Here is my first finished painting completed as an artist in residence at Phoenix Athens in Greece! It depicts a wild sparrowhawk chick in a somewhat stylized nest of branches.
This is Potential, acrylic on papyrus, 24x16.5”, 2023.
new artwork
Whiterock Conservancy New Artwork: Attuned
This is the first figurative piece I worked on at Whiterock Conservancy - a relief portrait of a small species of frog I found in abundance at the river shoreline. The Blanchard’s cricket frog, Acris blanchardi, is an endangered or threatened species in three states so far and is listed as a "Species of Greatest Conservation Need." It is considered a type of chorus frog, and is one of the smallest species of frogs in Iowa. Surprisingly (to me, at any rate) it is also considered a type of tree frog despite being semiaquatic and therefore not having the toe pads of their arboreal brethren.
As always, I began with a contour line drawing. My goal with this piece was a stylized, squashed relief reminiscent of antique bronze relief doors, so after finishing the drawing I began laying in the QuickCure Clay relief. Here are two process photos showing the beginning of that QCC work.
At this point, I got too involved in the actual creation to pause, so we’ll skip ahead to the finished work! This is Attuned, 14x11x1.35", QuickCure Clay relief and acrylic on basswood panel, 2021.
New Artwork: Whiterock Conservancy 8x8" Chromatograms
I and my friends gathered many natural materials while on my Whiterock Conservancy artist residency - plant, flower, fungus, bark, lichen, soil, water, rock, and mineral samples - which I then processed into a pigment solution and “printed” on filter paper through chromatography.
I’ve done a version of this before on my BROTA residency with the Buenos Aires Botanical Garden; that time, I used fairly standard scientific 4” rounds and only used one plant species per round for individual portraits that also captured differing seasons within the botanical garden. This time, I sized up to 8x8” squares, and additionally made a handful of larger 23x18” pieces; with these my chromatography features entire ecosystems. This post will display my new 8x8” pieces! The first photo is just a process pic, followed by 19 different chromatograms. (I donated three others to the conservancy, Liz Garst, and the groundskeeper Amanda who shared the tree frog with me.)
I’m really excited by this series and am interested to see how these pieces age in terms of pigmentation going fugitive; I have sealed them and hope they retain their coloration for many years to come, but their likely degradation over time certainly fits with themes in my broader bodies of work about ecological conservation and loss. My Buenos Aires pieces do appear to have lost a little saturation over the past two years, but they still display a good range of color. In that case, each round made use of only one plant species; in this case, since there are mineral and soil components as well, I have hopes that those sections will endure even longer than the plant pigmentation.
New Artwork: Displacement
in New Artwork
I just finished the second piece in my crystal series, which I’m titling Displacement. It is a companion piece to Reclamation. This series explores ocean acidification as well as natural reclamation of manmade constructions and catastrophes.
Displacement is a mixed media relief including driftwood, aragonite, calcite, and salt crystals, acrylic, and QuickCure Glaze on a wood panel, 7.25x6.75x3.25”, 2021.
New Artwork: Emerging
in New Artwork
An overhead shot of a Humphrey in the garden.
Since I don’t get to do an artist residency this summer due to the pandemic, I’m planning on producing from home! Sioux City is rabbit central - the Eastern cottontail, to be specific. Sometimes on neighborhood walks here I see just as many rabbits as I do squirrels. In my former town of Leavenworth, seeing a rabbit was notable and relatively rare. Earlier this spring, I noticed a juvenile rabbit made a home partially in my backyard (he also hops through the fence to my neighbors’ garden as well).
