betsy youngquist

norman, 2008, 10x6x7, humpty dumpty day, 2007, 6x9x5, baby bird on a stick, 2007, 11x17x7, petunia, 2008, 11x8x5, buzz, 2008, 8x9x6

i see betsy youngquist's freakishly funny (yet hopelessly loveable) creations at the philadelphia craft show every year and every year i agonize over the fact that i can't afford to buy one...one day i'll own one...one day...

As fourth graders at Welsh Elementary School in Rockford, IL my classmate Kristin Henard and I co-authored and illustrated a book entitled The Two Friends. Xeroxed and stapled, this book tells the story of an eagle and a horse who meet in the wild and become friends. Two of the book’s illustrations, both simple line drawings, picture the eagle, Bushy-Tail, riding on the back of the horse, Cherokee. It was a start. While a fledgling adult artist in 1998, the Illinois Committee for the National Museum of Women in the Arts selected a beaded painting of mine called Flight of the Zebra for an exhibition. With a red bird perched on a zebra the images of Bushy-Tail and Cherokee were back. Still great friends, they had morphed into an explosion of texture and color, and both now sported human feet. Anthropomorphism had taken root.

allison renshaw

brooklyn, 34x65, mixed media on panel, 2006, dolce, 34x65, mixed media on panel, 2006, escalade, 22.5x30, mixed media on panel, 2006, gucci handbags and angels, 22.5x30, mixed media on panel, 2006, chloe, 34x65, mixed media on panel, 2006

allison renshaw's work is full of layers, pattern, pop and fun and sort of like a female james rosenquist...

For her 2007 exhibition at QCA, Fragments, she combined images from fashion magazines and advertising graphics with her cosmic paintings. Of this work, Renshaw said, “These found fragments are turned into something new, something inexplicable. Lines between the organic and the man-made become blurred and a larger narrative is evoked through a banal fragment.” Her work transcends the everyday, giving the viewer a sense of the world but in a bigger and better way.

simon casson

the thesmophoria (feasting), oil on canvas, 2009, 31x37, athene polias beloved boreas-erechtheus, oil on canvas, 2009, 70x55, attica 1, oil on linen, 2009, 16x14, daedala v, oil on canvas, 2008, 48x54

see simon casson's work here, here and here. from the scott richards site...

...the artist explores diverse historical and mythological themes, yet he presents his lushly painted subjects as deconstructed by the defiant energy of gestural abstraction. While literally dragging his fingers thru the paint, Casson stirs up the surface of his paintings, creating a mystifying collage of imagery that stimulate our eyes and minds all at once.

monday studio tip of the week

one of robert genn's recent posts was concerning the color blue and how it contributes to creativity. the following is an excerpt from the original post:

'Blue is the colour to choose when creativity is a priority," says Dr. Juliet Zhu, an assistant professor of marketing who led the study. About 600 undergraduate students took part. While red might boost the brain's attention to detail, blue is simply loaded with other benefits. On memory tasks, for example, those presented with a red background on their computer screens were able to accurately recall a list of items. Those using a blue background made many more mistakes. "People are less literal and more exploratory with blue," says Zhu.

One test in the Zhu study had pages of 20 potential toy parts illustrated in either red or blue. She asked participants to choose five parts to design a creative toy. A panel of judges found that those using red parts produced designs that were less creative. Those using blue parts came up with the more creative toys. The researchers felt the results were based on learned associations. Red, for example, is associated with ambulances, stop signs, emergencies and blood. With red you are more inclined to be vigilant and careful.

