Painting

• Medium: acrylic on canvas

Artist info: Bula Barua is an Assamese-American visual artist and a well-known published author of short stories and poems. Bula was raised in the USA by immigrant parents from Assam, India and primarily works with acrylics and oils on canvas, paper and aluminum. Her works are included in many private and public collections around the world.

As a young adult, Bula divided her time between performing in plays and musicals, as well as sketching, acrylic painting, writing, and listening to pop music. Her influences, which range from Prince, Tori Amos, Sarah McLaughlan, and Michael Jackson… to the Indian traditions of Lata Mangeshkar, Parveen Sultana, and Ravi Shankar… to the paintings of Van Gogh, Renoir, and Picasso… to 19th Century English literature and popular teenage fiction… to Immigrant Culture, Greek Mythology and Astronomy… eventually inspired her to create a style distinctly her own. Soon, Bula found herself experimenting with a new technique in an effort to gain mass, volume, unity and form. She began to contour her figures with a long brushstroke that followed but did not emphasize the outlines.

Today, Bula works in oils, watercolors, and acrylics, and is particularly noted as a modern surrealist for her ability to express an idea with a minimum of effort and economy of touch. Her subject matter is often the intimate world of a sensitive woman who discovered poetry in the simplest acts and gestures, and her delicate, subtle works have been shown at many official Salons throughout the USA and Europe.

In addition to creating art, Bula is also a Usability Expert, helping to make user interfaces for mobile and web applications more aesthetic, efficient and user-friendly. She spends her time in Miami and Los Angeles.

• Medium: oil on canvas 

Artist info: Blaine, in Homogeneous Space, explores the human condition’s inability to employ “free will.” Homogeneous space is a concept that 19th century French philosopher Henri Bergson describes as “a place our mental experiences are collected in indistinguishable moments of time passage.” The ideas that are reflected in each of the artworks convey the challenges we face when navigating within the trappings of the external world that derail or limit our ability to truly act freely and take possession of ourselves. Working with oil on canvas, my paintings conceptualize the ideas Bergson theorized over 100 years ago that are even more relevant today. Henri Bergson best conveys these ideas when he states, “[W]e live inside ourselves, hardly perceiving anything of ourselves but our own ghost, a colourless shadow which pure duration projects into homogeneous space. Hence our life unfolds in space rather than in time; we live for the external world rather than for ourselves: we speak rather than think; we ‘are acted’ rather than act ourselves.” It is this thematic thread that weaves throughout my work.

• Medium: Oil on panel

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: Oil on canvas

Artist info: I immigrated to America at the age of nine, leaving behind everything I had ever known in Poland and entering a land where I did not know the customs and language. At the time, I thought my family and I were merely visiting America on vacation; I did not realize that I was never going home.

My work explores the journey of immigration both specifically and generally. I study my own tale of immigration and immigrant status by combining the legends and stories of my homeland with the narrative of my own personal history as a Pole living in America. The creation of my own folklore and myths allows me to create a space where I belong.

Universally, the work discusses the struggle for success that is so pivotal to all immigrants. The idea of success is intrinsic to the experience of immigration, as we come here, or are brought here, for a better future; my parents were adamant about my siblings and me utilizing the opportunities of our new country and creating futures that were better than theirs.

But gaining this success requires tremendous sacrifices.  For my parents, it meant leaving everything they knew behind. It meant working as a grave-digger, janitor and house cleaner. In the case of my father, it meant moving to America years before your family, flying home to see them only twice a year.  And when my mother, brothers and sister and I joined him, it meant stuffing seven people into a three bedroom apartment.

Gradually, America is becoming my homeland, but I still carry my experiences of immigration and my homeland with me. I also carry the experiences of the sacrifice my parents made so I could have a better life. http://www.bbronkowski.com/

• Medium: acrylic on paper 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: Flashe on Komatex panel

Artist info: I am one amongst a generation of artists after modernism who has given consideration to the ways certain cultural narratives over time become naturalized.  In the wake of modernism’s ossification into a series of predictably scandalous scripts, many artists looked to the “dead” or more traditional media to see what sorts of critical possibilities might be realized. With the depiction of landscape playing such a central role in the history of North American art, it seemed to offer many of the critical possibilities I was looking for, and it felt more and more like something I have always known. But how have I known it?

