...pursuit of happiness

Nom Kinnear King

2012-01-31T09:36:00.000-08:00

Absolutely and utterly taken with Nom Kinnear King's magically haunting girls...

[all work by/belongs to Nom Kinnear King, images via her website]

Monday Morning Movie

2012-01-30T09:32:00.000-08:00

Right now I need, for my soul, all the reminders of calm, flow and mindfulness that I can get...I am gathering these examples up in the hopes that one day soon I will be able to return to this state of delight in abstract acceptance. For now I watch things like this video and long for it, out of reach at the moment...it's Monday, I hope it's a good one for you.

Michael Shapcott

2012-01-26T08:23:00.000-08:00

Michael Shapcott's body of work has a complexly bight blend of folk art mixed with a wide range of other traditional/modern cultural influences...mostly though I believe I'm responding to the 'aliveness' in the eyes and expressions of his subjects. Beautiful, emotive stuff. He makes some stellar videos exploring and sharing his process as well. It's such a gift to be let in on process...

[all work by/belongs to Michael Shapcott, images via his Flickr photostream]

Web site, Flickr, Vimeo...

Dan Hillier

2012-01-25T10:52:00.000-08:00

Powerfully altered and inked engravings by Dan Hillier. I am enamored of the darkness and mystery that cloaks his work and it's well worth your while to troll through his various galleries of work...

[all work by/belongs to Dan Hillier, images via Dan's website]

Monday Morning Movie

2012-01-23T08:50:00.000-08:00

A tearjerker this one is...Happy Monday.

Friday Flickr Photo Collage [Pink & Brown]

2012-01-20T16:51:00.000-08:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, top to botom left to right: 1) Cristina Valla, 2) Fabio Moretti, 3) Mario Gutiérrez Vázquez, 4) Amy Miller]

Anna Edwards

2012-01-19T16:25:00.000-08:00

Anna Edwards' simple but richly swirling clouds...

[all work by/belongs to Anna Edwards, images via her Etsy shop]

Anna's Etsy shop.

A Quiet Post

2012-01-18T08:17:00.000-08:00

It is the nature of things to be lost and not otherwise. ~Rebecca Solnit

[click on image for credit/link]

Jennifer Steen Booher

2012-01-17T07:34:00.000-08:00

Dearly love Jennifer Steen Booher's photographed collections...they look like watercolors studies to me, completely delightful in tone and composition, brimming with visual satisfaction. The below are all from her Beachcomber Series...

[all images by/belong to Jennifer Steen Booher, image via her web site]

Jennifer's web site, blog and Etsy shop.

Monday Morning Movie

2012-01-16T08:30:00.000-08:00

The days that change your life start like any other... (Happy Monday!)

Full episodes of this beautifually crafted and touching animated series based on the graphic novel of Julian Hinshaw are here.

Friday Flickr Photo Collage [Aqua & Orange]

2012-01-13T09:34:00.000-08:00

It's been a light week here on the 'ol blog...it's been a full week in the 'real life'! Happiest of Fridays to you!

[images by/belong to, top to bottom left to right: 1) house on hill road, 2) giamarie, 3) Miss Danae, 4) CarolynsHope]

Monday Morning Movie

2012-01-09T08:37:00.000-08:00

A lovely homage to the history and (tenuously) continuing life of two dedicated-to-craft shops next door to each other in LA... Happy Monday!

2012-01-04T10:18:00.000-08:00

I look at the mountain, which is still doing its tricks, as you look at a still beautiful face belonging to a person who was once your lover in another country years ago: with fond nostalgia, and recognition, but no real feeling save a secret astonishment that you are now strangers. Thanks. For the memories. ~ Annie Dillard

[image by/belong to Rudy Lopez, via here]

Monday (but really Tuesday) Morning Movie

2012-01-03T08:53:00.000-08:00

Happy first official week of 2012...may it be a good one for you!

This is one of the most beautiful films I've seen in a while. A lovely jumble of surfing, beautiful cinematography and heartfelt pleas for the conservation of natural preserve land in Canada... it's full on inspiration. And at 20 minutes long is a investment in time --- make yourself a fresh cup of whatever you drink and settle in for this one. You won't regret it.

