Miroco Machiko

I love the vibrant, child-like, abstract work of Miroco Machiko.  I also love the kitties napping in the artist's studio (all images from artist's website).

Hiroko Shimanuki

Painting by Hiroko Shimanuki found at Mr. Kitly (a gallery space/store in Australia--new to me, and a cool source for inspiration).  I love the vibrant colors and texture of the brush strokes in Shimanuki's paintings.  Seeing this painting makes me want to bring out my paints and canvas.

Modern day impressionists

"Flowers for Kelci" by Lulie Wallace

I like contemporary artists who still paint in the style of the Impressionists. 

I discovered Lulie Wallace recently and fell in love with her expressive florals.

Untitled by Bella Foster

Bella Foster is another contemporary artist I admire . . . there's a great interview with her here.  I love that she paints a lot of living rooms.  I always want to jump into her paintings and settle into a soft chair with a cup of tea.

New painting/card and randoms

I like how this watercolor turned out.  It's a little crazy but has a friendly, sweet air about it.  I'm thinking of making color prints of it on card stock for cards.

I also created that leather circular thing/sculpture from a broken purse strap some time ago.  It just needs to find a home on the wall somewhere.

I haven't been feeling too well in one way or another for the past three weeks so I'm looking forward to getting all this sickness behind me.  Health is one of those things I take for granted until I get sick.

I took these photos from the window of our office/my brother's old room.  The open dumpster just looked kind of funny, and I liked how the clouds looked on this day.

My friend sent me a Christmas card with these cool vintage stamps.  Thanks, S!

Watercolors

I started playing around with watercolors again.  I particularly enjoy seeing the colors bleed and blend into one another.  It's like you're visually capturing movement when you use watercolors.
(Thanks for the watercolor paper, S!)

My Art in Other People's Homes

I have a lot of my own work hanging around my house.  It's not because I think I'm that great--it's because hanging paintings on the wall is a way to store them.  Hence, it's always delightful to see my work hanging in other people's homes--such as in the Y family home pictured below.  That's the best form of affirmation an artist can receive so thanks friends!

 

Kehinde Wiley

I was looking at Compai blog today (a really fun design and inspiration blog), and I stumbled upon her post on artist Kehinde Wiley.

WOW.  His paintings made me stop in my tracks.  There was all at once the mix of the feminine in his floral patterns, and masculine in his portrayal of male subjects.  It was also a mix of old world skill (think Rembrandt and others) and urban modern in his portrayal of everyday men.

I did some research and found out that Wiley paints portraits of men of color and has them pose in classically European poses in order to insert these men in the narratives of power associated traditionally with white males.

It is now a life goal to visit his paintings in person.

Image from http://www.npg.si.edu/exhibit/recognize/paintings.html
Three Graces
Kehinde Wiley, 2005
Oil and enamel on canvas
182.9 x 423.8 cm (72 x 96 in)
Hort Family Collection, courtesy Roberts & Tilton, Los Angeles, California
© Kehinde Wiley

New painting

I'm not sure how I feel about this one yet but it was fun to paint.

Finer lines and details

I've found myself working a lot with acrylic paint, oil pastels, and paint markers these past few years.  Some of the reasons for this were these were the materials I had on hand, all three mediums work well on wood, canvas, and cardboard, and I preferred creating abstract, graffiti like work with bright colors (street art is a source of inspiration for me).  Here's an example of something I created last year:

Lately I've been using pens and colored pencils to create more detail-oriented pictures with finer lines.  My materials of choice have been Prismacolors (the best colored pencils you can get), and Micron pens from Japan (also really good pens for drawing - I absolutely love these pens).

I worked on this picture last night inspired by a drawing I saved from some nice packaging:

As you can see, I love flowers.  I didn't realize how much I loved drawing and painting flowers until I started this blog. 

I dedicate this drawing to all our friends in Japan.  May hope bloom amidst the chaos, may new life thrive and grow, and may peace be restored.

Feeling blue

Recent painting

Inspired by this print in our house:

To paint this:

Acrylics on salvaged wood.