Category: In the Studio: Original Art

Another piece inspired by one of my trips to NYC. Whenever I’m on the subway and there are several platforms, it seems like strangers are off playing hide and seek when you can only see part of them from behind those large beams.

Things have been pretty busy over here – I’m still working away on artwork for my show next month. Gallery meetings, press releases, etc. It’ll be nice when everything has been taken care of and I’ve met all my deadlines. Aside from my exhibition work, I’ve also gotten started with researching MFA programs and trying to figure out which schools to apply to.

This weekend we had gorgeous weather in the area. I had a chance to walk around D.C. and take pictures of the sights. I have a feeling Bosty will have some future pictures to star in. Anyway, I’m off to do a little more artwork for the day.

I’m really getting into exploring different angles with my people collages – before I was pretty attached to the basic portrait composition where I focused in on the face of the sitter. Here the background has a pretty strong role and the figures are much smaller.

And now I’m off for a day filled with errands while escaping my warm apartment (they haven’t turned the air-conditioning on yet).

And it’s finished (at the moment). Sometimes I like revisiting previous collages to do a little bit of editing/touching up here and there.

I’ve always liked penguins so naturally I wanted to squeeze one in to one of my people collages. I like how penguins look like miniature people in a way – and they always look so dressed up like they’re wearing suites.Although I like making portraits/people collages the best, I am looking forward to working on some animal collages for my show in August. It will be a nice way to change gears a bit. I’d also like to work more on still life and landscape work since I haven’t had much time these days to really delve into those areas.

It’s crazy how quickly this weekend is going by – and now I’m off to take care of a few errands before enjoying the nice weather.

Another day, another collage.

With this particular collage, I was interested in making the piece look like the viewer’s walked into the same room where the sitter is. Perhaps they interrupted them while they were in the middle of a book? I like making narrative scenes, partially because they’re fun to make, mainly because different viewers can come up with so many different storylines or ideas of what’s going on in a scene.

Anyway, this week I’m going to try to finish another figurative piece and hopefully get started on a few more mini collages.

And it’s finished – another cafe/restaurant portrait with a yellow background:

This afternoon I installed my show at Arlington Central Library’s East Gallery space. I’ll post a few pictures of the exhibit when I upload the pictures from my camera. Luckily I didn’t need to nail holes in the wall when installing this show – which is always a challenge for me. I typically find myself trying to cover up mistakes I’ve made from hammering by hiding holes in the wall with the frames of the hanging artwork. So it was nice that the library used metal rods for their artwork which made the installation fairly easy and straight forward to do.I also received a pleasant surprise today – a letter from the Washington Art Association regarding the portfolio I submitted to them for a work on paper show. They’re interested in the piece I did, “The Commuters,” and would like to see a series of work that looks like that particular collage. So it was nice not to receive a generic rejection letter – and instead receive a somewhat lengthy letter wanting me to resubmit more work.

Anyway, I’m off to do some late night studio work. I hope everyone had a happy first day of March! (and Monday too of course)

And here’s the finished product.

And now I’m off to do some late night collaging – things are going to get a little hectic in the next couple of months.