new medium?

So, i've got this big bunch of grey linen.

Earlier this year i decided that i wanted to paint on something different, for a change. I went to a local (new haven) vintage shop and looked at scrap fabric. I look through several different scraps including this gorgeous grey linen - although, it really wasn't a "scrap", it was more like a bundle. But since it was cheap and i was looking for some grey material, i bought it. I've used it a couple of times with acrylic paint...

and then, just mere days ago, I wondered what it would look like if i tried my watercolors on this beautiful grey linen. I loved it!! And since i really enjoy my 'lines', i used a some Sharpie :-) These are my first two, of many, maybe...

why am i sad?

I heard on the news today that the famous Tavern of the Green in NYC is closing. It made me sad. Then i wondered, why am i sad? I've been to NY several times, and not once did i even try to find the Tavern, let alone try to dine there. (i'm sure it's out of my price range) So why do i care? Hmmmm...

If it's possible to miss your own birth date, i think i missed mine by about 50 years. Well, i love anything vintage, old, or retro and when i hear about an old landmark/kitschy tourist trap/historical building it make me sad because i can't experience it now. When i find vintage clothing at goodwill - i snatch it up (if it fits!). I mostly listen to recording artists that are dead - that sounds morbid. And i think movies are better in black & white. But when a "landmark" like the Tavern is closing, i can't do anything about it. But instead of staying in that "sad place", i looked up the history of the Tavern of the Green and found out that it has actually closed several times! But after some renovation, it always opens up to new life. So maybe one day i'll get my date at the Tavern :-)

Here's some of the history with pictures...

Built in 1870, the rural Victorian Gothic structure now known as Tavern on the Green was designed by Jacob Wrey Mould as a sheepfold. It housed 200 South Down sheep, which grazed across the street in Central Park's Sheep Meadow.

It served admirably in that capacity until 1934, when legendary Parks Commissioner Robert Moses decided the building had a higher calling - that of a restaurant. Moses banished the sheep to Brooklyn's Prospect Park and assigned their shepherd to the lion house in the Central Park Zoo.

The first incarnation of Tavern on the Green -- the restaurant -- was launched on October 20, 1934. Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia opened the restaurant with a brass key and, in the company of a proud Moses, took a tour of the facility. After chatting with the chef and sampling a breakfast sausage, Fiorello and Moses pronounced their satisfaction with Central Park's newest attraction.

Embraced by New Yorkers as a gathering place and Tavern on the Green quickly became an integral part of the city's summer social life. From the late 1930s until 1943, it was the headquarters of the Civilian Patrol Corps, until it was taken over and renovated by the Claremont Inn to become a year-round restaurant. By the 1950s, Tavern on the Green was showing some wear and tear and the brilliant designer Raymond Loewy was engaged to renovate the building, yet again.

A succession of management companies operated the restaurant until 1962 when Restaurant Associates took it over. By the early '70s, Tavern on the Green was a restaurant no longer in sync with the times, and Restaurant Associates shuttered it in 1974.

Rather than signaling the end of an era, however, its closing was the beginning of an exciting new one for the tavern. Warner LeRoy acquired the lease and embarked upon a spectacular $10 million renovation. With LeRoy's addition of the glass enclosed Crystal and Terrace Rooms, his lavish use of brass, stained glass, etched mirrors, original paintings, antique prints and, above all, chandeliers, Tavern was reincarnated. It became a glittering palace, Central Park's most spectacular structure.

The reincarnated Tavern on the Green took New York by storm from the moment it re-opened on August 31, 1976. It dazzled the city with its decorative whimsy, its eclectic menu and its playfulness. Tavern, once so "out" that it had to close, was now very "in" indeed. Celebrities flocked to the restaurant to see and be seen.

Always a fantastic work in progress, Tavern on the Green underwent yet another renovation in 1988 to expand its popular Tavern Store, relocate the bar, and create the lovely Park Room and Garden.

Subsequently, the beautiful Crystal Garden overlooking the Sheep Meadow was remodeled to accommodate dancing during the summer months. And, in 1993, a celebrated "Menagerie of Topiaries", created by the Hollywood wizards who fashioned the fantastic greenery for the hit film 'Edward Scissorhands', took up residence in Tavern's gardens.

Since LeRoy's death in 2001, Tavern on the Green has continued to thrive under the direction of his daughter Jennifer LeRoy. She has also commissioned new hand-painted murals and installed additional antique treasures to dazzle the eye of the next generation of Tavern diners.

attention class!