Chris Appelhans

2011-12-29T08:36:00.000-08:00

I am so, so drawn toChris Appelhan's work. There are plenty of people out there that work in that retro, graphic 1960ish illustration style but for some reason Chris's work resonates with me beyond the nostalgic warmth produced by recalling favorite imagery from childhood. I think it might be the saturation of color. Or perhaps the obvious skill he's got at rendering light...or maybe it's the point of view --- I tend to gravitate towards images that allow me to share the composition with the depicted viewer --- looking over their shoulder, viewing them from afar (instead of looking AT them as THE subject in the setting...) All musings aside I'm particularly fond of Chris's Coraline illustrations. Haunting as they should be but also thrilling and tantalizing in what they choose to revel and how.

[all images by/belong to Chris Appelhans, via his Website]

Chris Mullins

2011-12-28T08:38:00.000-08:00

Love the grand gestures of movement and the depth of saturated color in Chris Mullins' work...(and, of course, the obscured, altered and modified strata like references to earth.)

[by/belongs to Chris Mullins, image via his Etsy shop & Website]

Teagan White

2011-12-27T08:30:00.000-08:00

Teagan White's work has a lovely mastery of rendering techniques that she then plays off of typographical memes and simplistic line drawing to create deceptively complex compositions. This one in particular...resonates on several levels.

[by/belongs to Teagan White, image via her website]

Teagan's website and print shop...

Monday Morning Movie

2011-12-26T11:03:00.000-08:00

Happy Monday! (Hope you have the day off?)

Pinkish Purple [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-12-23T07:33:00.000-08:00

Happy Friday.

[images by/belong to, from left top to bottom: 1) Mariana Fernandes da Matta, 2) Katie Dabrowski, 3) Anna Melnikova, 4) Edward Olive, 5) Brandon Warren, 6) Mikako Chiba]

Stars ticking by

2011-12-21T08:47:00.000-08:00

it is best to focus your eyes
a little off to one side;
it is better to know things
drained of their color, to fathom
the black horses cropping
at winter grass,
their white jaws that move
in steady rotation, a sweet sound

and when they file off to shelter
under the trees
you will find the dark circles of snow
pushed aside, earth opening
its single steadfast gaze:
towards the stars ticking by one by one, overhead,
the given world flaming precisely out of its frame

~Jane Hirshfield

[image by/belongs to: emilie79*, via Flickr]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-12-19T11:25:00.000-08:00

Happy Monday. Watch the below, you'll be glad you did for the wonder-discovery-art of the obscure delight of it...

Head in the Clouds

2011-12-14T09:23:00.001-08:00

We fly; we dream in darkness; we devour heaven in bites too small to be measured. ~Rebecca Solnit

[image by/belongs to Stephen Beadles, via Flickr]

Igor Skaletsky

2011-12-13T12:28:00.000-08:00

Exuberant, emotionally varied shifting content --- beautifully unbalanced mixed media collages from Igor Skaletsky.

[all work by/belongs to Igor Skaletsky, images via DeviantART]

Igor and drummer Evgeniy Labich created a playful but illustrative stop motion 'making of' look at the collage process:

For more of Igor's work: DeviantART and Flickr.

Monday Morning Movie

2011-12-12T09:30:00.000-08:00

Here's a concept that had me thinking long after viewing... Happy Monday.

Red & White [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-12-09T10:45:00.000-08:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, left to right from top: 1) Aleksandr Lis, 2) Angie Nan, 3) adél borbély, 4) Cheryl Groff]

To the Sea

2011-12-06T08:52:00.000-08:00

For whatever we lose (like a you or a me) it's always ourselves we find in the sea. ~ee cummings

Took a weekend away to the Northwest coast and Olympic National Forest (Neah Bay, Cape Flattery, Shi Shi Beach, Ruby Beach, etc.) and it was beautiful. December is when I most love the coast and all it's trails and beaches. Hiking through mud, crawling under and over downed trees, clambering up ice cold boulders to reach crashing waves or rushing river water... immensely satisfying. Wish I could do an even better job of capturing the cool, quite calm of the Pacific Northwest in winter...

[more images here]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-12-05T09:50:00.000-08:00

Find what you love. Do it. Keep doing it. Happy Monday!