During the last 15 years, I have produced a body of work that tries to raise questions about the representation of nature from a variety of institutional points of view. The series began with an allegorical prairie grass museum that was housed in an abandoned 19th century fire station on the west side of Chicago. Soon after, I produced an illustrated Martian travel guide, an architectural bestiary and an illustrated lunar calendar.  After relocating in Pennsylvania, I continued with a deer-hunting labyrinth (based on the myth of the Minotaur, slayed by Theseus), a cow chapel - collaboratively with Scottish landscape architect Rolf Roscher and, as always, landscape paintings.

The paintings portray the kind of suburban, quotidian spaces in drastic states of transformation that increasingly define the character of North America. By employing the ancient craft (and/or technique) of tempera painting, a medium long associated with the depiction of the sacred; these prosaic spaces are rendered as social and historical ruins. By setting these depictions into a form of mythic space, a dialogue is initiated that sheds light on contemporary experience through an engagement with the history of painting. A kind of tension is created through these paradoxes that seek to pose questions about the nature of the sacred, the prosaic, the beautiful.

• Medium: acrylic on canvas

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: acrylic on canvas

Artist info: America needs a new image. Our national and cultural identity has long been dominated by a selfish and unwelcoming ideology. From a narrowly defined idea of patriotism to the popular stories and legends of our history, an image of America has been championed that resists change, suppresses differences and refuses to fully acknowledge its own failures. These qualities have become so entangled with the dominant portrait of America that at times it has become impossible not to see them as core principles of the American character. But we know that’s not the case.

There is an American identity that is curious and accepting, honest and daring, that does what is hard, that tries something new and challenges tradition where we know we can do better. It is this spirit of America that my paintings seek to rediscover in the icons and archetypes of the American mythology that has been created. My work depicts young people dressed-up in the costumes of familiar figures as they struggle, ponder and question their surroundings in an effort to breathe new life into these tainted representations of Americana. Using a keyed-up CMYK palette, I paint with an energetic mark that seeks to rediscover the excitement of creating a hand-made image that can sit comfortably with the digital and photographic images that prevail in our era. The paintings begin in a place of abstraction, in love with vibrant colors and kinetic marks. These elements collect around familiar sights and details, working their way toward building recognizable representations that finally make sense as portraits of American landscapes and figures. It is through this that I strive to find something new in the familiar picture of America. http://brookscashbaugh.com/

• Medium: watercolor on paper 
• Artist info: https://www.galleryguichard.com/calvin-colemann
• Artist interview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rlz6Qch7vc

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: acrylic on canvas

Artist info: Chaveevah is owner of BaHar Publishing, and does most of the proofreading, editing, layout, and cover design. She is author of "In Due Time" and illustrator of BaHar's children's books,"Good Morning, Lovey!" "Travis, It's NOT Your Birthday!", "Henry the Farsighted Heron", and "That's What Gentlemen Do". She was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, and as a divorced parent of five children, moved to Iowa in the late 1980's. Chaveevah earned her B.A. and M.A. degrees from the University of Northern Iowa, and has done "a little bit of a lot of things" from professional dancer and costume designer to career counselor, news writer, and undergraduate instructor. Her second novel, "What The Heart Remembers" was released in September 2008. Jeffrey, her recently retired husband of 15 years, released his first children's book [inspired by his experiences with his classroom of boys] titled "That's What Gentlemen Do!" in 2009.  Chaveevah and Jeffrey are hard at work revamping the company, and developing new products and services. If you'd like to talk to Chaveevah about your manuscript, book idea, or ask a few questions about the publishing process, contact her at chaveevahdread@yahoo.com.