This is part of my pop art report for the YWAM School of Design...

Pop Art is among the most important visual arts movements of the twentieth century. The Pop artists turned to popular culture and advertising for sources to create representational works that defied the modernist view of avant-garde and kitsch. Pop Art brought ART back to the material realities of everyday life in which ordinary people derived most of their visual pleasure from television, magazines, or comics. With the use of these mundane subject, Pop Art seemed to some observers to be frivolous and reactionary. However, it actually represents a turning point in the history of twentieth-century art.

The most famous artist from the Pop Art movement is Andy Warhol, who became famous worldwide for his work as a painter, avant-garde filmmaker, record producer, author, and public figure.

It was during the 1960s that Warhol began to make paintings of celebrities such as Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor as well as paintings of iconic American products such as Campbell's Soup Cans and Coca-Cola bottles. Warhol had this to say about Coca Cola: "What's great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest. You can be watching TV and see Coca Cola, and you know that the President drinks Coca Cola, Liz Taylor drinks Coca Cola, and just think, you can drink Coca Cola, too. A coke is a coke and no amount of money can get you a better coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the cokes are the same and all the cokes are good. Liz Taylor knows it, the President knows it, the bum knows it, and you know it."

Throughout the decade it became more clear that there had been a profound change in the culture of the art world, and that Warhol was at the center of that shift. A pivotal event was the 1964 exhibit The American Supermarket. The exhibit was one of the first mass events that directly confronted the general public with both pop art and the perennial question of what art is.

In Pop Art, the epic was replaced with the everyday and the mass-produced was awarded the same significance as the unique; the gap between "high art" and "low art" was eroding away. It was easy to understand, easy to recognize because it was iconic and accessible to the mass public. The media’s role was summarized with Warhol's famous quotation: "In the future everybody will be world famous for fifteen minutes". Television, internet, magazines and Hollywood are producing new images everyday. They are only enlarging the popular culture. Everything is just an image, and it’s ready to be consumed.

top 10?

Well, 'top' 10 may not be quite accurate. It's the end of the year and every t.v., blog, website, magazine, etc. starts posting their "top 10 whatever" of the year - you name it. There's best movie lists, top scandals, favorite trends, greatest youtube videos, funniest pets, great moments in history, and so on and so forth. So, i decided to have my own list. Is it a top 10? no. But it's a picture from each month of '09 with a memory to go with :-)

JANUARY - I was in Texas for most of Jan and for Dad's birthday the family went mini-golfing (sans Ryan) The picture is a little dark but it's my favorite from that night!

FEBRUARY - I was back in Connecticut and I was a teacher's assistant for a week long art class. These were the two students who gave me the most trouble but both wrote me thank you notes and hugged me at the last class :-)

MARCH - The start of many, many cupcakes. Why? Because I like decorating (and eating) cupcakes.

APRIL - Easter. As soon as Cora discovered that the eggs had candy, we couldn't stop her.

MAY - Cora-bora :-)

JUNE - Me and Nourtney singing together. First time ever.

JULY - In Germany with the lovely Anne-Kerstin :-)

AUGUST - Two words: Chocolate. Fondue.

Two more words: In. Switzerland!

SEPTEMBER - My wonderful and crazy room-mates, Celine (right) and Rocio

NOVEMBER - Don't adjust your screen. I don't seem to have any pictures from October so I'm showing 2 from Nov. This is one from my visit to Kansas City to surprise Nourtney on her birthday. They are watching a video of the family (in Wylie) singing Happy Birthday.

This one is from the Grimm Family Thanksgiving. That's my grandmother (Granny) giving my great-grandmother (her mom), Mama a hug. Mama is 99 years old! She doesn't usually make it to the family events because it wears her out, but she was a trooper that day :-)

DECEMBER - well, I'm waiting for Christmas pictures :-)

flashback...

i can guarantee that you've seen some of his work -

Drew Struzan (born March 1947) is an American artist. Struzan has painted album covers, advertising, collectibles, and book covers, but he is best known for his extensive movie poster work.

Struzan is one of the industry's most recognized talents, having provided artwork for over 150 movie posters, including many of the best-known films of all time. A particular favorite artist of film directors George Lucas and Steven Spielberg...

