Pretty sure I read in the latest InStyle Magazine ( we all have our guilty pleasures! ) that polka dots are big for spring. Maybe it’s the influence of Damien Hirst’s spot paintings. Here are some more artists marking the spot!
Georgia Gray | Michelle Y. Williams | Paul Ecke | Tory Cowles
Have a fantastic weekend! If you spot some dots over the weekend, post a photo on the Artsy Forager Facebook page!
All images are via the artists’ websites, linked above.
There is a quiet power that abides in certain landscapes that compels us to humilty. No cell phone reception, no internet, no traffic whizzing by. Nothing to make us believe we are the center of the universe. Just earth and rock and water and light. It is in these places that the earth is welcoming, yet can be strong and unyielding. The work of New York artist, Claire Sherman captures the essence of the quiet, raw power of our natural world.
Sherman’s overall cool palette, tinged occasionally with warm tones conveys the earth’s reticent beauty. It wants us to explore and appreciate its wildness, but fears the mark our hand often leaves.
This is still a dangerous place. We often forget, wrapped safely in suburban cocoons, thinking we are master of all that we survey. Yet still in many places, one wrong step and we may become prey to the earth’s power. The artist’s linear, often jagged brushwork reminds us to tread carefully. She is beautiful, yes, but we must never forget her untamed nature. Try as we might to use her up, certain parts of the earth will always remain wild and inhospitable to man.
These places are for her renewing and for moments ours, but they belong to her. That we will do well to remember. To see more of Claire Sherman’s work, please visit her website. Her work can be seen in person at the Kavi Gupta Gallery in Chicago.
Featured image is Pile of Rocks, oil on canvas, 72×78. All images are via the artist’s website.
Living in places with so many wild areas, whenever we go out hiking, we’re still very aware of man’s impact on the landscape. Salt Lake City artist Thomas D. Aaron brings attention to the natural landscape and the effect of man’s hand upon it.
Aaron uses PLSS ( Public Land Survey System ) imagery as the jumping off point of his mixed media works. Focusing on manmade grids imposed upon the landscape and the paradigms they create with the natural order of the terrain.
The painterly textures mimic the natural terrain and in some, dominating brushwork overpowers the landscape, just our infrastructure has done the same to natural wild spaces.
To see more of Thomas D. Aaron’s work, please visit his website. To learn more about the motivation and ideology behind his work, check out his interview with Ellen Caldwell on the New American Paintings blog.
Artist found via New American Paintings.
Featured image is Lakeside Clouds, mixed media, 36×24. All images are via the artist’s website.
As I mentioned before, there were certain shows I knew I wanted to see while we were in Seattle last weekend. I’ve loved the work of Seattle artist Anne Siems since first seeing it online and was excited to get my chance to see her work up close and personal. Her solo show, Guidance is showing at Grover Thurston Gallery, just up ( or down? Still don’t have my Seattle geography down pat ) the street from Foster/White, so away we went.
Siems’ inspiration behind the show was the evolution of her daughter from childhood into adolescence and the idea that wild animal spirits may help children navigate their way through this transition. In each of us there is a wild, animalistic-like spirit that, as we grow up and grow older gets buried under years of suppression and training in proper behavior.
In Siems’ work, we see children taking on historically grim expression and formal, constricting garb, reminding us of centuries of children whose innocence is lost all too soon. Children whose natural wild spirits may fight against the constraints of social tradition and custom.
I was particularly drawn to Bison Boy ( above ), perhaps for the way the figure is isolated starkly against the white paper background. He has been taken out of his environment, out of his element. His garments are in the somewhat effeminate style of his era, yet his bison head & skin seem to be reminding us to not forget the wildness within.
George’s favorite work in the show was Lynx Cap ( below ), as this figure retains a sprightly, little girl expression in contrast to the other figures’ more suppressed, even haughty countenances. She is still an innocent.
I could go on and on about these and talk about every one– they are so interesting, visually and spiritually. If you’d like to see more of Anne Siems’ work, please visit her website. If you’re in Seattle, I highly recommend a visit to Grover Thurston to see these in person, a truly stunning show.
Featured image is Heart Branches, mixed media on panel, 30×30. All images are via the artist’s website.
A huge part of what drew George & I to the Northwest was the mountainous terrain. When the weather is good, every weekend is spent hiking and exploring the mountains around wherever we happen to be. We’re gearing up for the ultimate mountain adventure this June, when we’ll take some time off to camp and explore Glacier National Park, the Tetons and Yellowstone. So it’s only natural that I’ve got mountains on the brain these days. Hope you enjoy these artist’s takes on the peak life!
Kate Shaw | Casey Roberts | Christina Foard | Marian Brunn Smith | Liz Tran
What say you, Artsies? Any mountainous adventures on the horizon?
Featured image is Magic Hour by Kate Shaw. All images are via the artist’s websites, linked above.
A gallery that takes advantage of a beautiful space, displays a wide range of interesting work in a well-designed and thoughtful way AND feels comfortable and unpretentious? These kind of galleries are my happy places. Foster/White Gallery in Seattle definitely qualifies for a spot on that list. Thanks to our time in Seattle being super limited and the tiny brain melt in which I somehow forgot that almost all galleries are closed on Monday, our only full day there and the day I’d planned to do lots of gallery hopping, I had to narrow down my galleries to visit to A) shows I really wanted to see and B) galleries that were close together. So we took a few hours before leaving on Tuesday to visit Greg Kucera Gallery, Grover Thurston Gallery ( more on that show next week ) and Foster/White Gallery, which was by far our favorite overall gallery experience.
