catherine opie

there are those experience you have with art that stick with you forever, like mashed potatoes to your ribs on a cold winter evening. my first overwhelming memory of an artist's body of work is of Keith Harring at the worcester art museum a year after his death. Im not sure my 9 year old self fully grasped the extent of the exhibit, but the weight of it did stick with me. I was aware of the sense of community in his work, humans of different shapes, colors and sizes all jumbled in together. 

Though 20 years later, I experienced something similar the first time I saw the work of Catherine Opie. The nuances of the work took more time to sift through and process but the immediate weight and importance of community in her work was undeniable. I have been thinking a lot about her "Ice House" series now that winter if fully upon us. She focuses her lens on a temporary community able to exist for only a short period each year. In the dead of winter, when life as we normally experience it shifts drastically this community of fisherman, comrades of a frozen landscape, appear. 

sasha seamour

i recently stumbled across the website of Sasha Seymour, a prop and food stylist from the toronto area. Im loving the dark moody still lives. They so remind me of dutch paintings. I feel like rarely do you see a photography with so much piled into it so perfectly. Usually they just end up looking cluttered to me, but these are so beautiful in their simple decadence. 

francesca woodman

francesca woodman is a favorite artist. in her very short life she created some of the most beautiful and haunting images. she seemed to have an intimate and innate understating of the language of photography and her use of everyday objects, environments and her body is extraordinary. 

cathy cullis

this work by uk artist cathy cullis is hauntingly wonderful. imbued with memory, a fluid history seems to flow through each piece. I am especially drawn to their nearly photographic quality - they remind me of the very early daguerreotypes. 

i also love the dream quality of her group images - as though you remember being a part of something but now how or why - i think this moon painting would be so gorgeous next to a bed and find more of her beautiful work in her etsy shop. 

 

lake tahoe

 it was a very relaxing weekend spent around lake tahoe - hiking was on the agenda and it was a beautiful time to go. new life and the bright signs of the thaw after a very long, very deep snow season were everywhere. 

i am always amazed at the diversity of the california landscape - you can understand why it was the back yard of photographers like ansel adams and edward weston.  

the air was still crisp with the coolness of the snow, in places on the hike it would have been nice to have snowshoes, in some spots around nine feet of snow was still on the ground, but the sun was bright and powerful and working its melting magic - running water was everywhere. 

for love of: laura letinsky

 recently ive been thinking about the work of laura letinsky. i attended a lecture of hers about a year ago and ive been rolling her images over in my mid alot as of late. 

like modern day vanitas they have a persistent quality of absence. i find myself studying them for clues about who has just left the room and the lives contained just outside the frame. 

beautiful to look at - soft but striking pallets and lots of little details to captivate. 

for love of: icart

as a little girl i was captivated by the dry point etchings of louis icart. its the first piece of art i remember seeing and wanting to poses - it was hanging on the post of an antiques dealer's tent at the brimfield show... i was probably about 8. fascinated, i spent the next bit of time researching and looking at his etchings. i loved the long delicate lines of the women and they were always dressed so beautifully with such a strong but feminine presence. in my 8 yr old mind, they were perfect....the fact that there were often dogs in his images didnt hurt either. my mother bought me a reproduction of one of his prints for my bedroom. some years later and it still hangs in my childhood bedroom. 

my tastes may have changed, and at this moment im not sure exactly where there would be a place for them in my decor...though if i had a very grand bathroom i would like just one there and nothing else at all. as i revisited many of his images for this post i was struck by the same things i was as an 8 yr old - elegance above all, long lean lines, confidence and beauty. but this time i couldnt help notice a slightly provocative darkness in them...  

  

for love of: janine antoni

im sure many of you are familiar with the amazing work of janine antoni. she is a sculpture/performance artist who's work explores, among other things ideas of femininity and rituals of the everyday. 

Cradle, and im sorry for the image angle, but it begins with a tiny silver baby spoon resting inside an entire graduate of other spoons until it ends with the shovel of a backhoe excavator. 

i love how often she incorporates family relationships, objects and history. Umbilical is a silver cast of family heirloom silver, the artist mouth and her mothers hand. truly her work gives me goose bumps, i would love to experience a pice first hand but for now videos and photographs will have to suffice. this is a great ART21 video interview with antoni about the piece in the photograph below 

for love of : small batch productions

i came upon this gorgeous etsy shop : small batch production and instantly loved everything about it - from the quilt inspired patterns to the minimalist shop photographs. claire creates and sews all of her designs with sustainable materials which amazing! and they can be composted when its their time. i so admire the elegant simplicity of her collection and would love to have that dishtowel in my kitchen and the tote for the beach!

go check out claire's shop~

saul steinberg

over the weekend i came across the drawings of saul steinberg. simple lines full of life and humor and a bit of satire, i just love his work. 

cartier-bresson

for many years he was an illustrator for the new yorker, creating nearly 100 covers for the publication. additionally he worked in the mediums of sculpture and photography. his drawings capture the rawness of the everyday - the vast majority of his work is done between the mid '40's through the mid '80's it feels as poignant as ever. 

i happily acquired "the art of living" 1949, this weekend and have loved paging through the book - a favorite section: a montage of his chair drawings in the first section. 

mario giacomelli

Mario Giacomelli is a photographer i have long admired. as a fledgeling photography student my first encounter with the work of maria giacomelli was one of curiosity and amazement. here was a respected (albeit its something of a cult following) photographer breaking almost every rule of the medium as i understood it. 

he was a print maker by trade and used the camera not as some marvel of technology, but as a tool. a tool to accomplish the surreal, haunting and poetic photographs for which he is known. his camera was closer to a handmade pinhole camera than anything and for the most part he captured images of his world. the landscape, village and people amongst whom he lived and worked and eventually died. with a few exceptions he did not venture out of his hometown to photograph and this relationship makes for even more introspective photograph of landscape and human condition. 

i could go on and on, but with giacomelli's work especially it is simply best to just experience it for yourself. in all honesty many of his images boarder on frightening. it has taken me years to be able to look some of them in the face, but i think on some level its more that he is holding up a mirror to the very aspects of the human condition we fear most.