She takes books, disassembles them and twists and shapes them to create sea-forms, a favorite here.

I also love the photography on her site – it’s so well done. Some of her twisting and curling reminds me of Wendy Wahl whom I wrote about earlier this week. Her tubes appear denser, tighter and colored though.

Look at that color – it’s like an indigo wash. You can see here clearly the repetitive nature of this work and the amazing creations that can come out of that monotony.

The above looks just like filigree – I love the idea of sculpture incased so that it can appear differently. I doubt that all these pieces of book are attached to one another but their weight holds them together here.

So incredible – I have no idea how that’s done, it looks like interconnected vacuum tubes. This reminds me of the plate sculptures of Tara Donovan that look to be growing and multiplying out of each other.

Her hanging sculptures are also incredibly – they look so airy but I imagine they are made of the same twists as the others making them have more weight.

Coral…these all look like coral. I wish I had a sense of their scale and their weight. I imagine this isn’t too big. It also could be a cool bean! I wonder if, like Wahl, she uses specific types of books to create her works or if she uses whatever she can get her hands on.

Look at that little urchin open up and show you more paper. I love all things sea-inspired and this is no different!

]]> http://pokate.com/2012/01/28/valerie-buess-twisted-paper-sculptures/feed/ 0 http://pokate.com/2012/01/28/valerie-buess-twisted-paper-sculptures/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/pokate/~3/9g78KlMp_dQ/ http://pokate.com/2012/01/23/wendy-wahl-paper-encyclopedia-installations/#comments Tue, 24 Jan 2012 04:25:09 +0000 Kate http://pokate.com/?p=2761 Oh Pinterest, how I love thee – another day another inspiring piece of installation art! This time the artist is Wendy Wahl, who creates installation art pieces using recycled encyclopedias, world books, and dictionaries.

How cool are those? They’re like trees made of paper…how meta is that? Wendy talks about it as a process of “considering the associations between the tree of life, defined as the patterns of relationships that link all earth’s species and the tree of knowledge, defined as the connected branches of human thought realized in the form of writing and speaking.”

In addition to using the pages of these tomes as leafs or layers in her new trees, she also takes and rolls the pages in a repetitive way to create the cellular, growing pieces.

How cool does that look up close…it reminds me somewhat of the work of Amy Eisenfeld Genser, though her rolls are tighter and more varied in depth.

I wonder which book each side of this work is from. The yellowing and the graying must mean different consistencies of paper / ink I would think.

What’s also cool to me about Wendy is that she’s fairly local – she lives in nearby Rhode Island an teaches in continuing education at RISD amongst other things. I love learning about artists who work in general area, broadly speaking New England. It’s fun to learn about all the creativity flowing sort of near my back door.

These look like slinkies! I can’t help but wonder what her armature is for these sorts of pieces (if there is one) and what they weigh!

Paper, ink and blackened elm – I love the contrast in this piece, which is sort of different for Wendy’s overall portfolio. I can’t wait to keep my eye on her and see when she shows near Boston!

He casts his pieces and then drills away parts of them with a hand drill it looks like in the pictures. He does perforate the castings, which is pretty cool. Reminds me of the totally insane pieces of Tony Marsh.

Chris also appears to be at the cutting edge of new ceramic processes include water jet cutting, I’m not sure which he uses for which pieces. As he says in his statement, “I routinely combine traditional and modern approaches whilst attempting to push back the boundaries and to redefine the perception of bone china as something more than simply the sole preserve of fine tableware.”

Part of why he works in bone china, he says, is because it is pure white and has a translucent quality – much like can be seen in the above.

In his inspiration images he includes honeycombs and other insect imagery, which is evident in the piece like the above. He also includes the irregularity of bubbles pushing up against each other. It seems like natural, regular formations are of interest the most to him, which makes sense given where he comes from.

He does an excellent job of photographing his work, which I really appreciate. It’s so hard sometimes to show off amazing work when the pictures aren’t so good.

What’s even cooler about Chris is that he was born in Glasgow, where we were just three weeks ago! He grew up on the western coast of Scotland, where we explored for a week and met many artists and artisans. It’s so beautiful, lush and mountainous up there that I can imagine he drew greatly from his surroundings.

His pieces are just so fabulous – I can’t imagine how many parts he must break in order to create his whole structures like the above. These to me look exactly like the shell that comes with and protects a tomatillo. They look the same and are similarly delicate.

Those are needle felted rabbits feet mounted like traditional taxidermy. I have looked at some amazingly weird and wonderful taxidermy before from the likes of Rachel Denny, Elaine Bradford and others but this might just be my favorite.

I love these little animal noses (rabbits again, a favorite of mine). I also really truly love feltidermy but for some reason it seems like no one else is experimenting with animal parts in this form.