Friday Flickr Photo Collage [Red, Orange & Brown]

2011-12-02T17:12:00.000-08:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, from top left: 1) adél borbély, 2) holland fotograaf, 3) Stephen Heron, 4) Susan Ford Collins, 5) Xava du]

A Quiet Post

2011-11-30T08:40:00.000-08:00

Over my head the curlews call, and now there is night wind in my hair; my heart is against the grass and the sweet earth. ~Charlotte Mew

[image by/belongs to Andrea Hübner, via here]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-11-28T08:07:00.000-08:00

So flipping beautiful. Iceland, of course, is on my list of 'places I must go.' But really, I must go everywhere in this world if I had my way...Happy Monday!

Nick Gentry

2011-11-23T08:19:00.000-08:00

Nick Gentry's artful reuse.

[all work by/belongs to Nick Gentry, images via his Web site]

Nick's Web site, Flicker and Facebook Page.

Mechanisms of Perception

2011-11-22T08:55:00.000-08:00

Strange how unmoved this place leaves one. Neither articulate or worshipful; rather the pressing need to look within and adjust the mechanism of perception. ~Gary Snyder

Monday Morning Movie

2011-11-21T08:18:00.000-08:00

Happy Monday!

Light posting last week! But I am here and really quite present (despite the lack of on-line presence!) and I have this lovely and thoughtful Monday Morning Movie to share today.

Inka Essenhigh

2011-11-09T07:04:00.000-08:00

While I'm drawn to Inka Essenhigh's content and subjects I'm most taken with the rich, saturated color in her surrealistic pieces...

[all work by/belongs to Inka Essenhigh, images via her Website]

David Fullarton [pictures with words on them]

2011-11-08T08:13:00.000-08:00

David Fullarton...oh sir I like your mind.

[all work by/belongs to David Fullarton, images via his flickr]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-11-07T07:59:00.000-08:00

For the love of all things collected, aged and with a life story to tell...Happy Monday!

Friday Flickr Photo Collage [Mint & Gray]

2011-11-04T16:20:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, left to right top to bottom: 1) amy e johnson, 2) vermillion$baby, 3) Avalanche Looms, 4) SarahLaBu, 5) R@0ul, 6) kevin dooley, 7) MOONSTITCHES mangetsu]

Cara Barer

2011-11-03T08:23:00.000-07:00

I'm a fan of how Cara Barer's sculptural books retain their bindings in most cases making for a lovely exploration of form within restricted framework.

[all work by/belongs to Cara Barer, images via her website]

Jacob Robert Whibley

2011-11-02T14:17:00.000-07:00

Jacob Robert Whibley's perfectly balanced intersections of line, form and color...

[all work by/belongs to Jacob Robert Whibley, images via his website]

Il Lee

2011-11-01T08:04:00.000-07:00

Il Lee's fantastically impressive (ballpoint pen only) pieces...

[all work by/belongs to Il Lee, images via here]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-10-31T08:35:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday~

Friday Flickr Photo Collage [Faded Blue & Orange]

2011-10-28T07:44:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, top to bottom left to right: 1) {traveling} mama, 2) Shandi-lee, 3) open cage, 4) aithom2]

Amy Casey

2011-10-25T21:20:00.000-07:00

Amy Casey's collaged cities...

[all work by/belongs to Amy Casey, images via her web site]

Amy's web site and blog.

Friday Flickr Photo Collage [Hazy Purples]

2011-10-21T07:53:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, left to right top to bottom: 1) *Zoha.N, 2) Everything's magic, 3) *gUTEs*, 4) hannah * honey & jam]

Abigail Ahern

2011-10-20T08:07:00.000-07:00

Abigail Ahern's (UK interior designer) living space as captured by The Shelby. Marvelous scale, color and pattern wrangling. Brilliant.

[images by/belong to The Shelby, via here]

François Schuiten

2011-10-19T07:42:00.000-07:00

François Schuiten; comic creator and artist. Son of architects. Known for creating Les Cités Obscures a series of graphic novels following the lives of cities, particularly keen on reflecting the way that culture interacts with architecture and it's expression.

