Victorian Collage

OH. MY. GOD. I am so unexplicably excited by this article/discovery that I can hardly stand it. Weekend project: collage.

Pop-culture leaves...

Loved this little "study in leaves" in the New York Times. A fun Sunday afternoon crafts project if you ask me. See the whole series here.

Artist Profile: Adam Stennett

Paregoric and Three Poppies. 2008. Acrylic on paper 22 x 22 inches.

I came across Adam Stennett's work after seeing his piece "Paregoric and Three Poppies" in an email newsletter from Irvine Contemporary, in my opinion THE best contemporary art gallery in Washington, D.C. I love this series of still life drawings that revolves around strange drugs. Says Irvine,

Adam Stennett has been working with photorealist styles for several years as ways to present provocative scenes that challenge the way we read an image. In recent paintings, he presents what appear to be still-life genre paintings of drug ingredients and over-the-counter medicines. The paintings have an eerie, almost documentary quality, as if an Old Master set up common plants and medical implements in a studio.

To learn more about Adam, go to www.adamstennett.com

Nude Women

I once had a friend explain the "tattoo debate" to me this way:

A person is in one of two camps. The first camp looks at the body as a blank canvas, a place where they can create something new. The second sees the body as a work of art in itself, something that shouldn't be tampered with.

I saw this painting at a store on Dixie and fell in love with it. The woman's face and figure are so modern. They seem in many ways to contradict the traditional (draped cloth) set up of the painting. In any case, made me think of the aforementioned argument, body as work of art.

Artist Visit: Courtney Garrett

Several months ago I wrote a piece for Thicket Magazine's March/April issue about the up-and-coming artist Courtney Garrett. While the piece focused on Courtney's career and work, I was also in awe of her design sense after seeing her place in Atlanta. She and her husband live in a converted basketball gym that they've kept clean and simple, but romantic at the same time. Notice the windows in Courtney's studio upstairs, which would normally be above the bleachers.

Courtney in front of one of her pieces (pink), from her Foxglove series.






Notice how great the light is in her studio...