• Medium: Acrylic on canvas

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: Acrylic on canvas

Artist info: Paintings of the American Heartland by Sharon France. Sharon has always had a fascination with old farmsteads, especially the old farmhouses and barns found on them. Some of her fondest childhood memories and inspiration come from the visits to her grandparent's remote Midwestern farm. Set down a very long lane, that eventually wound around the old barn, horse pasture, granary, corn crib, machine shed, and chicken house, to end up at their old farmhouse with a white picket fence in the yard beyond. The croquet set would be on the lawn and Grandma would have one of her homemade pies waiting on the kitchen counter.  "A little bit of heaven here on earth, it felt to me back then!", says Sharon. 

Her painting style leans towards Realism, although she often use elements of Tonalism and Minimalism in them. She has been inspired by the Hudson River School Artists, Minimalists, Tonalists, and Realist artists for her art. Sharon works in acrylic, oil and soft pastel, although she most often works in acrylic on stretched canvas, for her Heartland landscapes.  She builds up many layers, using both wet and dry brush techniques, for her paintings. Sharon's art work has been described as having an intriguing peacefulness, in its quiet simplicity.

Sharon received a Bachelors of Fine Art Degree from Northern Illinois University.  Her work is in the art collection of Kishwaukee College, Malta, IL, and in private collections throughout the United States, as well as in: Canada, France, Iceland, Portugal, Belgium, England, Ireland, Scotland, Italy, Japan, Brazil, Zimbabwe, and Australia.

One of her paintings is at the Jan. 2013, "Annual Juried Exhibit", at the Bridgeport Art Gallery, Chicago, IL. Several of her paintings are in the fall/winter 2012-13 Regional Juried Exhibition IX, (Honorable Mention) at the Freeport Art Museum, Freeport, IL. Her paintings have also been shown in juried art shows including:  "Annual International Small Works Show" at Emerald Gallery, Fairfield, IA, “The Modern Landscape” Springfield Art Association's, Springfield, IL, and "Agriculture in Art" at New Visions Gallery, Marshfield, WI. An article on her landscape paintings was on the online art Magazine “Empty Easel."

Besides painting, Sharon is currently working as a consultant on an upcoming Australian movie short  "The Landing", that is set on an old farm in the Midwestern Heartland.

Follow Sharon's work at http://francegallery.blogspot.com or http://www.francegallery.net/

• Medium: oil on canvas

Artist info: Everything I make is an attempt at capturing what I see with accuracy. Content is derived from observation and the act of visual discovery. This constant process of looking at light and analyzing color through the plastic vehicle of paint is my way of understanding the world and my ever-evolving place in it. My work focuses on quiet, intimate moments of time. I am particularly interested in the inherent dichotomy between capturing a moment of time while simultaneously documenting change. Ordinary scenes of city life, illuminated by light at varying times of day, represent both the literal and emotional paths we tread each day. I aim to create visual harmony through formal elements within the cityscapes, and in doing so establish a record of the here and now.

• Medium: Acrylic, Oil Pastel, Mixed Media on Paper

Artist info: My creative process involves taking thoughts and breathing life into them. The process is similar to Polaroid film exposure; you have an idea of your goal or product, but the process causes change, causing the end result to exceed my initial expectations.

I enjoy traveling, as the unmarred beauty of preserved natural landscape is an extraordinary inspiration.

My love for jazz stems from my own personal roots. My grandfather, Alfred Guichard Sr. was a famous New Orleans Jazz Musician in the early 1930’s. Knowing my family roots was a catalyst for the creation of an ongoing jazz series that expresses the relation between jazz music and the painted abstract, as well as the relationship between musician and instrument.

My love for sculpture has been inspirational in my canvas-sculpting technique. An appreciation for dance has inspired me to express grace and strength of dancers through painting. I posses a special affinity for African American dancers because of their natural beauty and poise.

