Post WWII prosperity ushered in a turning point in the world of advertising and manufactured goods– packaging and design were no longer concerned mainly with function, even the most mundane of objects were created with an appealing aesthetic. This month’s Featured Artist Holly Farrell celebrates the beauty in these old objects, breathing new and fresh life into designs of the past.
With a bright and light modern palette, accentuated with touches of muted color. Pops of graphic, retro pattern along with sleek metals recall the dawn of the industrial age, with those colors and a few carefully placed wood tones keeping the view warm and fun. I can’t decide which of these looks I like best! Which is your fave?
To see more of Holly Farrell’s work, please visit her website. The above painting, Soap, is a 10×24 acrylic and oil on masonite, available through Holly’s studio.
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!
In some ways, it seems like collage work is on the downside turn of its recent resurgence. There is so much of it out there, it can be a challenge to find work that feels fresh and original. Los Angeles artist Heather Landis uses a tight palette of color, cheeky use of typography and just the right mix of vintage and modern in her collages.
Her palettes are filled with those decidedly vintage-feeling hues of peaches and pinks, accentuated by the steely greys that were so indicative of the atomic age. Much of her work seems to deal with the coming loss of “innocence” brought on by turbulence of the Vietnam War, the sexual revolution, and well, just the end of what many perceive as the The Golden Age of pop culture.
The women in Landis’ collages seem to be blissfully unaware of what is soon to come. Beatific domesticity will give way to struggling to push through the glass ceiling and climbing the corporate ladder.
But Landis isn’t hitting us over the head with messages. Just subtly drawing us in to her happy-go-lucky world, then subversively reminding us that what used to be wasn’t always better.
I love artwork that transports me into a different world. The paintings of Ontario artist Janet Hill gives us a peek at a sweet and beautiful life, where all is loveliness and cheerful color.
Goldfinch
Her figures, lovely and graceful, entrance and enchant, her palette of sepias punctuated with bright, saturated color takes us back in time like faded photographs.
GiraffesGeneral Custard
Hers is a world that feels like that magical afternoon hour.. you know the one.. when the sunlight is just the right shade, streaming through the window and giving everything in its path a magical glow. A world that is accessibly glamorous, where even the most mundane task is done with delicious joie de vivre!
Entanglement
Seriously, doesn’t her work just make you smile? See more of it on her website and in her Etsy shop– lots of beautiful, affordable prints to be found! Perfect for girlie girls, big and small.
Featured image is Lady and the Lobster. All images are via the artist’s website.
In my much younger years, many a Sunday afternoon was spent glued to the television, enraptured by the movies of my parent’s generation. Each one filling my impressionable mind with images of the perfectly coiffed hair, sophisticated fashions and charming coquettishness of starlets like Doris Day, Audrey Hepburn and Leslie Caron. The work of California artist Tracey Sylvester Harris hearkens back to those glamorous days of my dreams.
Convertible, oil on canvas, 24×30
Those old films and their heroines led me to believe in a world in which women wore heels to the swimming pool, men were redeemable rakes and an awkward bookworm could be transformed into a beautiful swan.
Light Blue Slip, oil on canvas, 60×40Starlet, oil on canvas, 60×40
They caused me to prance around our house in my mom’s high heels and a floating negligee dreaming of the glamorous and romantic life I would lead when I grew up. But soon, reality taught me its hard lessons and I realized that the worlds I so admired weren’t real after all and the world of my dreams began to look a little different. A bit more earthy and down to earth. A little less frothy but a lot more fun.
Cocktail Hour, oil on canvas, 36×48
But that doesn’t mean I don’t still occasionally long to thrown on a little black dress and pearls. Old dreams die hard.
To see more of Tracey Sylvester Harris’ work, please visit her website. You can also see her work in person, if you’re in the Los Angeles area, at Skidmore Contemporary.
We are a world that loves stuff. One look at the tv show Hoarders will confirm that, as human beings, we develop emotional and psychological attachments to objects. Certain things may represent for us the physical manifestation of the memory of a time, a place, a relationship. Canadian artist Christopher Stott celebrates this connection by elevating every day objects to the subject of portraiture.
Good Times, oil on canvas, 30×30
Stott takes simple objects, isolating them against a neutral, traditionally lit backdrop, he treats them his subjects tenderly, as another portrait artist might portray the innocence of a child or quiet strength of a grandmother.
GE Vintage Electric Fan, oil on canvas, 22×28
Compositions containing multiple objects take on an interesting dynamic– they seem to communicate, to regard and relate to each other in an almost human-like way.
