I am flattered to have been commissioned by Sheldon Vance, an Appalachian Punk musician from Charleston, WV to build a fitting image for his upcoming mini-tour. It is built upon a stylized Converse® illustration that I haven’t technically finished. Take a look. (continues below)
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Sarcodes sanguinea, which translates roughly to “the bloody flesh-like thing”, is a fleshy saprophytic plant in the heath family, native to western North America, having a scaly reddish stalk and scarlet flowers and typically emerging early in the spring –often at the end of the snow melt.
Progress continues…
Thanks to Zumiez (Sevierville) & Headquarters Skateshop (Knoxville), I have decks for The Dark Slide project sponsored by the Dubuque Area Arts Collective. They are in the midst of being sanded, primed & gesso’d. But, in the meantime, I finished the initial designs, left to right — London Calling, México Floración & Miami Reclining. (continues below)
These designs are meant to be a study in iconography and how it connects us to times & places entirely personal. The London Eye, an umbrella and bowler hat, sugar skulls, flowers & mattress ticking, Deco-era waves, a bikini & seaweed.
How excited am I?
My decks have arrived. Special thanks goes out to Zumiez (Sevierville, TN) & Headquarters Skateshop (Knoxville, TN) for hooking me up with decks for my new project for The Dark Slide sponsored by the Dubuque Area Arts Collective. (continues below)
The next step is to get them sanded, primed & gesso’d for illustration transfers. I kind of hate to sand them down because they already look pretty rad even in their current state. But, I just gotta. In addition to being a great art project for me, it is also a benefit for a new skatepark in Dubuque, Iowa.
I was approached by author Annette E. Neumann about illustrating her upcoming book, Songs of the North Series: Short Stories inspired by history of Northern Europe. Because these are stories lost, I thought a minimalist, silhouetted approach with intricate patterned detail offered plenty of space for the reader to fill in the gaps of place and time that make stories feel personal. (continues below)
This book in the series is slated to contain four stories. I have finished 6 illustrations for the first story, “Pestilence”, and I thought I would share a little sneak preview. The book will be published in trade-size format 6″ x 9″, but the original illustrations are 12″ x 18″. Prints may be available once the book is released. I am excited to tackle the additional illustrations.
So many of you have asked me about my preference in colored gesso. I have pretty standard preferences in gel medium (Liquitex) and acrylic paint (Golden). I find that an art supply is usually popular for a reason. But occasionally, I find favorites by accident. (continues below)
I’ve spent years contemplating the addition of color and texture to my xerography, but all experiments have failed to impress. Xerography, by my method, is tricky and inflexible. Holbein to the rescue. Lots of the big name manufacturers offer white, black & gray gesso. But the 22 colors offered by Holbein make my heart sing (non-affiliate link). Did I mention that the packaging helps you squeeze out every last drop and makes mixing a dream? LOVE. Carmine is my favorite. I’ve added my first coats of gesso in prep for transfer…then paint.
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I have spent a lot of years working with an absence of color. Black & white photography has and continues to be the cornerstone of my work. In 2014, I opened Do I Know You with every piece featuring hand-drawn background patterns to that same b&w photography. But, as I continue to move toward a new series, Better Than Figs, I can seem unable to avoid color. (continues below)
I’ve been experimenting with both color and b&w photography on both white and colored gesso (examples above). I’ve also been testing out other transfer mediums. In the end, colored gesso will likely find a place in my work.
On December 14, 2014, she finally got some peace. Emma Gibson had just 15 days to go until her 93rd birthday, but she just couldn’t go there. My intimate journey with her began 2 years ago today with a phone call.
When I answered that call that told me my father was in the ICU grappling with what would eventually be revealed as fatal injuries, my first thoughts were not for him but for my grandmother. She had been in nursing care with end-stage dementia for a couple of years at that point. And, while she could still recognize me, she was fading fast.
My journey with her through guardianship, conservatorship, and every imaginable health issue possible inspired me to share my passage from fear to resolution. It all ended in a fairly confident summation in artist-statement-format for my July 4th opening of “Do I Know You?” that ended with “The best we can hope for is a few good photos and a really good story about how we got to the end. Smile. Everyone dies.” I meant it at the moment, but…
Sometimes I am a pompous ass.
She’s dead.
She’s not smiling.
I’m not smiling.
She loved me.
I loved her.
I love her still.
I can’t believe she’s gone.
How shocking that I could be still shocked that her loss hurts this badly. It was expected; I thought I was prepared. I was not. Her lessons for me will continue–despite her absence.
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I edited my artist resume this week. Yes, I shortened it. My resume was so long, that even I was too bored to get to the end of it. My solution? Chop it off. I took out at least HALF of the shows. I improved documentation & details (dates, websites, jurors, etc.) for the remaining shows & arts admin work.
When I read resumes from artists as a part of juried shows or the Featured Artist contest at AAAD, I find they usually contain every instance that their work has been anywhere. It always screams at me: “I don’t think my resume is good enough, so I am going to overwhelm you with volume.” It doesn’t work. So, I finally took the bold step.
My work is good enough. My experience is good enough. So is yours. We are all where we are based on the work we’ve done. There is no reason to be ashamed of where you are if you’ve worked for it. So quit apologizing, people.
the why & the whatI’ve been getting a lot of inquiries that all say something a little like: “Why add paint?” to xerography. Why now? What is that going to look like?
It is an evolution. I’ve been working in black & white for SO LONG. I love it. I do. I’ve always considered my work sort light-handed Pop Art, often with a dollop of Surrealism from my own photography. But, when I appropriated family portraiture for the #DIKY series, it all began to unravel. I have thousands of family photographs. My family was prolific, but bizarrely enough, a lot of them don’t feel personal. Honestly, they feel like my family posed as studies for the lifestyle advertising mock ups of the 1930s through the 1970s. They are real people living glamorous lives without the benefit of money or extraordinary wealth.
Loads of saturated color will help me share a portrait of what life can be if you are paying attention. Color will help me express what it feels like TO LIVE. So in the meantime, I study color theory & the techniques of abstract expressionists. Today’s happy place–LIVING.
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