Spring has finally taken hold and color is exploding everywhere! And speaking of bursting color, make sure you go over to Escape Into Life today to see the work of German artist Markus Linnenbrink. He is masterful in his use of bright and brilliant hues!
Body language speaks louder than words. Many times, our posture and expression may belie what we’re really thinking, despite the words coming out of our mouths. The paintings of Santa Fe artist Ali Cavanaugh shout with quiet profundity.
Cavanaugh’s inspiration comes much from her dependence upon visual language, due to the loss of much of her hearing to spinal meningitis at a very young age. Utilizing simple compositions with bright palettes and extraordinary light against white backgrounds, Cavanaugh tells visual stories not only of what is meant to be communicated, but also what is kept hidden.
Her figures employ their bodies to communicate– folding their arms and hands to tell the world what perhaps they dare not speak.
Even these tools of communication are often concealed, hiding behind brightly colored socks, as if performing in an impromptu puppet show. They are trying to convey truth, yet it still remains obscured.
Be sure to visit Ali Cavanaugh’s website to see more of her incredible work and to find out where you can see her work in person.
Featured image is Place One End on My Memory That Holds an Imperfection. All images are via the artist’s website.
The first time I saw the work of Jill Ricci, I was completely smitten. Her palette, use of texture, pattern and materials lend such a glamourous edge to her work. Wonderfully feminine and sophisticated yet rustic-ly urban. I’m giddy to have her as the Facebook Featured Artist for May! So much so that I find myself going to the Artsy Forager Facebook page just to gaze at her cover image. Is that weird?
Her work reminds me of the things I love so much about New York– the glamour and elegance of the city, its history and architecture, how it teems with life and colorful characters.
But even as we idealize the city, it hits us with its grittiness, its realness. As the song goes, “If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere.” Ricci’s work shares that same energy, stubbornness and passion.
Like apartment windows in the city, each portal in Ricci’s work is a glimpse into a different world– graphic niches to discover and explore.
If you haven’t done so already, head over to the Artsy Forager Facebook page to see an album of more of my Jill Ricci faves– tell me which is your favorite! And of course, check out her website for even more gorgeousness!
Featured image is Bullseye, mixed media on canvas, 48×24. All images are via the artist’s website.
Note: The title of this post is a reference to the original Dead or Alive song, not more recent versions featuring people who are possibly young enough to be my children. Children of the 80s unite!
I love art of all shapes and sizes. Large scale, small, square, rectangle, ROUND. Artists who take on the circular composition get extra kudos. Check out some examples I’m loving this week!
Jill Ricci | Steve Williams | Ben Hughes | Nicholas Bodde
Any other orb-obsessed artists I should know about? Tell me about ’em in the comments!
Featured image is Andy Says by Jill Ricci. Be sure to head over to the Artsy Forager Facebook page where Jill Ricci is this month’s featured artist! All images are via the artists’ websites, linked above. Special thanks to The Jealous Curator for introducing me to Ben Hughes’ work!
Advertising imagery has become such an integral part of our cultural landscape that products are often instantly recognizable simply by their logos. Like his Pop Art predecessors before him, Jacksonville, FL artist Mark George takes inspiration from the inescapable world of advertising, putting his own spin on the Mad Men era.
Of course, there are obvious parallels between George’s work and that of Pop Art icon, Roy Lichtenstein. Yes, the imagery also takes its cues from advertising imagery and comic books. But where as Lichtenstein enlarged his imagery to the point of replicating in paint the Ben-Day dots that comprised printed materials of the day, George chooses to flatten out the imagery even further.
The lack of visible brushstrokes and use of smooth, reflective surfaces emphasizes the slick nature of the mid-centuray imagery. While the severely cropped faces and “torn” edges of his panel suggest that these are relics abandoned to a different kind of future.
But what interest me most is the emotionality to be found in the faces of George’s subjects. There is a sad, melancholia about the imagery, bordering on the disturbing. In this respect, his work could be seen as our past looking back upon itself with current eyes, shocked and saddened by what is seen in hindsight.
What do you make of the faces of Mark George’s subjects? Please visit his website to see more of his work. If you’re in South Florida, he will be participating in a show, Jet Set Glamour at Harold Golen Gallery in Miami, opening tonight!
