I just really like what she's doing :)

   I was given the task of interviewing someone in the School of Art that I'm really enjoying. I picked Lucy Carey, a good friend and someone I really admire. She is very calculated, but her works after usually focused on the more natural aspects of life. Her work is grounded in nature and most often depicts the sky. I really love the juxtaposition of her meticulous process and more ethereal subject matter.


What do you hope to do with your degree? Grad school, a specific job?

1. I have no immediate plans to go to grad school. It's not out of the question for the future, though. I would like to go together with a few fellow artists and get a studio space with a small gallery/store area in the front to display and sell our work. I'm imagining a storefront on a city block with the store in front, a nice studio in the back, and an apartment above to live. This would be perfect for me, because I want to work for myself, or at least with people I know well and trust.

Who are your favorite artists?
2. I love Alphonse Mucha. I was first drawn to his female personifications ofparts of nature, such as the moon and stars and the seasons. Nature plays a huge role in my work, and he portrays it in an interesting, beautiful way. I also like Amy Ho. She incorporates images of nature in cool installations. I love her piece Skylight, where she projects an image of the sky onto the roof of a subway tunnel. Gerhard Richter does wonderful work, too.

 What first got you into art?
3. Art was always one of my favorite classes in school, and I have been drawing since I could first hold a crayon. But I really started taking art more seriously after getting excited about the anime Sailor Moon, around 6th grade. I was obsessed with it. I would constantly draw the characters and write my own stories for it. That led to my own original stories and characters and eventually expanded into what I do today.
 

 Who are your least favorite artists?
4. There aren't a lot of artists I completely hate. I try to find at least about them or their work that I can appreciate. For example, there's Milton Avery. He uses nature for his imagery, but he abstracts it in such a way that it it looks like simple planes of color. I enjoy abstraction, but not as he does it. That said, I can appreciate his approach to color. He prefers to let color be the dominant force within his work. What look like solid shapes of colors in his paintings are actually many similar colors that the eye blends together from a distance. This is very interesting and something I would like to explore.

Is there anything you dislike about being an artist?
5. I have a love/hate relationship with enjoying many different kinds of art. I practice several kind of printmaking, oil painting, digital and film photography, digital painting and animation... On one hand, I have lots of different experiences to draw from; each medium can provide a bit of insight into the other. On the other hand, exploring all of these media at once makes me a bit of the classic "Jack of all trades, master of none". Not to mention the money spent on basic supplies for all of these media.

Vastly Different Spaces

    In an earlier post I spoke about visiting Prairie for the opening of "Forms of Authority", and I was just today at the Reed Gallery, located inside The College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning (DAAP).

 Outside view of The Reed Gallery

   The Dorothy W. and C. Lawson Reed Jr. Gallery hosts exhibitions that focus on the fields of study associated with the College of DAAP, with emphasis on current work in those disciplines brought in from outside the college to enrich the exposure of students to work produced elsewhere. It is a very clean and organized space.

   Like Prairie, the walls are white and kept very neat. However, the floor at this location is a nice polished wood finish. The Reed Gallery seemed more put together, and very formal. It seemed like a small piece of a museum stuck into a school building.

  Currently The Reed Gallery is being set up for the student Dry Run showing, which acts as a dress rehearsal for DAAP Works in June. 

An Image from the student Dry Run showing 

   I did enjoy the more informal atmosphere of Prairie. The floors and small size of the space give it a more casual feel. A narrow flight of stairs leads to the second floor, which is separated into two main areas by a crisp white zigzag wall that stops a couple of feet short of the ceiling. Long windows overlooking the street are unobstructed. Darkroom and photo lab are at the rear.The whole space is very streamlined.

    “It suggests opportunity, openness, the United States,” says David Rosenthal. “I think the arts crack society’s barriers. They voice social issues and break out of convention.”

   I have recently learned that the gallery owner, David Rosenthal, splits his time between the gallery space and his community outreach programs. He works tirelessly on giving art to the masses. He transports what is essentially a portable photo lab with him to different schools in the Cincinnati Area. His gallery space is second to his humanitarian work, and for some strange reason I appreciate the simpleness of Prairie more after knowing those facts. 

"Cake Sprinkles" by Caren Alpert, shown at Prairie Gallery

   "I spend 15% of my time in the gallery. The majority is spent on my work bringing art to students who would have no other way of getting it." - David Rosenthal.

And now for some Batman propaganda:

I recently googled: "What do you call a person obsessed with Batman?"

Google Answer: The Riddler. 

    Well considering I'm not The Riddler, I have decided to try to figure out what the art and writing of the Batman comic series is one that I find interesting. 

    Over the years Batman has had many different writers and teams of artists. Batman is a fictional character, a comic book superhero created by artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger. The character first appeared in Detective Comics #27 (May 1939), and since then has appeared primarily in publications by DC Comics. Originally referred to as "The Bat-Man" and still referred to at times as "The Batman", he is additionally known as "The Caped Crusader".

