and off of Toronto Island, where I was a resident artist for the first two weeks of August at Artscape Gibraltar Point Centre for the Arts. I was greeted during my first twenty-four hours in my travels by painter, Genevieve Robertson, carpenter and leather worker, Shane Trudell, and of course Finn, their trusty marble-eyed hound. Robertson is a community-based visual artist and painter who paints abstract landscape paintings. We first met in 2012, when we were in residence at The Homestead in Willow, Alaska. It was here that we bonded over a mutual obsession with Payne’s grey, mountains, migration, and abstraction. We began what is now a collaborative, durational project entitled Call and Response.
Binary, 2014
As day became evening during my first twenty-four hours residing and working on Toronto Island, I made my way over to the Toronto Island Fire Parade, an annual celebration organized by Shadowland Troupe. By far, this had to be the best introduction to a locale and residency that I have encountered at this time. The fire had to be at least 25 feet tall, which, we arrived at after following a troupe of paper lantern wielding gymnasts who fire danced as a crowd of onlookers followed them to the beach. Later in the evening as young beach dwellers took to splashing in the blue-black lake, samosas in a pan rested over the coals of what once was the raging bonfire. The sparks flew up as we prodded the glowing coals with sticks and added logs to the fire to keep it going. Not that the fire needed much encouragement.
“Could you paint that campfire?” … “No, it is too beautiful.”, 2014
Lake Ontario appeared to push forward, endlessly into the night, and the moon and stars were covered by clouds. Everything glowed orange, yellow, and red, as light reflections danced across the water’s surface. Everything was at once open and insulated. As I walked away from the fire that night and into the darkness, all felt surrounded in blackness and the soft sounds of laughter and ocean. My walk back to studio was shrouded in green leafy trees whispering softly as if in conversation with the waters that sloshed rhythmically in the distance. This was how my trip began and I thought of Alex Katz’s night paintings. Of temporality, ephemerality, the fleeting nature of night, and the intense shroud that night surrounds you in: a veil that encompasses both comfort and uncertainty.
The days that followed were filled with planning and making. Robertson and I prepared ten works from our Call and Response series for the opening at Milk Glass Co. Since meeting at The Homestead, we had mailed each other small triangular paintings and responded to what was sent by the other. A result of this on-going durational project is some 40 sets of triangles that represent a painterly dialogue between Robertson and myself over the course of two years.
Exhibition install at Milk Glass Co., Toronto, ON, Canada
Images courtesy Genevieve Robertson and Stephanie Clark
Exhibition install at Milk Glass Co., Toronto, ON, Canada
Image courtesy Genevieve Robertson and Stephanie Clark
I spent three days in Toronto aiding in the install of the show. After the opening and a few days spent in the city, I returned to the Island and my studio.
The air on Toronto Island was often thick with water and rain. Through the tall windows of my studio at Gibraltar Point Centre for the Arts—which was once a classroom—I could see the full trees. As I made my way to the shore in the early mornings and late evenings, I watched the gulls migrate in traffic patterns across the skies while drifting on air currents. During these evenings, the sun receded into the horizon again and again and night beckoned. The fires along the beaches jumped and popped, exploding into the night’s cool and heavy air. These were nights filled with campfire smoke, hazy purples, murky blackish blues and clean, deep blueish greens that were bordered by horizons that seemed to stretch deeply. It is a darkness that at once retreats and pushes forward into the distance.
Thanks so much, Stephanie for sharing your experience with us! If you’d like to see more of Stephanie Clark’s work, please visit her website. You can also read my thoughts on the Call and Response series in this post, just in case you missed it!
I am always amazed at the way an artist’s mind will interpret a given subject. I believe artists “see” in certain palettes, even when looking at a thing that is obviously one color, the artist feels it as another. Such seems to be the way of Australian abstract painter Jo Davenport, whose expressionistic interpretations of landscape, instead of being literal regurgitations of a scene, are spontaneous bursts of color and mark.
As we transition from summer into autumn, these paintings remind me of how utterly changeable and temporal our landscape is. As branches, grow, then break, soil erodes, flowers seed, and light changes, a given scene will never be exactly the same as it is in one exact moment.
As we get back into the swing of normal life following our week in the wild, I’ve been struck by the obvious artificiality that surrounds so much of our landscape. Plastic flowers where real should be, fountains instead of waterfalls. In their In Pieces series, photographer Dean West and Nathan Sawaya present highly stylized, manipulated representations of modern life.