Blue makes folks think of expansive skies and open oceans--perhaps of endless possibilities--which may explain the link to creative, unencumbered thinking. Funnily, the people tested thought blue would help them with both creativity and attention to detail (66 per cent and 74 per cent respectively).'

so this week's studio tip is to try using blue in your work and see what happens as far as creativity. i've started doing this and i'll post the results by the end of the week! click here for robert genn's complete post about the color blue.

sunday church drawing

michelle hinebrook

infinite regions 4, enamel on wood, 3' x 3', 2007, vein I, enamel on wood, 4' x 4', 2007, interlaced, enamel on wood, 2' x 2', 2006, inflate, enamel on wood, 4' x 4', 2008, taste, enamel on Wood, 4' x 4', 2007

i love the combination of rigid structure and fleshy softness in michelle hinebrook's paintings. she writes:

my work investigates sensation and perception as partly constructed, connected, remembered and imagined. my paintings are composites of multiple layers, vibrant color, structural patterns, abstracted imagery and organic forms.

ariana page russell

patterns’ faction, c-print, 20 x 17, 2005, rrrrr, c-print, 17 x 23, 2005, inevitable, c-print, 17 x 23, 2005, index, c-print, 17 x 23, 2005, toile 2, c-print, 30 x 40, 2006, flora, c-print, 24 x 20, 2006

see more of ariana page russell's work here.

...skin reveals how bones shift, muscles loosen, freckles and wrinkles form, and bruises appear....skin also protects us while revealing internal emotions, offering a translucent space for adornment....i have dermatographia, a condition in which one’s immune system exhibits hypersensitivity, via skin, that releases excessive amounts of histamine, causing capillaries to dilate and welts to appear (lasting about thirty minutes) when the skin’s surface is lightly scratched. this allows me to painlessly draw patterns and words on my skin, which i then photograph....i am investigating where one surface ends and another begins, the bloom of adornment, and how shifting exteriors reveal as they conceal.

cythina lin

TiltCrop4noseJK and detail, 2008, charcoal on paper, 41 x 78, Crop3DSnosemouth, 2008, graphite on paper, 66 x 71, lips 2, 2004-05, graphite on frosted mylar, 22 1/4 x 22 1/4, crop8ear7-21, 2004, graphite on frosted mylar, 20x21

cynthia lin's incredibly detailed, large-scale drawings of skin intrigue me as well as make me feel somewhat uncomfortable...

these colossal orifices, pressed against glass, convey a tension between intimacy and vastness.

crit group: collaboration

my critique group met last week and for this month's meeting we had decided that instead of critiquing someone's work, we would make a collaborative piece. we met at wendy osterweil's studio and she led us in a mark-making challenge to partner up and through marks only (no talking) we were to have a conversation with our partner (my partner was heather veneziano). we worked with crayons, markers, paint, nail polish, stencils, fabric, stitch, ink, pastels, collage, x-acto knives, glitter, found objects, etc. the challenge was timed in the beginning and although we started out giggling and feeling a bit awkward, we all fell into a comfortable rhythm of drawing in silence. we drew for about 2 hours and eventually moved around the table, responding to marks as the drawing began to merge into a cohesive piece.
the images above are details of the drawing, some of the tools we used and the collaborative mark-makers are myself, heather veneziano, dee nicholas, kellianne mccarthy, wendy osterweil and brenda howell.

red walls on my drive to work

Francesca DiMattio

figure 4, 2008, oil and acrylic on canvas, 108 x 84, whiteout, 2008, oil and acrylic on canvas, 108 x 84, tunnel, 2007, oil and acrylic on canvas, (5 panels), overall dimensions, 284.5 x 914.4 cm, each panel 284.5 x 182.9 cm, tunnel (2 details), black ship, 2006, oil on canvas, 84 x 120", ladder, 2006, oil on canvas, 304.8 x 210.8 cm, broken arch, 2006, oil on canvas, 304.8 x 210.8 cm,

i saw francesca dimattio's work on a show called art in the city: new york on ovation tv and was smitten! here's a bit about her work from the saatchi site:

Francesca DiMattio’s canvases take architecture as their subject as a means to restructure the concept of space. Using painting as a springboard for invention, DiMattio’s buildings and interiors descend into a myriad of perspectival confusion as grid-like patterns of brick and tile, decorative arches, and off kilter staircases become departure points for painterly contrasts and expressive mark-making. Occupying human-sized scale, DiMattio’s canvases create a dizzying sense of physical environment. Veering between art historical references – from pop, art nouveau, and op art – DiMattio’s paintings extend post-modern eclecticism into the realm of the surreal.