[all work by/belongs to François Schuiten, via various and sundry on google images]

Catherine Nash

2011-10-18T08:46:00.000-07:00

Catherine Nash. Holy Hell lady. You are my hero. This is the such an accomplished and beautifully balanced (yet passionate) mixed media collection of encaustic, assemblage and sculpture. Resonates deeply with me in terms of the innate desire for discovery and mystery.

[all work by/belongs to Catherine Nash, images via her web site]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-10-17T07:52:00.000-07:00

This week it became full on fall-ish here in Seattle with enough chill in the air to necessitate the curling of hands into sleeve ends and wondering where the gloves from last year are hiding...

Happy Monday!

Something Else

2011-10-13T08:25:00.000-07:00

The process of transformation consists mostly of decay and then of this crisis when emergence from what came before must be total and abrupt. ~Rebecca Solnit

[image by/belongs to heinrick ingenson, via here]

Claire Basler

2011-10-12T09:11:00.000-07:00

Claire Basler's large scale floral paintings (like this one) are lovely and flush with decided tinges of all the best of the impressionistic style. But it's her studio/atelier that I'm the most taken with. It's a wildly organic mix of industrial metal, layered palette paint and nature on the inside.

[all images belong to Calaire Basler, via here]

Claire's web site...

Monday Morning Movie

2011-10-10T08:37:00.000-07:00

"In 'The Saga-Steads of Iceland: A 21st-Century Pilgrimage', [Dr Emily Lethbridge] is exploring how the sagas [of Iceland are] a living literature with an existence beyond the printed page."

The Saga-Steads of Iceland: A 21st-Century Pilgrimage, Emily's blog that follows her research and adventures.

About Love...

2011-10-06T07:50:00.000-07:00

Belle and Sebastian inspired a lovely informal campaign a while back for their album to "write about love" I remember really liking the images I saw pop up around the web in response...and as I am finishing up my most recent obsession with Rebecca Solnit (and my insistent posting of quotes of her work) this is the image that I couldn't get out of my head as I read and re-read these words...

Many love stories are like the shells of hermit crabs, though others are more like chambered nautiluses, whose architecture grows with the inhabitant and whose abandoned smaller chambers are lighter than water and allow them to float out to sea. ~Rebecca Solnit

[image by Veronica Aguilar, via here]

Stella Im Hultberg

2011-10-05T08:50:00.000-07:00

Stella Im Hultberg's soft, starry and contemplative daydreams.

[all work by/belongs to Stella Im Hultberg, images via her flickr and here]

Stella's Web site, shop and blog.

Matthew Cusick

2011-10-04T08:32:00.000-07:00

Matthew Cusick's collage work with bits and pieces of maps is...well, it's something else. I work with maps often in my own work but nothing like this. Maps as fodder for building and driving the composition --- that's a feat of skill and inspiration that makes my jaw hang open in amazement.

[all work by/belongs to Matthew Cusick, images via his web site]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-10-03T07:32:00.000-07:00

Yum. Happy Monday!

Blue on Blue [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-09-30T09:50:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday.

[image by/belong to, left to right top to bottom: 1) Églantine, 2) ming mong, 3) ZedZaP..., 4) EudaldCJ]

Debbie Smyth

2011-09-29T10:19:00.000-07:00

Thread drawings; lovely, messy pin and thread installation art by textile artist Debbie Smyth.

[all work by/belongs to Debbie Smyth, images via her web site]

Fumi Nakamura

2011-09-28T08:45:00.000-07:00

Dramatic as all hell, Fumi Nakamura's pieces still speak to a human's place in nature through a complex visual narrative...

[all work by/belongs to Fumi Nakamura, images via her web site]

David Choe

2011-09-27T07:47:00.000-07:00

Last week I got a surprise in the mail; a postcard of a piece by David Choe from one of my sendsomething pals. I can't tell you how happy it made me to open my mailbox and see something so vibrantly, beautifully chaotic and so my kind of thing. And this from a stranger. We don't know each other from Adam. I adore the act of sending something, anything, to anyone. God knows I don't do it often but as a receiver it has enormousness meaning and impact. What will we do if the US post office goes under? The times they are a (constantly) changing people. And nostalgia has such power as they do. Anyway. David Choe. Muralist, fine and graffiti artist...vibrant (as I said) as all hell.

[work by David Choe, image via his web site]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-09-26T08:17:00.000-07:00

Bittersweet beauty for your Monday.