Candlestick Phone and Electric Fan, oil on canvas, 24×24Remington, Overwhelmed, oil on canvas, 36×24
By choosing subjects with an already inherent history, the artist celebrates the lives of these every day objects– the people they have served, the differences they may have made to a human life, the treasured memories that may be associated with their torn pages and chipped paint.
Baggage, oil on canvas, 30×30
To see more of Christopher Stott’s work, please visit his website. Maybe these portraits will inspire you to look at your “stuff” a bit differently!
Featured image is Quartet, oil on canvas, 48×24. All images are via the artist’s website.
I have a weakness for objects with a past. Everyday pieces from days gone by hold the untold stories of a person, a family , a home. Toronto artist Holly Farrell’s paintings of vintage objects explore this sense of nostalgia for days gone by, while also having a strong, strikingly melancholy visual impact.
Bowl ( stripe ), acrylic and oil on masonite, 14×18
The self-taught artist isolates her subjects, often with a muted, neutral background, taking a bit out of their normal context, emphasizing their design and calling our attention to their forsaken state.
Couch, acrylic and oil on masonite, 28×18
These are works that are wryly reverent. Remember that hideous sofa in Grandma’s living room? It is now immortalized on canvas, forlornly longing for the days when grandchildren used to bounce and play on it’s floral-covered cushions.
Colorful Fire King mugs, which once warmed young hands and tummies with hot cocoa are now another kind of “mug shot”… snapshot compositions feel like they could be the sales photos for an eBay or Craigslist ad. Going once, going twice.. sold.
Fire King Mugs, acrylic and oil on board, 12 @ 7×8 each
Ken and Barbie dolls, once beloved playtime companions now seem vacant and distant.
Scuba Ken & Barbie, acrylic and oil on board
Though there can be a definite sadness surrounding some of Holly Farrell’s work, it is tempered with charm and joy. Just as our memories should be. To see more of Holly’s work, please visit her website. On her website, not only will you find more deliciously intriguing work, but also a list of galleries in the US and Canada where you can see them live and in person.
A bad night’s sleep does not sit well with me. Ask George. And last night, I did not sleep well. Tossing and turning, waking up every hour to toss and turn some more. A restless night = crabby blogger this morning. But do you know what will turn my frown upside down? Wonderfully fun and happy artwork. While crabbing around this morning, after bearing too many Facebook statuses, links, etc re: um, odorous exports from bodily orifices, accidentally smearing blackberry jam on every article of clothing I’m wearing and falling up the stairs, one image kept coming to mind. This one, by Olympia, WA artist Mimi Williams…
What A Dandy Day by Mimi Williams
Was it my mind being cyncial & sarcastic? Maybe. Or was my subconcious trying to remind me that no matter how the day is going, that my lifeis, indeed, dandy? Or maybe it was the universe reminding me of Mimi Williams’ work and nudging me forward to feature her on the blog. I’m thinking it was a combo of those last two.
Kitchen Confidential by Mimi Williams
Whatever the case, it gives me great pleasure to present Mimi’s wonderful linoleum prints to you. Seriously, these make me smile, so it is doing much for my mood just to peruse her website. Unlike a painting, which can evolve over time, a linoleum print must know what it will be from the beginning. The artist must decide the composition, the positive and negative spaces and such beforehand, because once you start carving into the linoleum, there’s no going back.
Flying Free by Mimi Williams
So it is no wonder that I am marvelling at how free and fluid these pieces seem to be. They flow with narrative detail, unlike most linoleum block prints I’ve seen, that are more, well, block-y.
Cup of Joe to Go by Mimi Williams
There is something about the nature of her visual storytelling that seems both nostalgic and modern. Kind of in the way that Mid-Century design fits in so smoothly with contemporary design. Perhaps it is the way the design and colors remind me of groovy 1950s barkcloth.
Anything is Possible With the Right Partner by Mimi Williams
The compositions suggest the capturing of a moment in time, almost photo journalistic in style. Almost like they could be screen-shots from an old movie or those wonderful old photographs found in your grandmother’s closet. Back before laptops and internet and smart phones, a slower, simpler time. A time when riding in the back of a truck was okay. Feeling the wind in your hair, the sun on your face, an open road before you.
Wishing I’d Brought a Hat by Mimi Williams
If you’d like to see more of Mimi Williams’ work ( and I heartily suggest you do! ), check out her website. Now that I’m smiling, maybe I’ll indulge in some more happiness inducing activities.