What’s also crazy to me is that she’s only one year older than I am and she’s doing this! She lived in New Orleans until Hurricane Katrina and now lives in NY, NY.

She literally has a combo of all of my favorite things in her work – animals, animal parts, taxidermy (of the textile variety), nature, sea list, etc. In her bio she talks about exploring dreams as a part of personal mythology – I love that idea of having a personal mythology. It’s so true. When I wake up for that moment when I remember my dream I think – wow where did THAT story come from.

If you can dream it you can needlefelt it I assume I love that these pieces break outside their boundaries and incorporate beading (I think) into their tentacle-like forms. Though to be fair, given how hungry I am right now, these look like soft serve with sprinkles on top.

These look like punk hairdos to me – or urchins, big urchins.

Totally epic. About her work and her influences Zoe says, “My own experiences in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina also inform my work and no doubt contribute to my desire to give permanence to the fragile and ephemeral.” I might just be in a mood but it’s always so so very interesting to hear where people are influenced from and how life experiences (unexpected ones in particular) can completely shift a creative flow.

I love octopus tentacles in art – they can regrow when they get wounded / cut. That’s rejuvenation right there.

My last and maybe my favorite, HUGE rhino, breaking through and out of the frame, gold, magical, dream-like – beaded, leafed, realistic but not at all. Who needs a unicorn when you’ve got this!

]]> http://pokate.com/2012/01/20/zoe-williams-needlefelt-taxidermy/feed/ 3 http://pokate.com/2012/01/20/zoe-williams-needlefelt-taxidermy/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/pokate/~3/QHPTYB5Rgo0/ http://pokate.com/2012/01/16/hong-seon-jang-installations/#comments Mon, 16 Jan 2012 21:22:20 +0000 Kate http://pokate.com/?p=2705 I’m horizontal on my couch this afternoon after a morning adventure to the new CrossFit location here in Boston – wow, what a killer workout. Since I’m largely immobilized and it’s a semi-holiday here for MLK Day, I’ve been perusing the internet and came upon Hong Seon Jang.

As the lover of unique uses of materials I was really into Hong’s work – the above piece is called Zip City and is made of zip ties of all things. It’s helpful for him to have included the person in the photo for scale. I particularly like how it moves from the walls to the floor and varies in density of line – I imagine it looks very different from another angle.

About his work he says it “consists of installations often made out of found objects and common products. In giving these everyday materials new meanings and aesthetic possibilities, I strive to actively practice the concepts of the Eastern philosophies of the circulatory life system and the continuous flow of connections.” The above, “fungus” are made of cut and glued magazine papers – they almost look like tongues to me.

Hong is originally from South Korea and then got his MFA from the Rochester Institute of Technology. Based on all of his activity, I think he’s still living and working in the US but I’m not fully clear. This piece is called, Parasites, which I can see ad understand – it looks like something taking over one’s veins. It’s actually made of matchsticks, glue and fishing line of all things.

I’ve looked at artists who use tape as a medium before from Tara Donovan to Mitra Fabian and others – this 2D work to create a 3D environment is really lovely – I think it’s because it’s been adhered to a black wall that sets it apart.

Made of paper, wax and thread the above piece, “Abandoned History” is quite large, 60 x 70 x 10 inches in depth. I love that it looks almost like quartz or mica flakes, or even mother of pearl.

Off all things, those red items are actually clay connected via twine. I like the idea of a series of like final shapes comprised of a variety of shapes to create the whole. I also like that you can see the individual units that make up the whole.

Nnenna also incorporates a variety of different textiles into her works. The above include yarn, dye, burlap, handmade paper and more. She calls this “Foliage” though to me it could just as easily be a rotting leaf as a weird insect / beetle thing.

This newspaper and thread piece, which is far larger than this clip represents, reminds me so very much of the work of Michelle Lougee - many pieces by Nnenna are reminiscent of Michelle pieces (which I recently got to see in person again in the South End!). After getting her MA and MFA at the Univ. of Iowa, Nnenna is now an Associate Professor at North Park University in Chicago so I’m sure she is quite familiar with artists like Michelle.

As I mentioned before she also uses clay in addition to fibers and found / handmade paper. The clay work seems to be where she gets the most repetitive in her process, which I like. Many of her clay objects are sewn onto pieces of burlap to create what appear to be heavy, patterned textiles.

How beautiful are these ceramic rings? I love this because it reminds me of coral. Of her own work she says, “much like impermanent earthly attributes, my organic and twisted forms mimic the dazzling intricacies of fabric, trees, barks, topography and architecture.” I would say that’s very accurate in the pieces she highlights on her site.