Yellow & Charcoal [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-09-23T07:11:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday! Happy First Day of Fall!

[images by/belong to, left to right top to bottom: 1) be_khe, 2) mumble bee, 3) spodzone, 4) jardinoMe, 5) Philipp Klinger Photography]

This/That

2011-09-22T08:15:00.000-07:00

Sometimes gaining and losing are more intimatly related than we like to think.

~Rebecca Solnit

[image by/belongs to Jimmy Mac (Keyport Kid), via here]

Aaron Smith

2011-09-21T07:00:00.000-07:00

Aaron Smith's bearded and dignified gentlemen...(tempered with dabs, swirls and color.)

[all work by/belongs to Aaron Smith, images via his web site]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-09-19T18:31:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday-

Rusty Blues & Brown [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-09-16T07:23:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, left to right top to bottom: 1) heinrick05, 2) ouch, 3) heinrick05, 4) Something To See, 5) gari.baldi]

Catrin Welz-Stein

2011-09-15T08:10:00.000-07:00

Beautiful digital imagery from Catrin Welz-Stein.

[all work by/belongs to Catrin Welz-Stein, images via here]

Cecilia Levy

2011-09-14T08:00:00.000-07:00

Cecilia Levy. Paper bowls made from old books.

[all work by/belongs to Cecilia Levy, images via her Flickr]

Cecilia's Web site, blog and Flickr.

Yuriy Ratush

2011-09-13T08:00:00.000-07:00

A beautiful expression of contrast in Yuriy Ratush's lovely compositions; big, harsh black brush strokes living side by side with delicately drawn features and small scale details floating around the edges.

[all work by/ belongs to Yuriy Ratush, images via here]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-09-12T07:56:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday!

More Purple & Green [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-09-09T06:30:00.000-07:00

(Can't seem to shake a pull towards purple these days...) Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, top to bottom left to right: 1) Rayani Melo, 2) paul goyette, 3) monitorpop, 4) a girl with a lens]

Camila Svenson

2011-09-08T08:02:00.000-07:00

Photo collages by Camila Svenson.

[all work by/belongs to Camila Svenson, images via her Flickr]

Seeds of Love & Lust [Caitlin Russell]

2011-09-07T07:22:00.000-07:00

I am exceedingly fond of Caitlin Russell's artistic brain. And there's good reason for the crush... look, here's what she has to say about her 'Seeds of Love & Lust series:

"Seeds of Love and Lust re-imagines botanical idioms into a gardening guide for tending to one’s love life, revealing how human beings attempt to control and tame their desires, as gardeners endeavor to subdue nature."

[all work by/belongs to Caitlin Russell, images via her web site]

Caitlin's web site, blog, Flickr and Etsy shop.

Monday (but really Tuesday) Morning Movie

2011-09-06T07:24:00.000-07:00

If Labor Day was a holiday for you, I hope it was a good one! Happy Tuesday!

Purple, Blue & Yellow [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-09-02T07:00:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, top to bottom left to right: 1) Patrick Ng, 2) Stuck in Customs, 3) Shapeshifter Photography, 4) mat56, 5) BLUETUNNEL]

Eli Halpin

2011-08-31T08:15:00.000-07:00

Eli Halpin paints rapturously colorful renditions of creatures great and small...captured on reclaimed wood in oil and spray paint and incorporating gold, glitter, crushed glass and pearls.

[all work by/belong to Eli Halpin, images via her web site]

Oliver Morris

2011-08-30T08:15:00.000-07:00

I am, in many ways, a fairly obsessive person. (Or passionately engaged if I want to use the most positive of descriptors.) I become tenaciousness in my connections and overwhelmed by certain elements of my experience as a human being. I'll replay the same song for months because every time I'm brought to tears or suddenly in the midst of a memory that nothing else brings up. I'll eat the same sandwich for weekend brunch for, almost, ever. Sit in the same spot in my favorite coffee shop for a year before trying another nook instead...

