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      Contemplative Works by Ali Cavanaugh Consider Vulnerability and the Sublime Through Watercolor

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      Art
      #painting
      #portraits
      #watercolorJanuary 20, 2022Grace Ebert“Steep” (2017), 16 x 20 inches. All images © Ali Cavanaugh, shared with permissionThrough delicate washes of peach, aqua, and smoky gray, St. Louis-based artist Ali Cavanaugh (previously) renders watercolor portraits that lay her subjects’ spirits bare. “I’m continually searching for something complex in human expression,” she tells Colossal. “Curiosity, sadness, wonder, hesitation, peace, and acceptance all in one glance.”Cavanaugh paints her dreamlike works on wet clay panels, allowing the bright backdrops to illuminate the translucent pigments. The resulting works are introspective and intimate while simultaneously harnessing the universal experience of the sublime. “I want the viewer to look at one of my portraits and say, ‘What are they thinking?,’ and also at the same time say, ‘This is so familiar and is exactly how my loved one looks at me when they are vulnerable,’” she says.If you’re in New York, you can see Cavanaugh’s portraits through January 28 at Salmagundi Club. Otherwise, shop available originals on her site, and keep an eye out for future print releases on Instagram. She also shares videos chronicling her process and tutorials on some of her techniques on Patreon.“Above,” 12 x 12 inches“Smolder” (2017), 12 x 12 inches“Only Once” (2015), 18 x 18 inches“Confidante” (2017), 12 x 16 inches“One to Listen and One to Love”“Rest on Water” (2017), 12 x 12 inches
      #painting
      #portraits
      #watercolorDo stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member and support independent arts publishing. Join a community of like-minded readers who are passionate about contemporary art, help support our interview series, gain access to partner discounts, and much more. Join now! Share this story  More

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      Miniature Watercolor Works by Ruby Silvious Are Painted on Stained Teabags

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      Art
      Illustration
      #landscapes
      #miniature
      #painting
      #tea
      #watercolorNovember 26, 2021Grace EbertAll images © Ruby Silvious, shared with permissionRuby Silvious’s quaint seaside scenes and bucolic landscapes nestle between the torn edges and wrinkled folds of a used teabag. The Coxsackie, New York-based artist (previously) paints miniature scenes of everyday life on the stained paper pouches, leaving the string and tags intact as a reminder of the repurposed material’s origin. Silvious sells prints of her watercolor pieces on her site, and you can follow her latest projects and news about upcoming exhibitions—she will be showing her upcycled works in France and Japan in 2022—on Instagram.
      #landscapes
      #miniature
      #painting
      #tea
      #watercolorDo stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member and support independent arts publishing. Join a community of like-minded readers who are passionate about contemporary art, help support our interview series, gain access to partner discounts, and much more. Join now! Share this story  More

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      Gold Ornaments and Precious Stones Adorn Tender Photographic Portraits by Tawny Chatmon

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      Art
      Photography

      #gemstones
      #gold
      #portraits
      #watercolor

      November 4, 2021
      Grace Ebert

      “Joy” (2020), 24k gold leaf, acrylic on archival pigment print, 30 x 20 inches. All images © Tawny Chatmon, shared with permission
      In If I’m No Longer Here, I Wanted You to Know, photographic artist Tawny Chatmon overlays portraits of young children and families with dabs of 24-karat gold leaf, precious stones, and watercolor details. The heavily adorned images are the latest in Chatmon’s superimposed works, which veered from digital collages to the hand-gilded pieces evocative of Gustav Klimt’s Golden Phase that are similar to those shown here, and respond to themes of unity and togetherness born out of the ongoing pandemic.
      While many of Chatmon’s works previously centered on a single subject, she’s transitioned to also photographing two children at play or entire families, including fathers where she otherwise had not. She explains:
      My father played such a paramount role in my, my sisters’, and my mother’s lives. It did not sit well with me that I wasn’t celebrating that in my work, too. It has been 10 years since we lost our father to prostate cancer, yet still, his lessons and love carry us through our days. I thought of my husband too, my brother-in-law, my friend’s fathers and husbands, and all of the world’s compassionate fathers and how important they are, and I especially wanted to celebrate Black fathers who are often depicted as anything other than what they truly are… phenomenal.
      Through gilt embellishments, Chatmon emphasizes the beauty and value inherent in her subjects, whose joyful, tender expressions and gestures exude warmth and affection. “The past year’s pandemic revealed to me once more that time with our loved ones is not infinite… While the revelations of injustice leading to civil unrest reminded me of the urgency to continue to work towards a better future for our children,” she says. “I do not wish to wait for the perfect time, the perfect place, or the perfect day to express my love for family and friends.”
      Currently based in Maryland, Chatmon will show some of her portraits with Galerie Myrtis at the 2022 Venice Biennial. She’s working on a new series titled Remnants, which explores themes of futurity and harmony through mosaic-style pieces comprised of snippets of the artist’s previous paintings. You can follow her progress on Instagram.