All images are via the artist’s website.
I absolutely adore work that is marries striking visual elements and imagination stirring imagery. Come and take a magical ride through Geoff Mitchell’s work with me over on Escape Into Life today!
The way colors play off one another has always attracted me. There are certain designs I find myself staring at over and over again simply for the juxtaposition of hues and how they relate together. The work on Nicholas Bodde strikes my chroma-loving heart to the core.
Bodde’s work is beautiful in its simplicity and in its joyful exploration of color. Parallel, horizontal stripes race across the canvas in a controlled riot, almost like we’re looking out a car window while whizzing by a carnival or planted fields of flowers.
Especially in the works featuring wide bands of blue or orange at the top of the canvas, these seem like distilled landscapes. Complex scenes broken down to simple bands of color.
In this way, the placement of colors on the canvas and beside each other takes these away from being just painted stripes of color and into sophisticatedly designed patterns and compositions. And they simply make me happy.
To see more of Nicholas Bodde’s work, please visit his website. How are you embracing color these days?
Featured image is O.T., acrylic on aluminum, 100×56 cm. All images are via the artist’s website.
Things we experience in childhood have such a powerful impact on the people we become. They are the memories, good and bad, which come back to us again and again. Ontario artist Casey McGlynn’s work recalls recurring symbols from his childhood and life, symbols that many of our own lives share.
I first saw Casey’s work at Foster/ White in Seattle, where he was exhibiting alongside Rachel Denny. His work is striking from afar, but the elements in each work are what really drew me in and caused me to closely examine each one.
His canvases are filled with symbols of formative memories and experiences throughout his life. You’ll see repeating pictographs recalling influences and events– like the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion and blues musician Robert Johnson, along with even more personal memories like the artist’s pregnant wife.
The work is autobiographical, but remains accessible and universally appealing. I found myself pouring over the canvases and thinking– “Yes! I remember where I was when the shuttle went down.. yes! I know what it’s like to gather coins for the laundromat.
His primitive drawing style adds to the power of these visual memories, works created by the child within the man acknowledging where he’s been and how he arrived at where he is. To see more of Casey McGlynn’s work, please visit his Facebook page and his representing galleries, Foster/ White in Seattle, Bau-Xi Gallery in Vancouver, BC and Artistic Spirit Gallery in Charleston, SC.
Featured image is Coin Laundry, mixed media on canvas, 48×40. All images are via the artist’s representing galleries, linked above.
.. and not a drop to swim in. Well, without a wetsuit, at least here in Northern Idaho. What is it about the water that calls to us, calms our senses, rejeuvenates? These photographers might have a clue, as they’ve answered water’s siren song..
Philippe Cheng | Mertxe Alarcon | Neil Krug | Thomas Hager
To see more work from these artists, please visit their websites linked above. Happy weekend, Artsies!
All images are via the artists websites.
With the increasing sophistication of technology, we have become more and more aware of the realities of what was once mysterious. We know what the inside of our bodies look like, it’s even possible to see an unborn baby in 3-dimensional form. We can know what our children will look like before they ever take their first breath. Yet, what remains to be revealed is their personality. How they will evolve spiritually and emotionally remains a mystery. Sculptor Christina Bothwell‘s figures illustrate for us the metamorphosis of our beings, our deliverance into who we are become.
In her cast glass sculptures, Bothwell incorporates figures within figures. We see smaller figures nestled into the glass, most often in the shape of a newborn.
From the artist: “I think of these pieces as souls, each being pregnant with their own potential, giving birth to new, improved versions of themselves.”
As long as we are breathing, we are constantly evolving, hopefully into a better version of ourselves. Wouldn’t it be fantastic to know that at the end of your life, you had become your most strong, your most loving, your most compassionate, the very best version of you?
Bothwell’s work shows us, not the end result, but the transformation. We see the adaptation and evolution of the spirit as translated into the material. To see more of Christina Bothwell’s work, please visit her website.
Featured image is Dawn, cast glass, ceramic, wood and oil paint, 38x10x7. All images are via the artist’s website.