Collaboration through task-specialization and artist networking is both a focus in my life as an artist and in my work process. I find that as artists, we share a common interest in life-thread issues. http://www.galleryguichard.com/
http://www.artjaz.com/artists/guichard/index.html

• Medium: oil on canvas

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: oil on canvas

Artist info: Everything I make is an attempt at capturing what I see with accuracy. Content is derived from observation and the act of visual discovery. This constant process of looking at light and analyzing color through the plastic vehicle of paint is my way of understanding the world and my ever-evolving place in it. My work focuses on quiet, intimate moments of time. I am particularly interested in the inherent dichotomy between capturing a moment of time while simultaneously documenting change. Ordinary scenes of city life, illuminated by light at varying times of day, represent both the literal and emotional paths we tread each day. I aim to create visual harmony through formal elements within the cityscapes, and in doing so establish a record of the here and now.

• Medium: oil on linen 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: oil on canvas

Artist info: My paintings focus on multiple aspects of my daily life and surroundings: living conditions, my experiences of being a single father, having a mixed race child, and my son’s views about his own identity. Toys, pop culture, and cartoon characters have always influenced me and inspired the images in my work. My current oil paintings deal with identity, using creatures or monsters as subjects. The monsters I paint all vary in appearance, drawing parallels to the diversity of the human race. I place and arrange these creatures in environments where we find ourselves in the real world. These paintings encompass acceptance, diversity, empowerment and relationships. My painted monsters include expressions of humor, feelings of isolation and depression. I take surreal images and arrange them in a way so that people can relate to the interactions or tangible human qualities. http://ryanhennebry.com/home.html

• Medium: oil, enamel, and collage on canvas

Artist info: Ken Hoffman is Professor Emeritus of Art at Bradley University, Peoria, Illinois.  He earned his BFA and MFA at the San Francisco Art Institute. His work has been exhibited nationally and is in the public collections of the Rockford Art Museum in Rockford, Illinois and the Lakeview Museum in Peoria, Illinois. His work is also widely collected, and is represented in the collections of the Administrative Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, and the President of the Chicago International Art Expo. He has also shown internationally in Paris, Poland, Germany, Australia, and Argentina.

“For the past twenty years, the anthropomorphic subject matter of my portrait paintings has been the central focus of my artistic endeavors, “ states Hoffman.  “My main objective has been to pursue this vigorous and surreal approach to the human head and to accost the viewer with animal-people expressions which I intend should convey a sense of awe and uneasiness.” “Technically, I try to achieve painterly surface effects and a heavy build-up of mark-making with the oil paint, which is incorporated into the forms and the surrounding space.  The use of sensuous color plays a complex and expressionistic role.”

• Medium: oil on canvas

Artist info: Color interaction and basic geometric forms are the primary instruments used to create the illusion of space in my paintings. My exploration of color based on the theories of Josef Albers and Wassily Kandinsky is essential to my process in generating spatial tension. Josef Albers wrote, “In order to use color successfully, one must recognize that color deceives constantly.” With the idea that my paintings change with the introduction of every new color, they need to be constantly reinterpreted throughout the process. As a result of this, my final images are never predetermined; they are the outcome of improvisational control and the search for perfect balance. Whether my options develop from spontaneous marks or conscious arrangements of geometric forms and color usage, the meandering logic that exists within each painting generates paradoxical settings demonstrating that our visual perception cannot always be trusted. The contradictory assortment of illogical perspective, flat shapes, volume and voids produce a series of passages that seem to change as the eye is guided through the composition with a sense that there is reason, yet the answers are never revealed.

• Medium: acrylic on canvas

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: oil on panel

Artist info: Like many artists, my experiences as a youth and adolescent have had a profound influence on the imagery that permeates my artwork. Growing up on a horse farm, I witnessed first hand the hyper manipulation of nature and natural process for human use. Livestock are routinely subjected to selective breeding, artificial insemination, ultrasound scanning and inoculations solely for commercial purposes. What initially begins as harmless bio-mimicry - creating a better future through chemistry and technology - devolves into a dystopia, rife with the cast-offs of unintended consequences and a garbage dump heap of bionic refuse stacked and left to rust and rot.