      “Created in Her Image” (2020), 24k gold leaf, acrylic on archival pigment print, 40 x 30 inches
      “Destined To Lead The Way” (2021), 24k gold leaf, acrylic, precious and semi-precious stones, on archival pigment print 34 x 22 inches
      “He’s Got The Whole World In His Hands” (2021), 24k gold leaf, 12k gold leaf, acrylic on archival pigment print, 46 x 28 inches
      “Best” (2020), 24k gold leaf, acrylic on archival pigment print, 40 x 30 inches
      “Look Forward, Beloved Boy” (2020), 24k gold leaf, acrylic on archival pigment print, 36 x 24 inches
      “It Was Never Your Burden To Carry” (2020), 24k gold leaf, acrylic, watercolor on archival pigment print, 52 x 36 inches
      “Sweet Heart” (2016/2020), 24k gold leaf, acrylic, precious stones on archival pigment print, 20 x 16 inches
      “Ahead” (2020), 24k gold leaf, acrylic on archival pigment print, 28 x 21 inches

      #gemstones
      #gold
      #portraits
      #watercolor

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      Graceful Swimmers Breach the Water’s Surface in Sonia Alins’s Poetic Mixed-Media Illustrations

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      Art
      Illustration

      #acrylic
      #ink
      #mixed media
      #swimming
      #water
      #watercolor

      August 12, 2021
      Grace Ebert

      “Placer,” hand-embellished print. All images © Sonia Alins, shared with permission
      In Sonia Alins’s dreamy works, figures gently break through the surface of the sea, creating a minimal ripple around their bodies as they dip in and out of the water. The Spanish artist and illustrator (previously) is known for her expressive swimmers, whose enlarged limbs splay in graceful positions as they float and move through the ocean. Translucent sheets of vellum produce the cloudy effects of water, obscuring fish and coral and adding a three-dimensional element to the largely ink, acrylic, and watercolor drawings.
      Although Alins primarily centers women in ambiguous states of emotion, men and children have been emerging in her mixed-media illustrations, further reflecting on the artist’s own experience with motherhood and the incomparable force of aquatic environments. “I feel the water as powerful entity, a supernatural force capable of source anguish, pain, desperation in the same way that it is a source of happiness, joy, inner peace, and love. Water helps me to express my feelings ​in a louder way, and it’s why I love it,” she tells Colossal.
      Alins works on a variety of commissions in addition to her personal practice, and her ethereal project for Moleskine titled “The Beautiful Red Reefs” recently won her an Award of Excellence from Communication Arts’s annual competition. Browse originals and hand-embellished prints in limited quantities in her shop, and you can keep up with her illustrations, in addition to news about upcoming shows like the one at Taipei’s Contemporary by U gallery in October, on Behance and Instagram.

      “Return to Harmony”
      “Mar en Calma,” hand-embellished print
      “Maternal Love,” hand-embellished print
      Left: “The Bather.” Right: “Inspired by the Moon”
      “Birth”
      Left: “The Boys of the Rocks”, commissioned by 180 Hilos. Right: “The Girls of the Rocks”, commissioned by 180 Hilos
      “Swimming in the Ocean”

      #acrylic
      #ink
      #mixed media
      #swimming
      #water
      #watercolor

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      Watercolor Illustrations by Steeven Salvat Cloak Natural Specimens with Elaborate Metallic Motifs

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      Art
      Illustration

      #beetles
      #butterflies
      #drawing
      #insects
      #watercolor

      August 6, 2021
      Grace Ebert

      All images © Steeven Salvat, shared with permission
      History, science, and nature converge in the watercolor and ink drawings of French artist Steeven Salvat (previously). Whether encasing beetles in ornate armor, rotational gears, and antique dials or rendering vast entanglements of flora and fauna, Salvat’s works exquisitely apply a fanciful veil to wildlife and insects. Each piece, which is the result of hundreds of hours of painstaking linework, stems from biological studies and 18th-century engravings, two themes the artist returns to as a way to allude to the precious qualities of the natural world.
      Salvat’s Nymphalidae series will be on view from August 14 to September 12 at Haven Gallery in Northport, New York. Find a multitude of videos detailing his process on Instagram, and shop limited-edition prints and originals on his site.

      #beetles
      #butterflies
      #drawing
      #insects
      #watercolor

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      Vivid Botanicals Bloom from the Coats of Charismatic Cats in Watercolor Works by Hiroki Takeda

