There’s a school of thought that white walls = boring. But white walls + wooden textures + pops of colorful artwork? Anything but!! And this Artsy is here to prove it to ya. Let’s take a beautiful, airy space like the one below. The white surfaces have already been warmed a bit by pops of cozy wood textures. The way the light bounces off those walls make this the perfect place for some color. And that beautifully curved staircase wall? It’s just crying out for a fabulous wall sculpture or installation. Don’t believe me? Let us count the ways..
There are lots of different ways you could take the artwork in this space– those white walls are the perfect blank canvas!
1 | happy texture Smooth surfaces abound in this space, which leaves ample room for adding pattern and texture. A Liz Tran sculptural installation is like a party on a wall, providing an instant shot of joyful movement. Or how about gettin’ a little groovy with a retro-ish weaving? Tanya Aguiniga‘s Multi Knot Wall Hanging is a bit more minimalistic, but still adds just the right amount of texture and color. Making a simple, bold statement is hardly ever the wrong choice and one of Jen Pack‘s fabric & wood wall sculptures packs just the right amount of punch.
2 | organic elegance Not only can a space like this handle something dynamic and full of color but a single elegant representational sculpture can add just the right amount of elegance to bring the slightly casual atmosphere up a notch.
3 | slick pop Interesting juxtapositions your game? Graphic, pop inspired pieces provide an intriguing touch of je ne sai quois when paired with these white walls and warm textures. Think of the neon signs, sand and palm trees of Miami– opposites never looked so good together.
Have I convinced you yet? Are you running out to buy gallons and gallons of white paint? 😉 See more of my favorite artsy interiors on my Artsy DwellingPinterest board. Oh and like what I put together here? I can do it for you, too!
I’m a Southern girl. You may not know that about me, since we’ve been all over the Northwest during most of Artsy Forager’s existence. OK some may not include Florida as the Deep South, but North Florida is pretty dang close to South Georgia, which is pretty dang Southern. Mr. F is a Southern boy and while we definitely feel more at home in the Northwest, there are things about the South that are so incredibly identifiable and iconic, that only Southerners, whether by birth or transplant, truly understand. Artist Jon Davenport came to the US South by way of the UK where he grew up well versed in Southern iconography, but it wasn’t until he was fully immersed in its culture that he began his artistic exploration of distinctly Southern tastes.
Jon, who shares a similar style to his wife, this month’s Featured ArtistChristy Kinard, creates heavily textured, layered work filled with vintage advertising imagery much of which built up our ideas about life in the South, for better or for worse. Some of these icons can still be seen as faded paintings on the sides of buildings, especially in small Southern towns. In many ways, there is a fierce desire to hold onto the past in the South, where Sunday dinners at grandma’s and yes ma’am and no ma’am are still the norm.
Yet behind the fun and frivolity and charm, there was a darkness that would best be forgotten and which many Southern cities are still fighting to overcome. Many strive to overcome lingering stereotypes and “Ol’ Boys Networks”, while seeking to maintain the best of what it means to be a part of what has been a troubled region. Davenport’s work with its bright but slightly faded palette and layered drips and splotches of paint remind us that time marches on, ideals fade, but hopefully what is left is our favorite, most positive parts of ourselves.
To see more of Jon Davenport‘s work, please visit his website. His work can be seen in his solo show at Matre Gallery in Atlanta through February 8th. Stay tuned over the next few days for interviews with Jon & Christy in a special “He Said, She Said” feature on what it’s like to be half of a creative couple!
Our modern society has such a fascination with speed and we are constantly feeding our need for it with faster internet, cars, food, you name it. But once upon a time, most cultures valued things done with meticulousness and care. Florida based Japanese artist Hiromi Moneyhun hand constructs elaborate and delicate paper cuts using a methodical and time consuming process, hearkening back to the careful artistry and precision long cherished in the Japanese culture.
Drawing upon characters synonymous in traditional Japanese culture for their artful deftness such as the geisha and oiran, Moneyhun carefully drafts these complex paper-cuts first as line drawings. It is only after the initial drawing is complete that she begins the slow, methodical process of cutting around the lines to create sculptural drawings that delicately float, an interesting juxtaposition to their bold lines and composition.
In one way or another, we all buy into the idea of “the American Dream“, we strive for success and prosperity. And if we haven’t achieved it, we’ll fake it ’till we make it. Or we’ll just fake it. In his mixed media work, Brooklyn artist Matthew Conradt looks at the contradictions we’ve built in our pursuit of the prosperous dream.
We buy McMansions with more space than we’ll ever need, filling them huge flat screens and designer knock-offs. We stand in line to upgrade to the latest phone, we trade in perfectly running cars for new. We’ll present ourselves as successful and prosperous, even if we are drowning in debt in our pursuit of a facade.