Foster/White has been on my list of galleries to visit for quite a while and when I saw that they were showing Rachel Denny’s work, it quickly went to the top of the list for our time in Seattle. But I’m one of those people that saves the best for last, so while I saw Rachel’s work out of the corner of my eye upon entering the space, there were so many other wonderful works around each corner that I made my way around the whole gallery before I spent some time with Rachel’s amazing sculptures.
Speaking of amazing sculptures, these bent wood pieces by Paul Vexler were exquisite. The way the grain of the wood caught the light from the window drew attention to those beautiful curves. As impressive as his work was ( and there is a large hanging piece in the F/W lobby that is to die for ), Cookie the elephant by Shay Church both delighted me and drew me in.
Cookie is part of Church’s Wet Clay series, site specific installations consisting of a wooden armatur covered with clay and sand. In this series, Church focuses on elephants and whales, gentle yet imposing creatures who must survive long migrations. With each passing year, those migrations grow more and more dangerous and daunting for these animals. Cookie leans into the wall for support, seeming to struggle to stand. As the clay has dried, it has begun to crack and fall, adding to the emotional impact of the piece. We are watching Cookie deteriorate before our eyes.
Another installation that caught our eye was Bone Yard by Evan Blackwell. The white clay pieces, pinned to the way may appear to be fragments of bone, but upon closer inspection, we see that they are actually broken pieces of model jets. Perhaps a commentary on our military policies? Or our desensitization to such destruction?
The abstract, colorful reflection of Staccato Surface by David Alexander had unbelievably lovely gestural movement and a gorgeous palette. Photos do not do it justice! Finally we made our way over to Rachel Denny’s work. I’ve been a huge fan of her work since the very first time I saw one of her Domestic Trophies online and have been looking forward to finally seeing her sculptures in person. I was blown away by just how intricately constructed they are, their palettes & construction perfectly designed to catch and direct the viewer’s eye. I was just as delighted by her work as I’d hoped to be.
To see more of each artist’s work and more of the amazing work on display, please visit the Foster/White Gallery website. If you’re in Seattle, Rachel Denny & Casey McGlynn’s current shows will be up until April 28, 2012. I highly recommend a visit!
Take a look back with me on Escape Into Life today! I’m in love with the nostalgic pop culture work by California artist Robert Townsend.
I love work that speaks to me on several levels. ( Yes, I can hear the artwork talking to me! ) The work of Philadelphia artist Jackie Tileston seems to communicate to us from several worlds at once.
Atmospheric foundations hint at other-worldly landscapes filled with mystery, while pops of graphic color and pattern create a layer of modern visual language.
Linear color leads the eye to dance across each composition against backgrounds of painterly texture. Tileston’s surfaces fairly crackle with excitement and visual energy.
To see more of Jackie Tileston’s work, please visit her website.
Featured image is Auspicious Circling of Mad Utopias, oil and mixed media on linen, 72×60. All images are via the artist’s website.
When I launched the Artsy Forager Facebook Featured Artist program this month, I was thrilled when Steve Williams agreed to be my inaugural artist. Like me, Steve is a native of our hometown, Jacksonville, Florida and has long been a fixture on the art scene there. Steve, along with his then gallery partner, Jim Draper, encouraged a young Artsy Forager to continue painting just out of college. Even though I allowed myself to get sidetracked, I never forgot their kindness.
As he splits his time between being president of his family’s successful sign business, Harbinger Sign, the gallery he has created at the business’s headquarters, Florida Mining, his own work as an artist AND being a devoted father of three, Steve is a busy soul. Which makes it all the more amazing to see the quality of thoughtful work he creates.
His experience in the sign business is evident in the strong graphic quality and balance evident in his compositions. His most recent Money series ( images above ) explores currency as symbolic of all that we strive for as a society yet ensnares and imprisons us.
While I love this current direction, my personal favorite works of Steve’s are those that incorporate layers of texture and color in which graphic signs and images are enshrouded. These works, as well as the Money series, invite us in, asking us to look more closely at not only the world around us, but the motives and desires within us.
I hope you’ll check out more of Steve Williams‘ work on his website. And do yourself a favor– don’t miss his blog, Making Cheddar, or his Twitter feed. He’s as hilarious as he is insightful.
Featured image is Grant, mixed media, 60×36. All images are via the artist’s website.
If you’ve been reading Artsy Forager for a while, you may have noticed me mention the love my hubby & I have for Seattle. He was living there when we began dating and although we’d known each other a long time before, it was in the Emerald City that we truly fell in love. Exactly 2 years from this Sunday, I flew to Seattle to celebrate my birthday ( the 15th ) and George’s birthday ( the 11th ) and to truly test the waters after 12 years of friendship, 1year of online flirting and 1 month of long distance dating. Not only did I fall madly in love with George, I fell hard for the city of Seattle. So we’re heading there on Sunday to spend a few days soaking in the delights of our favorite city. Needless to say, I’m pretty Seattle obsessed today. Hope you enjoy these artists’ renditions of our city of love!
Deborah Scott | Julia Hensley | Michael Prince | Marie Gagnon | Robin Weiss
Have a fantastic weekend! Posts will be going up as normal for the next few days, but I’ll only be online sporadically to answer questions and approve/respond to comments. See you on Wednesday!
Featured image is The Original Starbucks at Pike Place Market, Seattle by Marsha Glaziere. All images are via the artists’ websites.