Right now my obsessive passion is simply a heightened, hyper sensitive noticing of nature and my place in it. Here in the Pacific Northwest, after the most crappy 10 months of dismal weather I can ever remember encountering we have finally hit a vein of beautiful blue, golden light and soft breezes. And so I can't stop an internal repetition of Theodore Roethke's words "...what I love is near at hand, always, in earth and air." I see these words hanging in the air and they echoing in my ears as I lay under grape vines in a dear friends new back yard, when peeking at my scrap of a view of Lake Union at sunset and as the sun makes my skin all prickly with warmth while writing this post.

I get that same feeling browsing through Oliver Morris's photographic collages; the reminder of my place in nature. I am it, it is me. We are simply parts of each other. No more, no less. This (personal knowledge) has so much beauty and quiet revelry in it.

[all images by/belong to Oliver Morris, images via here]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-08-29T08:41:00.000-07:00

This is a 'fire up the soul' piece of work. Beware; you may be inspired.

Happy Monday.

Sol Halabi

2011-08-24T19:00:00.000-07:00

Obscured vs. revealed...Sol Halabi's work is reminiscent of baroque and medieval artistic visions.

[all work by/belongs to Sol Halabi, images via her web site]

For more visit Sol's web site.

Here

2011-08-23T08:08:00.000-07:00

Be here. Here now. ~Ray Lamontagne

[image by/ belongs to: marina shakleina]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-08-22T08:02:00.000-07:00

Hopeful, imaginative, beautiful. Happy Monday!

Purple & Green [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-08-19T09:42:00.000-07:00

Happiest of Friday's to you!

[image by/belongs to, top to bottom left to right: 1) Eric M Martin, 2) Blue eYes ArT, 3) Dalla, 4) Michele Catania]

Sally Mann

2011-08-18T08:30:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you look at something, someone, an object before your eyes...and all you can do is mentally stutter. I look at Sally Mann's photography and my response is a resounding shout of a thought; "Evocative." The word just echos and echoes around my brain like a bit of a song that I can't shake.

[all work by/belongs to Sally Mann, images via her web site]

Myoung Ho Lee

2011-08-17T14:20:00.000-07:00

Myoung Ho Lee's trees.

[all work by/belongs to Myoung Ho Lee, images via here]

Jeanne Opgenhaffen

2011-08-16T13:57:00.000-07:00

I could tell you that the reason why I love artistic expressions of topography/geography is because I was up a tree looking down at the earth more often than not when I was a kid and that should explain it. But. I think it's a bit deeper than that because it feels like such a visceral sense of wonder for me to look at work like Jeanne Opgenhaffen's. Her ceramic layers of strata feel like a simultaneous slice of above (airy and temporal) and below (rich and solidified.) I think work that references topography inspires a dissonant, dualistic feeling of small/big, in/out. And I love it. Even if I can't fully explain or understand it.

[all work by/belong to Jeanne Opgenhaffen, images via her web site]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-08-15T15:42:00.000-07:00

Thanks to A for constantly pursuing new interests and being of an inquiring and then sharing mind...otherwise I would never have seen this brilliant (and, for those of us, like me who are uncoordinated; terrifyingly), beautiful show of flow.

Blue, Pink and Orange [Friday Flickr Photo Collage]

2011-08-12T10:56:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday!

[images by/belong to, left to right top to bottom: 1) tanakawho, 2) dan [durango99], 3) Pink Sherbet Photography, 4) mactastic]

Menno Aden

2011-08-11T08:40:00.000-07:00

I'm really drawn to Menno Aden's precision (it balances so delicately on the edge of austerity). This is particularly well displayed in his parallel homes series (and in this collages print of the same.)

Menno's web site for more.

David Gilliver

2011-08-09T08:22:00.000-07:00

David Gilliver's light paintings.

[images by/belong to David Gilliver, via his Flickr photostream]

More on to be seen, visit David's web site here.

Monday Morning Movie

2011-08-08T07:05:00.000-07:00

Move. Happy Monday

Lori Nix

2011-08-03T08:29:00.000-07:00

Lori Nix makes dioramas and photographs them. Amazing. (Understatement.)

[all work by/belongs to Lori Nix, images via her web site]

For more of Lori and her work: web site and blog.

Staghorns

2011-08-02T08:22:00.000-07:00

I'm not going to say much about staghorn ferns --- you can read up on them here --- except to note for the record that they are pretty much the most awesome thing ever. So there.