Upon first glance, these may appear as simple photographs, just as that strip mall facade from a distance might appear to be a row of historic buildings. But on closer inspection, we see that these are carefully crafted tableaus combining West’s photography with Sawaya’s LEGO sculptures to create an unreal reality. ( click on each image to enlarge the photo and see the LEGO elements better ).
To see more from the In Pieces series, please visit the collection website. You can check out more work from Dean West here and Nathan Sawaya here.
With worries over the health of my mom, close friends, and myself ( I checked out fine, whew! ), it’s been an emotional summer. Not really the carefree season of years gone by. So Mr. F and I were really looking forward to unplugging and spending a week camping and hiking in Yosemite National Park. An escape to staggering beauty could not have come at a better time.
Simply taking time away from work, social media, and just the stress of every day life will have a renewing effect, but to be surrounded by an incomparable natural landscape, incredible in its beauty and yet struggling for its own survival, definitely puts everything into a new perspective.
These getaways allow for a resting of the mind and soul and an opportunity for Mr. F and I to really reflect individually and as a partnership on where we are and where we would like to be. Clarity comes, decision making is easier without distraction and passion for beloved pursuits are reawakened and reinforced. Every morning in Yosemite, we were awake with the dawn ( and sometimes before! ) excited for the adventure and inspiration the day would bring. Why can’t we rise to great each day as if there is adventure and discovery waiting?
We would lay our heads down each night and look up at the stars, exhausted yet satisfied that we’d taken full advantage of the day we’d been given.
By the end of our trip, we’d made goals for changes we’d like to see in our lives, a backing off from invasive technology and a renewed focus on physical, mental, and spiritual health. I personally came away incredibly inspired to dive deeper into painting and can’t wait to work through the amazing amount of artistic stimulation that I’ve felt since stepping foot onto Yosemite’s sacred ground.
While Mr. F and I are camping in Yosemite, I’m resharing some posts you might have missed the first go ’round! Enjoy!
If there is one thing we learned during our time in the desert, it is that Mr. Forager & I are water people. We need to see it, smell it, hear it. Whatever form it make take, whether the ocean, the Puget Sound, a lake, or river, something about it is essential to us. In her work, Rhode Island artist Jessica Pisano invites us into the sense of stillness and timelessness the water gives us.
Watermark, oil and silver leaf on panel, 60×48
In water, there is such a delicate balance. It’s presence, when contained, calms us, but when loosed, it can be an incredibly destructive force. It is essential for growth and life, yet slowly erodes what is in its path.
Fog Ascending, mixed media on panel, 36×36Fog on the Horizon No. 6, oil and silver leaf on panel, 40×30Sea Legs, oil and silver leaf on panel, 36×36
Pisano works her water series in translucent layers, creating a depth that reminds us of how the waters overflow and overtake.
Still Waters, oil and silver leaf on panel, 40×40
If you’d like to see more of Jessica Pisano’s work, please visit her website. You can see her work in person at a number of galleries in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, as well as Stellers Gallery in Ponte Vedra Beach, FL.
While Mr. F and I are camping in Yosemite, I’m resharing some posts you might have missed the first go ’round! Enjoy!
Although I love the cold winter months, for many, January is a tough month to swallow. All the gaiety of the holidays now in the past, it seems such a long time before the warmth of spring and the ease of summer. So on what may be for many of you a cold, dreary Monday, I thought a little sunshine and warmth from German artist Nina Nolte may put a little spring back in your socked & booted step!
Forgotten Dreams, acrylic on canvas, 100x16x4 cm
Nolte’s depictions of stylish ladies lounging by the pool recalls, to me, a modern-day version of traditional European works depicting the wealthy socializing and at play, such as Fragonard or Boucher. The richness of the color ( that yellow! )and details in the folds of fabric bring to mind the sumptuousness of the textiles of Vermeer.
The Days of Wine and Roses, acrylic on canvas, 100x200x4 cm
The works do hearken back in some ways to European traditions, but it is done in such an enchantingly modern, yet elegantly timeless way.
Some of Those Days, acrylic on canvas, 100x160x4 cm
The viewer is given the position of voyeur, thanks especially to the bird’s eye view angle of many of the pieces. It feels a bit like we’re eavesdropping on some really juicy society gossip!
You Must Believe in Spring, acrylic on canvas, 65x65x4As Time Goes By, acrylic on canvas, 100x160x4 cm
To bask in more of Nolte’s bathing beauties, please visit her website. Think of these while you’re sloshing through freezing rain and snow!
Featured image is How Deep is the Ocean?, acrylic on canvas, 1oox200x4 cm. All images are via the artist’s website.