Conradt’s work begins with the collection of found imagery symbolic of American Life. The images are then reconstructed and transferred onto mylar in large scale form, reinforcing the “bigness” of American culture. The resulting images focus on the contradictions we find in our culture and how they creep into our subconscious.
I have such a weakness for ceramics. Some people are glass lovers and I agree, handblown glass is gorgeous, but I’ve always loved the beautiful imperfection of ceramics. I think it started when I was young, eating chocolate ice cream from my grandmother’s Frankoma pottery bowls. The swirling of the spoon made such a distinct sound and the bowls usually had slight imperfections that just added to their charm. Mr. F and I didn’t register for china when we got married, mostly because we knew we would be traveling for a while and didn’t see the point. If I had registered, delicate china wouldn’t have been my choice. Artsy pottery dishes would have been the way to go for me. The work by ceramic artist Diana Fayt surely would have been ( and still is! ) on my short list.
The delicate graphics of her hand drawn “etchings in clay” and the gorgeous array of glaze colors make Diana’s ceramics almost too beautiful to use. Oh but use them, I would! How much better would my morning muesli taste out of one of these bowls? Or just arrange a few leafy branches in one of those vases and let the pottery be the star. Her work would fit just perfectly in our artsy dream home in the woods.
To see more of Diana Fayt‘s work, please visit her website. Some work is available for purchase on her website, or check out the galleries & stockists listed.
Mr. Forager and I are without a home. We have a roof over our heads always, but as we move from furnished rental to furnished rental, none of them are actually home. A place that is ours, filled with our own tastes and personalities. In a way, it is incredibly freeing– if we had a home to decorate, believe me, I would spend waaay too much time doing so! This idea of creating a beautiful, comfortable home has been around for centuries and continues to be perpetuated and heightened today by magazines, blogs, and social media. The burden of home-making, often self-inflicted, usually falls to women. In her Anonymous Women: Draped series, photographer Patty Carroll explores the idea that we become so obsessed with creating a perfect space that we lose ourselves in the process.
From the artist’s website, “I am addressing the double edge of domesticity; the home as a place of comfort, or conversely, a place where decoration camouflages one’s individuality to the point of claustrophobia“. Or to the point of invisibility. If, like me, you’re a reader of interior design blogs, think about the homes you see– don’t they all kind of look a bit alike? We follow trends and take hold of popular styles, never really considering whether or not it truly reflects who we are. I look back on some of my own choices and wonder, who was I? The answer– I had no clue who I was, so my choices reflected that lost sense of self.
And its not only in decorating our homes that we lose ourselves, but in fashion, work, tradition, emotion, even as members of larger groups, we immerse ourselves, taking on characteristics that may not otherwise have been a part of who we are. Then, its only when we separate ourselves that we realize that the entire time we felt that sense of belonging, we, as individuals, were actually lost.
I’ve heard of this phenomena called the January Blues. A condition in which the post-holiday, short, usually cold and cloudy days get some folks down. I’m thankful not to suffer that affliction! If anything, I absolutely revel in the winter blues of January.
I love the fading light of late afternoon, the silhouette of bare tree limbs and the softness of the snow covered landscape. The world slows down, cools down, literally and figuratively, and our minds are given the chance to rest and renew. I’ve been pinning some of my favorite wintery images on my An Artsy WinterPinterest board and thought I’d share some of them with you!
I hope that maybe this post and peeking around the board will help you find the beauty in your winter blues! To see more selections, visit the An Artsy Winter board on Pinterest. If it doesn’t do the trick, turn on a heat lamp, pour yourself a cup of cocoa and count the days until spring! 😉
Artists, let me ask you a question. When you paint, do you find yourself mesmerized by the way the paint is moving across the canvas? Not in an I’m a painting genius kind of way, but in an omigod paint is the most beautiful, wonderful thing ever, way? Just me, then? Ooookay. Seriously, it is the gorgeous movement and blending of paint that draws me to the work of artist Francesc Ruiz Abad.
You can see the gentle stroke of the brush, imagine it filled with paint, the colors mixing on the palette first and then the canvas. Light, luscious, cotton candy like movement through the surface of the paint. Colors bleed beautifully into each other, creating a sense of light and softness.
Paintings like these make me want to paint! And run my fingers over each canvas.
I began 2014 determined to get back into an artistic practice. I feel like this part of my life is filled with so many starts and stops. It’s too easy to let it slide when other things come up. It’s too easy to choose watching BBC serials rather than sitting and drawing. So on January 1st, I started my #colorforaging2014 project, in which I’m exploring a different color in paint each day and posting my finds on Instagram. I hoped that this daily exercise would feed my desire to create and making it an Instagram project would help keep me accountable. And you know what? It has.