[images by/belong to my lovely friend Shannon]

If you are a Seattleite you can see many fine specimens of the staghorn fern at the Volunteer Park Conservatory (which is were these bad boys reside...)

Monday Morning Movie

2011-08-01T07:50:00.000-07:00

Happy Monday! Protest Flatness!!

Matej Andraž Vogrincic

2011-07-28T08:11:00.000-07:00

Site specific installations by Matej Andraž Vogrincic.

I love the sense of crowded movement and flow...

[images by/belong to: 1) Martin Smith, 2) Peter Bennetts, 3) Richard Giles]

Susanne Ussing

2011-07-27T11:00:00.000-07:00

Susanne Ussing was a danish ceramist, architect and painter who had a lot to say about impermanence, scale and women's issues.This piece is so engaging. The kneeling pose coupled with the tightness of the proportions...such a humble openness in the figure but so clearly contained in a way that constricts and confines.

More info about Susanne here (you'll need to translate the page though!)

Fernando Vicente

2011-07-26T08:00:00.000-07:00

I've never been a concrete person, a person connected to the physicality of my body.It's been a simple fact that has defined much of me and my life. I'm a completely abstract person who believes that who I am is what I think. All that ephemeral shit that spins, sits in solitary moments of wondering, tries to find connections ---frantically finding it's self a pattern, wanting to understand, never, ever stopping...that's me. I see myself as a collection of thoughts, concepts and ideas. And that's how I define my value. It's where I put my efforts and frankly, I revel in it.

But in recent years I've begun to suspect that I'm doing myself a dishonor by only focusing on my brain and leaving the vessel that holds all that gauzy stuff of thought out of the equation all together. Maybe it's ageing (or just clearing the big angsts of the twenties and bringing my eyes up from my navel a bit), maybe it was the ankle blown out in soccer a couple of years back or maybe it's the last year spent focused on what changes I am going to make in my life and how but I've definitely begun to turn my attention towards who I am physically. I feel a little sad that it's taken me 33 years to say "hello physical self. You are amazing and I love who you are, you are me too." It is what it is. I'm just glad I have time to become stronger physically in and out, to find grace in my movements as I turn more energy towards how my body is connected to who I am. Integration. We talk about it often. A holistic approach to healing or the complexities of different aspects of our work. Etc. Not something I've practiced much of in my own life/identity. It sometime feels uncomfortable to be a physical, concrete being after all these years of celebrating the abstract and intangible self but the element of wholeness I am starting to feel on a physical level spurs me on with curiosity...

Fernando Vicente's work instantly puts a visual to my thoughts on the honoring of both mind and body (especially in terms of a reminder of the astounding, beautiful complexity in the body that moves, contains and sustains us).

[by/belongs to Fernando Vicente, image via his web site]

Monday Morning Movie

2011-07-25T11:50:00.000-07:00

Florence Welsh (Florence + The Machine) covering Buddy Holly's 'Not Fade Away.'

Happy Monday!

Patience

2011-07-20T11:00:00.000-07:00

Patience is

wider than one

once envisioned,

with ribbons

of rivers

and distant

ranges and

tasks undertaken

and finished

with modest

relish by

natives in their

native dress.

Who would

have guessed

it possible

that waiting

is sustainable—

a place with

its own harvests.

Or that in

time's fullness

the diamonds

of patience

couldn't be

distinguished

from the genuine

in brilliance

or hardness.

~Kay Ryan

[image by/belongs to wild goose chase, via here]

Joshua Bronaugh

2011-07-14T08:30:00.000-07:00

Speaking of spectacular portraiture work...Joshua Bronaugh.

[all work by/belongs to Joshua Bronaugh, images via his web site]

Joshua's web site.

Moussin Irjan

2011-07-13T08:15:00.000-07:00

You know what? I am so much more a fan of figurative and portraiture work than I used to be. (Which was not at all.) Actually getting to be kind of a huge fan of the genre as expressive content...Work like Moussin Irjan's which is haunting to say the least and has me won over, sold completely.

[all work by/belongs to Moussin Irjan, images via here]

Moussin's web site.

Philip Govedare

2011-07-12T08:00:00.000-07:00

Philip Govedare's mesmerizing landscapes...

[all work by/belongs to Philip Govedare, images via his web site]