I have become increasingly interested in the closing gap between science fiction and science-fact. Cloning, transgenic breeding, surrogate mothering, surgical augmentation and food modification are just a handful of supposed advances that have sparked my imagination. I approach my work by imaging the experiments that have gone awry and try to create a world where the byproducts resist expiration. The juxtaposition of organic forms with sustaining mechanical devices suggests man's imposition and calls to question the conflict between infliction and dependence. My paintings result in images of biomorphic beings, fluctuating between success and failure in their own dayglo world of desolation.

• Medium: acrylic on canvas

Artist info: I am a Chicago area resident who grew up in the suburb of La Grange Park. After high school I went downstate to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign to study Architecture. I continued there for graduate school, and after more than 6 years including 12 months in Europe, I returned to Chicago with my degrees. My future wife, Jackie, and I decided to try something new, and after another year we moved West to Portland, Oregon. Over the next 8 years we lived in 3 states, including the San Francisco Bay Area and Boise, Idaho. After our first daughter was born we moved back to Chicago where we had our second daughter.

I worked in the field of Architecture for 3 years, then moved to the emerging field of digital graphics and websites in 2000. In the years since I have designed websites for technical organizations and administered ecommerce websites. While I have always engaged in art, I started oil painting as a hobby to stimulate my creative energy that I could not in my professional fields. I was attracted to Surrealist painting because I felt it closely aligned with my own creative goals.

I use my free time on photography, walking around Chicago, and going on road trips out West to inspiring destinations, usually desolate and extreme, and always visually exciting. 

• Medium: Acrylic on canvas

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: oil on panel

Artist info: "Rizzo’s paintings are equal part fact and fiction. Using her direct experience with a place, event or object as a catalyst, she abstracts, invents and explores new realities in painted space and form. Rizzo imagines places unseen or hybrid spaces, creating a world that is full of wonder and possibility. Her use of exaggerated color, fluid brush strokes, and spatial ambiguities reveal sensual environments where interiors and exteriors collide and our notion of reality is questioned." -Stephanie McMahon, Curator, Perceiving Place, 2010. www.ninarizzo.net

• Medium: oil on canvas
• Artist info

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: watercolor on paper

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: watercolor on paper

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: watercolor on paper

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: oil on canvas and paper

Artist info: The act of making art is the journey that I experience, realizing the implications of why, and what my art has become. It is the complex and diverse human histories that shape who I am and my place in the world. It is a world with its footings in relationships and knowledge. Things that I felt, saw, imagined, and emotions that were conveniently left by the side of the road are markers in the reality of the self that need to be revisited. Looking behind myself to see what I know is there yet won’t consider, can turn my moment inside out. Without this heightened state of past reality my relationship with the self cannot exist. Traditions and the judgments of others have given way to the understanding that where I used to look for a deeper understanding of our culture is merely an image associated with it. With this exploration of the self comes a symbiotic journey into the other end of the self. Through abstraction, I strip away all aspects of the self and explore the space occupied by the many sides of who I am. Through my work I am exploring the many different sides of the self, and the worlds that are viewed through them. http://www.robertsebanc.com

• Medium: mixed media 

Artist info: I enjoy the job of being an artist, the work, building paintings, arranging the parts, the structure of it, juggling the visual and the conceptual, solving little problems and stumbling across ideas during the process.

For me it simply all boils down to making slightly odd and interesting things to look at, things which are halting and provide a level of inquiry. That is what motivates me as a painter. It is mostly no more complicated than that. Of course there are specifics and complexities within each series but other than titles and from time to time and a few words, clarification just seems to deflate the work.

It is very important for me, not to provide answers, as soon as I do I limit the scope and range of the work. Someone once told me that whenever they get close to understanding what my work is about I seem to pull the rug out from under them. I'm not so sure that my intention is to pull the rug out from under anyone but I am absolutely certain that I will not provide anything close to an explanation or a conclusion with my work. There is none, therefore I cannot provide one.

I see my work gently provokig a thought in the viewer. It's not my job to tell people what to think nor is it my job to presume to rattle their world with huge ideas or issues, but rather, through something that is just a bit out of the ordinary show them perhaps the most interesting thing that they have seen that day. Hopefully they will walk away from the work thinking.