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      Art

      #cats
      #flowers
      #watercolor

      July 21, 2021
      Grace Ebert

      All images © Hiroki Takeda, shared with permission
      Japan-based artist Hiroki Takeda adds a dose of whimsy to his otherwise faithful portrayals of friendly felines. Largely rendered in shades of pink and purple with intermittent splashes of blues and greens, Takeda’s watercolor works blend flora and fauna into affectionate cats and kittens caught lounging around or mid-snooze. Vines and grasses add fur-like texture and outline the creatures’ figures, which the artist then completes with sprawling gardens brimming with leaves, blossoms, and butterflies.
      Takeda tells Colossal that his vivid works are derived from a combination of influences, including his mother’s enthusiasm for plants and his background in caricature, and are the result of experimenting with myriad styles throughout his university studies. “One day, I had a moment in my mind when I saw a painting of an animal and its fur looked like a plant,” he says. “The idea of combining watercolor with plants and animals felt very natural to me.”
      If you’re in Osaka, stop by Shinsaibashi Gajin Gallery to see the artist’s floral animals between July 24 to August 12. Otherwise, pick up a print, and follow his work on Instagram. (via Design You Trust)

      #cats
      #flowers
      #watercolor

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      Surreal Watercolor Illustrations Shake Back and Forth in Marija Tiurina’s Chaotic Stereograms

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      Animation
      Art
      Illustration

      #painting
      #surreal
      #video
      #watercolor

      May 27, 2021
      Grace Ebert

      All image © Marija Tiurina, shared with permission
      Longtime Colossal readers will recognize the surreal, fictionalized scenes illustrated by Marija Tiurina (previously). Whether a bizarre mishmash of thoughts from quarantine or a crowded parallel universe in North London, Tiurina’s works are a seemingly endless exploration of mystery, delight, and general chaos, themes the London-based illustrator continues in her new series Stereogramos—the title is a portmanteau blending the “Spanish world for a bouquet (of endless objects and limbs, in my case) and ‘-os’ ending that is typical to the worlds of plural female form in Lithuanian language,” she says.
      Comprised of three jiggling gifs and a longer, scrolling animation, the works deviate from Tiurina’s static paintings and build a playful, peculiar setting around three central characters in her signature style. The female figures exude an air of cool disinterest and are surrounded by objects defining their unqiue personalities, including greasy slices of pizza, cracked vinyl, and even a disturbingly severed limb.
      To create the dizzying works, Tiurina began by drawing and painting the individual elements with watercolor, and after cutting each out, she layered them into rich, abstracted scenes with a single central character. Her stereograms, or two-dimensional renderings that give the illusion of greater depth, diverge from historical stereoscopic images that positioned two photos side-by-side on a flat plane viewed with binocular vision. Instead, the illustrator merges the two into one glitching visual that appears in three dimensions.
      Tiurina recorded her entire process for Stereogramos, which you can see in the video below, and you can find more of her packed, sprawling illustrations and similarly looping Droste Effect watercolor on Behance and Instagram. She also sells originals, prints, and books on her site, and if you’re in Reykjavík, stop by SIM Residency to see her work as part of a group show that’s open through May 29, 2021.

      

      #painting
      #surreal
      #video
      #watercolor

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      Discarded Technology and Branded Trash Are Stacked into Dystopian Structures in Alvaro Naddeo’s Paintings

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      Art
      Illustration

      #logos
      #painting
      #watercolor

      May 7, 2021
      Grace Ebert

      “AmeriCan’t” (2018), watercolor on paper, 20 x 22 inches. All images © Alvaro Naddeo, shared with permission
      Behind each one of Alvaro Naddeo’s watercolor paintings is an imagined character who’s built a rickety shopping cart structure or gathered waste materials for a tiny, mobile dwelling. “I believe they are strong people, resilient, and survivalists,” the Brazilian artist tells Colossal. “They use creativity to overcome obstacles and adapt to any situation they are put in. So in a way, both of them, characters and discarded objects, are proof that there’s value in everything if you know where to look for it.”
      Evoking an alternative universe in a state of ruin, Naddeo (previously) renders ramshackle structures and vehicles—which only span a few inches—made primarily of outdated technology, rusted carts and frames, and a plethora of branded materials: a Marlboro sign props up an upper level, a Coca-Cola panel offers protection from the elements, and logoed posters and stickers cover almost every surface. By fashioning these relics anew, the artist speaks to consumerism and the waste it generates, a concern that dovetails with a focus on income and wealth inequalities. He explains:
      The gap between rich and poor continues to incessantly grow and it seems like nothing can’t stop it. That’s the harsh and important message of my work, but this message comes wrapped in a nice and warm blanket of nostalgia and the beauty of the composition. This warmth makes up for the harshness of the subject matter.
      Currently living and working in Los Angeles, Naddeo is involved in a few group shows in the coming months, including at Beinart and Outre galleries in Melbourne and A. Hurd Gallery in Albuquerque. He’s also preparing for two solo exhibitions next year, which will be at Thinkspace in Los Angeles and at Beinart. Until then, check out his Instagram for glimpses of his process and a larger collection of his dystopian paintings.

      “Die Hard” (2018), watercolor on paper, 12 x 12 inches
      “Mad as Hell” (2020), watercolor on paper, 20 x 20 inches

      Left: “Ghosts,” watercolor on paper, 12 x 24 inches. Right: “Yes, Please,” watercolor on paper, 12 x 24 inches
      “Mil Grau” (2020), watercolor on paper, 14 x18 inches

      #logos
      #painting
      #watercolor

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