And it’s teaching me some things about myself as a person and artist ( I’m trying hard to accept that label ).
1 |I have to make time to do the things I want to do. If I don’t carve out specific time, I’ll always find other ways to distract myself, with previously mentioned serials, web surfing, work, etc. This Instagram project has forced me to spend at least a few minutes each day with my palette out and a brush in my hand. And those few minutes have made me ache for longer, more dedicated time– I’m usually doing my #colorforaging2014 project immediately after dinner cleanup, but rarely do much else creatively in the evening. So when Mr. F announced that he was planning to spend Sunday afternoon brewing beer, I announced that I was going to spend the afternoon painting.
2 | I need accountability. There was a reason for saying out loud to Mr. F that I was going to paint on Sunday. Because I knew he would remember and ask me why I wasn’t painting when I sat on the couch and watched back to back episodes of Doc Martin on Hulu. I have all these grand schemes and ideas in my head but if I don’t get them out and tell someone, much of the time, they never leave the comfort of my mind.
3 | I need deadlines. I am a procrastinator by nature. And a perfectionist. I think those two traits go hand in hand. I procrastinate because I’m afraid of my results being less than stellar. But I know that I need practice to improve and grow. But the perfectionist in me hates it when my efforts result in disappointing work. Such a vicious cycle! My niece Kendall told my sister-in-law ( after I’d already purchased & shipped her Christmas gift ) that she wanted a painting from me for Christmas. So I decided she will have one as a birthday gift in June! Deadline established. But her sister Samantha’s birthday is coming up on February 3rd, and how could I not give her one, too? Deadline established. I also signed up to be a Contributor for the February 2014 project for We Are the Contributors. Another deadline established.
4 | I need to seize moments of inspiration. Every day I see little moments of life that I want to sketch. My coffee cup and its shadow. The funky yellow chair in the living room. Mr. Forager’s profile. But often I see the inspiration, note it, then let it just slip by. No more! From now on, if I see beauty in a moment, I want to try to capture it. My sketchbook now lives on our coffee table instead of hidden in a bag. There is a felt pin with it always. Even if I’m just inspired to doodle, I need to do it. Because once I start, I don’t want to stop.
5 | I need mini-projects to spur creativity. This truth applies to my blogging and freelance work as much as to my fledgling art practice. It’s so easy just to do what I’ve always done, but in order to grow and evolve, I need to challenge myself. The mini-projects I’ve done on Instagram get my wheels turning in so many ways. I find myself challenged to look at things differently, to come up with new angles on old ideas. Painting is my first love, but not every project has to involve paint. It’s about finding new ways of seeing. I want to learn to weave and throw pottery. I want to find new ways of approaching the world.
6 | I need to mess with the just OK. In some things, good enough is good enough. Like making the bed or doing laundry. It isn’t perfect but its done. This attitude doesn’t fit for an art practice that is about growing, learning and evolving. When in college, I was a pretty good artist. Then in the following years, I became an OK painter. Being OK is no longer OK with me. Now, I’m finding myself bored with the type of work I would have been happy with a few years ago. On Sunday, as I was working on a little 6×6 canvas ( which you’ll see when the WAC February project is revealed! ), I arrived at a point that was OK. Not bad, but not super fantastic. Not exciting. I hesitated. I wanted to do something bold to it, feeling like it needed a push. But I was afraid to screw up the OK. I hemmed and I hawed. I tried to visualize a bold change. Then I watched this Philip Guston video. He didn’t settle and neither should I. So I took the chance. And that one change prompted other changes. Until I was left with something I liked. Something I daresay I am proud of.
I feel like I’m making progress. Its slow, but building up a good habit always takes time and effort. How about you, Artsies? Do any of you struggle with some of these issues? How do you face them down?
Thumbing through an old photo album. Spending an afternoon sifting through the contents of a cedar chest. These are things I took for granted before we started traveling. I’m even a bit envious of friends posting childhood photos of themselves all over Instagram for “throwback Thursdays”. All of my nostalgic ephemera is tucked away in a storage unit in Seattle. So I couldn’t help gushing over the work of Berkley artist Jane Hambleton whose mixed media pieces layer together glimpses of time into collected memories.
Beautifully textured, these created fragments seem torn from life’s scrapbook. Sweet, momentary glimpses into a day, a summer, a moment that may have long been forgotten. Each piece is lovely on its own, but when put together into installations, as the artist intends for each series, we see not only black and white memories, but blank canvases of color. Perhaps these are the times that aren’t specifically remembered, yet in our minds they are still colored with feeling.