That’s hung from the ceiling – again it reminds me of Michelle Lougee’s pieces. So wild what people can create with normally recyclable materials! This one is also a favorite of mine as it’s called, “Nests.”

Her work is so varied. As always, I love the monochromatic, geometric piece as above.

These are recycled plastic bags, they appear tied together into what she calls, “Camouflage.” I love the scale, the sort of rough weaving type of work she does – I really like everything.

He’s great about showing images of his process on his site, these also give a sense of scale, which is much larger than I imagined. I wonder what the average screw count is per piece. I imagine it’s 100s-1000s!

Andrew is, for lack of a better term, a man of the world – born in Braunschweig, Germany he was raised in Ciudad Real, Spain according to his bio. However, he came to the US and attended the Laguna College of Art and Design where he graduated in 2002 so he’s not much older than myself.

This one looks like it has a backing of pages from the white pages but I can’t quite tell what that is, the perpendicular stripes create a cool look though.

I’m fascinated by his use of regular materials such as screws to create, using undulating patterns of different depth, these portraits that seem very tactile and whole. I also like to squint at them and see how consistent they look.

Look how cool!

You can see in this close up that much of her items are literally coated in wax.

Many of her works are also suspended above the floor. In this case, the one on the left looks like a blackened heart or other organ to me. According to her Wikipedia page, the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art cited her as part of, “a generation of sculptors—many of them women—who came of age in the late 1980s and forever changed the muscular practice of sculpture with their new interest in nature and a penchant for painstaking craftsmanship, domestic references and psychological metaphor.” I think perhaps I need to take a closer look at the period from which a lot of the artists I blog about come out of.

I wish I’d known that she had a recent show at MassMoCA, I definitely would have gone. I think I need to sign up for more news from the nearby museums.

I love the above sculpture – I like that it takes up more of the room than just the place where the piece lives and that it looks like something just covered in naturally-colored barnacles.

How beautiful is this. I’ll definitely be trying to keep better track of Petah now too

I linked to their site above but I will note that it’s sort of hard to navigate. It’s beautifully done but it’s a pretty graphics heavy.  These brothers seem to have very unique and yet linked stories. Humberto is a trained lawyer where as Fernando is a trained architect and they now work together on an International scale.

Many of their items are functional, while being very unique. The above chair is made of leather formed around sprayed foam on a chair frame. We have these sprayed foam balls in NH, we sprayed them on top of huge beach volleyballs – given how easy that was I wonder how difficult it was to form these chairs or if it was sprayed and then the foam had to be carved away in order to make the final chair shape.

Love these lights. I believe they’re woven – they look almost like a natural colored wicker with glass lights set within their natural form. They look to me like deep sea coral with little critters coming out of it.

More lights – and a sense of scale with the brothers included – how crazy! This to me looks like those fossilized pieces of stone you can buy that are big chunks of rock with small, irregular portions of fossil within them. The lights in this case being the exceptional fossil parts. There’s a great interview with the brothers in a 2008 BOMB Magazine, which has even more photos and information on their inspiration in particular. My favorite part is the explanation of the term “giambarra,” or unlikely mend for any problem that needs solving. It sounds just about how I live my life these days!

]]> http://pokate.com/2012/01/02/fernando-humberto-campana-sculptures/feed/ 0 http://pokate.com/2012/01/02/fernando-humberto-campana-sculptures/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/pokate/~3/Kg_r1YbH_5A/ http://pokate.com/2011/12/18/katrine-hildebrandt-paper-cutting/#comments Sun, 18 Dec 2011 17:19:30 +0000 Kate http://pokate.com/?p=2658 The Hallway Gallery in Jamaica Plain has a new show up right now, Katrine Hildebrandt. She uses paper cutting as her medium and she does incredible, ocean-inspired work.

That’s seriously cut paper. She calls it Yupo Paper, which I had never heard about before. I quick spin through Google explained that it’s a synthetic, water resistant paper, she does however then also work with india ink and watercolor on the paper and I’m not sure how that plays with the paper’s water-resistant quality.

Using the exact same materials she created the above, which looks like a nest to me. She calls is “Accumulate,” which is fitting for the nest reference as well.

I wonder if these are set on the backgrounds or if she adds them just for the photos and the pieces are more like sculptures.

This one I believe it applied to the watercolor background and it’s so beautiful. As always, the Hallway Gallery is showcasing local artists. Katrine went to Mass Art for her MFA. She got her BA from Hartwick College in Oneonta.

These large scale works I think are my favorite of hers as they’re easier to get the scale and scope of. The paper seems to have some density to it, which I like as well.

Looks like a super intense version of the snowflake cut outs we did as children. I really really like the monochrome quality of this, all just really shadow play.

Color! It reminds me of diamonds and Tron, I have no idea why.