    Batman became a very popular character soon after his introduction and gained his own comic book title, Batman, in 1940. As the decades wore on, differing interpretations of the character emerged. The late 1960s Batman television series used a camp aesthetic which continued to be associated with the character for years after the show ended. 

     Various creators worked to return the character to his dark roots, culminating in the 1986 miniseries The Dark Knight Returns, by Frank Miller, while the successes of Tim Burton's 1989 film Batman and Christopher Nolan's 2005 reboot Batman Begins also helped to reignite popular interest in the character. A cultural icon, Batman has been licensed and adapted into a variety of media, from radio to television and film, and appears on a variety of merchandise sold all over the world such as toys and video games. The character has also intrigued psychiatrists with many trying to understand the character's psyche and his true ego in society. 

      In May 2011, Batman placed second on IGN's Top 100 Comic Book Heroes of All Time, after Superman. Empire magazine also listed him second in their 50 Greatest Comic Book Characters of All Time.

 

 Released just yesterday: 

   Batman and Robin #6

Batman sure has come a long way from this:

 

Sfeer Theory Comic

I've been crazy obsessed with this web-comic recently.  I really like the story line. It is set in a fictional fantastic world, and usually I tend to stay away from anything that falls into the realm of fantasy. However, there is enough explained that can ground me in the reality of the world. Everything seems to have its place within the world and it all seems carefully though out.

So, needless to say I enjoyed what is posted of it so far. I also really like the style, the exaggerated facial features, mixed with the sharpness of the clothing, which I might add is impeccability drawn.

"Luca Valentino" Art by Jayd Aït-Kaci

It has been on a extended hiatus for a while, but thanks to the magic that is kick starter, a website that helps artistic ventures appeal for money to a larger demographic outside of the small populations that know it actually exists, Sfeer Theory will be back up and running WITH A PRINTED BOOK COMING SOON!!!!!!I can hardly contain my excitement.

 First Page of Uitspan Era

Check it out here: http://sfeertheory.littlefoolery.com/

Gallery Visit

I was recently at Prairie Gallery for the opening of Forms of Authority. After hiking up the steps to the gallery, which is located on the second story of a small building in Northside, you reach Prairie. Prairie is fairly simple in presentation. White walls, unfinished wood flooring. The place was full of people that I felt that I should know. I saw a few professors that I know through school, but most of the people seemed to be wealthy wasps...And since I do not fall into either of those categories it was very interesting to listen in to their conversations. Many of which were about how conceptual the works were. However, none of them ever said why...

 A piece by Hanry Navarro

On display were three artists, Hanry Navarro, Stewart Goldman and Joseph Winterhalter. Each artist worked to explore the contemporary institution through painting and drawing.

 # 26 by Joseph Winterhalter

"Together they explore the tension between natural forms and processes and the increasing complexity and power of contemporary social institutions, said gallery owner David Rosenthal.

I felt strongly that two of the artists really fit into the theme of the show. Both the works of Navarro and Winterhalter reflected a strange look into the idea of the institution.However, Goldman's works seemed to reflect more of the natural world. The images looked more like landscapes, rather than something to do with modernization. Unless the piece was trying to come off as a stark contrast to the others in the space. Yet, I think that the artists should have tried more to work together to really make the theme present. Overall, I liked the show, but I did leave feeling a bit confused.

A collective image of Winterhalter's works

Excitment in the Distance

    I had my internship interview today at Prairie Gallery in Northside, which is one of the many neighborhoods here in Cincinnati. I was really excited to learn that Prairie had interns, mostly because of the community outreach programs ran by the gallery's owner, David Rosenthal. He devotes a large portion of his time to bringing art to students at local high schools, many of which wouldn't have any exposure to art otherwise.He organizes and brings, what is essentially a mini photo lab to each of the schools that he works with. He also creates specialized programs to interest the group of students that he works with.
 

   This is an image from Prairie's current showing, "Forms of Authority"

 
      I will be interning with David at Lighthouse Community School. Lighthouse Community School (LCS) specializes in highly individualized, flexible, and intensive strategies to meet the educational needs of youth in the child welfare system.  LCS effectively deals with social and emotional barriers. David is currently working with local musicians who will be the subject matter for the students enrolled in his photography course.  I really think I'm going to enjoy the internship opportunity.

Some Old Photos

   While trying to put together a portfolio for graduate school, I unearthed some of my old photographs from the time I broke into the old Crosley Radio Building. The space is large and empty. Personally, I'd like to see it renovated into either apartments or studio spaces. It would be a great place due to all the windows and it has a small parking lot. There were plans in 2009 to renovate the building. However, the project seems to have fallen through.I still find it beautiful in it's raw state, but part of me hopes that one day it will be transformed into something more...functional, for lack of a better word.

                                                                     
                                                      "They've Been Here" - Digital Photograph

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