Over the course of many decades of painting and drawing I have come to a few conclusions. One of which is that I have no use for thick, unintelligible, over cooked art theory and criticism and its application to painting and drawing. I don't trust a good deal of it anyhow, the product of dueling, bullying academics mostly, blustering on and on and getting caught up in minutia until they have eventually eviscerate the damned thing.

I paint because i love to paint. I draw because I love to draw. I do them both because they make me smarter and i love getting smarter. I love beauty. I love skill and I love objective, empirical knowledge. I figure things out when I'm painting and drawing and that makes me smarter.

• Medium: acrylic on canvas (painting)
• Donated by: Michael and Elaine Bennett
• Artist info: http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/carriers-torch/27013-nelson-stevens-artist.html

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: acrylic on canvas 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: Oil on prepared paper

Artist info: Still life and story are of primary interest and passion to me. These paintings are explorations between collections of anthropomorphic objects, flat materials, and the spaces in between. The curious nature of these ensembles evoke my continuing fascination with narration and formal arrangement. Americana, popular culture and a lingering sense of nostalgia fascinate and ignite my investigation. www.franktrankina.com

 

 

 

 

 

• Medium: oil on canvas

Artist info: I enjoy the job of being an artist, the work, building paintings, arranging the parts, the structure of it, juggling the visual and the conceptual, solving little problems and stumbling across ideas during the process.

For me it simply all boils down to making slightly odd and interesting things to look at, things which are halting and provide a level of inquiry. That is what motivates me as a painter. It is mostly no more complicated than that. Of course there are specifics and complexities within each series but other than titles and from time to time and a few words, clarification just seems to deflate the work.

It is very important for me, not to provide answers, as soon as I do I limit the scope and range of the work. Someone once told me that whenever they get close to understanding what my work is about I seem to pull the rug out from under them. I'm not so sure that my intention is to pull the rug out from under anyone but I am absolutely certain that I will not provide anything close to an explanation or a conclusion with my work. There is none, therefore I cannot provide one.

I see my work gently provoking a thought in the viewer. It's not my job to tell people what to think nor is it my job to presume to rattle their world with huge ideas or issues, but rather, through something that is just a bit out of the ordinary show them perhaps the most interesting thing that they have seen that day. Hopefully they will walk away from the work thinking.

Over the course of many decades of painting and drawing I have come to a few conclusions. One of which is that I have no use for thick, unintelligible, over cooked art theory and criticism and its application to painting and drawing. I don't trust a good deal of it anyhow, the product of dueling, bullying academics mostly, blustering on and on and getting caught up in minutia until they have eventually eviscerate the damned thing.

I paint because i love to paint. I draw because I love to draw. I do them both because they make me smarter and i love getting smarter. I love beauty. I love skill and I love objective, empirical knowledge. I figure things out when I'm painting and drawing and that makes me smarter. http://www.edvalentineart.com/

• Medium: Oil on canvas

Artist info: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOxQQpZrHR

Amanda Completed her Master of Fine Arts Degree in Painting from Northern Illinois University and her Bachelor of Fine Arts Degree in Painting, Drawing, Printmaking  from Millikin University. Amanda’s work explores and communicates the concept of play. She utilizes the word play as a verb, not accepting it to be haphazard or mindless; it is about spontaneity, curiosity, and discovery. Control and will are exercised, but allow for chance to occur in the physical process and experience of each oil painting, work on paper, and relief print.

She continues to hold play as the foundation of her studio practice and eagerly pushing its limits. Through a steadfast pursuit she seeks a liberal vocabulary of marks, surfaces, color relationships, and most importantly, to define space in more illusionistic ways and inflict peculiar tensions that occur within painted spaces. 