I named him Humphrey and began to try to acclimate him to my presence, so that I could take some nice reference photos for paintings. I talked about him to family and friends, and at one point joked with my parents that I supposed there might be several rabbits all being called Humphrey… and wouldn’t you know it, the very next day I saw two simultaneously! Since I can’t really distinguish them individually, giving them more names seemed unhelpful, so they’re now the Humphreys, plural. It appears there’s a nest/burrow under my deck, and I have now seen three Humphreys at the same time so there are at least that many but probably more. There do appear to be two different sizes of Humphrey, both juvenile but one small and one even tinier. My neighbor says she’s seen the parents, but I don’t know if I have; I’ve not seen an adult rabbit in my backyard at all this spring but I have seen one in my front yard once. And again, rabbits are ubiquitous here.
I plan to do several rabbit paintings, but here’s the first! It’s tentatively titled Emerging, though the title Under the Deck is also in consideration. It’s a 16x12x1.5” acrylic on basswood panel.
BROTA and Buenos Aires Artwork 1
I’ve been working on two different series of artwork from the start using the new-to-me methylcellulose and chromatography papers, but both are very experimental and I’m not sure exactly what the finished products should even look like at this point. That’s why I’ve yet to reveal much in terms of production other than a couple early test images from the chromatography papers.
However, I started feeling anxious about how experimental I’m being - of course it’s good to experiment, but I wanted the comfort of completing a more traditionally “me” type of piece with a clear end point. Plus, I bought those artisanal handmade papers from Ato Menegazzo Papeles, and it would be a shame not to even work on some while here!
This not-quite-finished painting is of a dwarf water hyacinth, Eichhornia crassipes. The common names in Spanish for this plant are (as per Wikipedia): jacinto de agua, flor de bora, camalote, aguapey, lechuguín, tarope, tarulla o reyna. I chose this plant in particular because I love how graphic and full of character it is, and the fact that it’s an aquatic plant means that the whole of the plant, including its root system, can be shown in a figure-ground relationship that also celebrates the handmade paper. Water hyacinth is an ornamental plant that is occasionally consumed and used medicinally, but is also highly invasive in warm climates and is often illegal to own or sell. An interesting dichotomy that inspired my current tentative title: Adrift.
New Artwork: Puffinry
in New Artwork
I haven't actually added paint to this piece in a couple months, but I also hadn't decided it was done either. I'm finally willing to call it and say it's officially finished!
This piece is acrylic on birch panel, 20x10", and is titled Puffinry.
La Pedrada de Noemi Artwork 3
This piece is rather quiet, even though it features a loud subject - the Ornate Wrasse, Thalassoma pavo. I am particularly pleased with the background, which is in keeping with my overall style but also references the refraction patterns of the ocean. I also think this painting shows that though the Ornate Wrasse is brightly colored, it can blend in surprisingly well.
It is acrylic on pastelbord, 9x12", and I'm still wrestling with the title.
La Pedrada de Noemi Artwork 2
This acrylic on gessobord is quite small - only 5x7" - and purposefully awkward. To me it's simultaneously uncomfortable and amusing. The subject is a redlip or horseface blenny, Ophioblennius atlanticus. I'm titling it Stage Left. This painting also uses iridescent gold in both the background and the eyes, so it too is more arresting in person than in photo.
La Pedrada de Noemi Artwork 1
Here's the first finished piece of artwork from my residency! It features two Canary damselfish, Similiparma lurida and/or Abudefduf luridus. There are a lot of this species in the Zoco Negro where I went snorkeling and had my scuba diving "baptism." The males are territorial, and this species is occasionally called sergeant major (though the name more commonly applies to a different damselfish species). I've decided to name this painting Reconnaissance. It is acrylic on pastelbord, 11x14", and looks even nicer in person because the water and the eyes of the fish have iridescent silver and gold paint on them, respectively, and so they shine intensely depending on viewer angle and interior light levels.
Intercambiador ACART Residency Journal 5 - New Artwork!
Here's my first painting featuring a fox kit I met while in Portugal. City Solstice, acrylic on canvas, 14 5/8 x 22 5/8". I'm not 100% certain, but given the very thin margin I left, I think I'll be framing it (ugh, the cost though!).