A Portland, Oregon native, Struzan was born a child prodigy with the rare distinction of skill in art. In 1965, at age 18, he enrolled at the Art Center College of Design. "The first thing the counselor asked me was 'what do you want to major in,' so I asked what the choices were." He was informed that he had two choices: fine art or illustration. The counselor went on to describe the two careers, telling Struzan that as a fine artist he could paint what he wanted, but as an illustrator he could paint for money. It didn't take him too long to choose his course of study. "I'll be an illustrator," he announced. "I need to eat."

After graduating from college, Struzan found a job as a staff artist for a design studio. There he began designing album covers. Over the next 5 years, he would create album cover artwork for a long line of musical artists, including Tony Orlando and Dawn, The Beach Boys, Bee Gees, Roy Orbison, Black Sabbath, Glenn Miller, Iron Butterfly, Bach, Earth, Wind and Fire, and Liberace.

Along with a friend, Struzan started a small company, Pencil Pushers. It was during this time that he honed his distinctive one-sheet style and first became proficient in the use of the airbrush, which would later define him as a master of the tool. In 1977, fellow artist Charles White III, had been hired by Lucas to create a poster design for the 1978 re-release of Star Wars. White, uncomfortable with portraiture, asked Struzan for his help on the project. As such, Struzan painted the human characters in oil paints and White focused on the ships, Darth Vader, C-3PO and all the mechanical details of the poster art. The poster went on to become a fan favorite as well as the director's, as the original art hangs in Lucas' Northern California home.

Throughout the '70s and '80s Struzan produced a constant stream of work for such diverse films as Blade Runner, The Cannonball Run, the Police Academy series, Coming To America, First Blood, Risky Business, An American Tail and The Goonies, among many, many others. But his most recognizable works would be The Back to the Future series, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, The Indiana Jones series, The Star Wars series.

Although equally talented in other media, Struzan's primary work medium is airbrushed acrylics on board with finishing details in colored pencil. Working from reference photographs and live models, Struzan has been known, at times, to include depictions of himself, family members and friends in his work. He is known for working very quickly; typically it takes him two days to finish a painting.

"A poster becomes that one image that represents the entire film," Struzan says. "If it is accurate and truthful and has good spirit, it resides with you forever."

Here are some favorites from my childhood :-)

Drew's website

a new thing: Stuart Davis

So i'm trying this new thing: at least once a week, I want to blog about an artist or art movement. I've been getting art book from the library and reading all kinds of different websites and blogs, so i've decided to share with you. Let's start with Stuart Davis, a personal fav...

Stuart Davis (December 7, 1892 - June 24, 1964), was an early American modernist painter. He was well known for his Jazz influenced, proto-pop art paintings of the 1940s and 1950s.

He grew up in an artistic environment, for his father was art director of a Philadelphia newspaper and his mother was a sculptor. Between 1910-13, Stuart made covers and drawings for the social realist periodical The Masses. It was during an exhibition in 1913, which also included works by Vincent van Gogh and Pablo Picasso, that Stuart became a committed "modern" artist. After a visit to Paris in 1928-29 he introduced a new note into US Cubism. Using natural forms, particularly forms suggesting the characteristic environment of American life, he rearranged them into flat poster-like patterns with precise outlines and sharply contrasting colors.

He later went over to pure abstract patterns, into which he often introduced lettering, suggestions of advertisements, posters, etc. The zest and dynamism of such works reflect his interest in jazz. Davis is generally considered to be the outstanding American artist to work in a Cubist idiom. He made witty and original use of it and created a distinctive American style, for however abstract his works became he always claimed that every image he used had its source in observed reality: `I paint what I see in America, in other words I paint the American Scene.'

what happened?

Yeah, that's right. I'm a jerk. I said that i wanted to blog more, then i go for weeks without posting. Well, i'm not making excuses but i want you to know what happened. Ok, for about a week, i was just lazy. I didn't post because i didn't want to. Then i woke up one morning and thought, I'm gonna blog today. Wouldn't you know, that would be the day we lost the internet at our house. We were switching over to a new provider or something and we had to wait for our new router (or something) to come in the mail. So that was a few days. Then as soon as we got our internet up and running, I took a trip to Kansas City with my friend, Rita, to visit my sister, Courtney (a.k.a. Nourtney). And I just got back yesterday. So here's a short little blog post, let's call it a "bloglet"...

my told my sister-in-law, Sarah, that I would paint her anything for her birthday - her choice :-) she wanted something to go in their kitchen and she found a vintage advert for orange juice. here's the finished product...

imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, right? the original poster