• Medium: acrylic, vinyl, and resin on panel

Artist info: My studio practice encompasses two different, but related bodies of work.  Both involve my response to, and engagement with, the world around me. Likewise, both employ a process that unifies them visually and metaphorically.  This process is a unique paint or ink application technique that I call a “Snap Line”.  A “Snap Line” is made by dipping cotton twine into thinned acrylic paint or ink and snapping a taut line onto the support.  It is the springboard from which I begin my drawings.  It is the color field behind my large acrylic and resin paintings.  The “snap line” is a record of the violent impact of paint with support.  It suggests an event, an explosion, a reverberation, yet the over spray lends a softness to the line quality that reminds me of dry point intaglio. I like the idea that something beautiful on the surface has an underlying violence, a dark side.

In one body of my work I use a computer to repeat images that I stitch together visually in order to make an appealing pattern, often resulting in tapestry-like, spatially flattened compositions.  Through decorative patterning, the work of art draws the viewer into a slowly unfurling narrative that invites a discussion about ecology and/or sociopolitical realities of the contemporary world around us.  Meaning is implied by the juxtaposition of images.  Conclusions are left to the viewer in the hope that a continued questioning will be inspired by the work of art.

These images are exhibited in several formats. I frame the digital prints on rag paper. I enlarge the images and combine them with acrylic paint, vinyl, and resin on panel for large scale layered paintings Or, for very large installation work, I apply vinyl directly on the walls, windows, or floors of a gallery space. 

The second body of work consists of large ink and wash drawings on rag paper.  Since my move to Detroit in 2009, I have been working on a series of drawings titled, “Frontline: Detroit”, that depicts the remains of buildings that were once signifiers of the culture here. I believe that I was attracted to these hulks because of their formal qualities. I could see these skeletons of buildings as drawings of line and shadow. I begin each drawing with a “snap line”.  They are more portrait than landscape. I increasingly refer to them as “bones” that speak to the decline of the American Dream.

As I look for the buildings to serve as my models, I have found that they are not only in Detroit. I have begun to notice them all across the country. There are bones of regional cultures that dot the countryside along Route 66.  There are ruins of motels, gas stations and, actually, whole towns. I have expanded this “Frontline” series of drawings by tying the urban ruins of Detroit to those across the country. The scope has become a visual probe into our national ancestral bones through drawings of the urban and rural ruins across the country. http://www.margiweir.com/

• Medium: pigment on silk

Artist info: Hiroshi Yoshida (born Hiroshi Ueda) was born in the city of Kurume, Fukuoka, in Kyushu, on September 19, 1876. He showed an early aptitude for art fostered by his adoptive father, a teacher of painting in the public schools. At age 19 he was sent to Kyoto to study under Tamura Shoryu, a well known teacher of western style painting. He then studied under Koyama Shotaro, in Tokyo, for another three years.

In 1899, Yoshida had his first American exhibition at Detroit Museum of Art (now Detroit Institute of Art). He then traveled to Boston, Washington, D.C., Providence and Europe. In 1920, Yoshida presented his first woodcut at the Watanabe Print Workshop, organized by Watanabe Shōzaburō(1885-1962), publisher and advocate of the shin-hanga movement. However, Yoshida’s collaboration with Watanabe was short partly due to the Great Kanto earthquake on September 1, 1923.

In 1925, he hired a group of professional carvers and printers, and established his own studio. Prints were made under his close supervision. Yoshida combined the ukiyo-e collaborative system with the sōsaku-hanga principle of “artist’s prints”, and formed the third school, separating himself from the shin-hanga and sōsaku-hanga movement. Source: Artcyclopedia article

• Medium: Watercolor and ink on paper

Artist info: My abstract paintings evolve from a notion, develop through intuition, and are evocative rather than descriptive. They are greatly concerned with subjectivity and emotions, and refer to metaphorical landscapes of inner worlds.

The technique is a combination of watercolor and ink drawing. There is quiet tension between the two; watercolor’s fluidity, softness and calm, vs. the dynamic, rhythm and energy of a drawing.

In my process of painting and drawing there is a balance between the controlled and the accidental, and I see this as a metaphor for the duality in life; where certain things can be controlled and others happen on their own.