Art

Erik Otto Haunts Me

When it comes to artists I like, I go through phases. I have favorites for periods of time, some long, some short, and then they fall off the list when I find something new to obsess over. I’ll always be a fan of those artists, but I tend to pay less attention as my A.D.H.D. kicks into high gear and shiny, new artists cross my eyeballs. There are a few that stick, though, like David Cho, James Jean, Blaine Fontana, Sylvia Ji, Joshua Petker and now Erik Otto.

I stumbled on Erik through Twitter, watching his tweets, but not really paying much attention to his art. I figured him to be an illustrator/designer based on his avatar. Then one day I clicked on a link to his blog proceeded to collect the pieces of my shattered preconceived notions. Sure, he’s an impressive street artist turned gallery phenom, but what really got my attention is his choice of medium, most pieces being produced on reclaimed/repurposed pieces of wood.

If you’ve followed my blog or tweets for any length of time, you’ve probably figured out that I am big on the three Rs—Reduce, Reuse & Recycle. I’m not some hi-falutin’ environmentalist or chest thumping conservationist. I just don’t see the point in wasting what doesn’t need to be wasted, both from an environmental standpoint, but also from an economical standpoint, but I digress.

Erik doing work on recycled wood is just one of the many reasons I dig what he’s doing. Although he uses similar themes throughout his work, much like some art masters like Dali and Van Gogh, Otto reinvents his work constantly. The style is obvious, staying true to who he is, but still mixing it up enough to stay fresh. Some contemporaries can’t seem to get out of a rut when they’ve latched onto a success.

Recently, Otto released a new open edition print to honor the people of Japan who have suffered through the most recent earthquake, tsunami and the potential ecological disaster of several nuclear reactors going south. When I saw the print, I thought to myself that I really should pony up and buy some art, not just for the cause, but because it was a chance for me to get my hands on some of Otto’s art at a reasonably cost. I kinda let the thought slide past me only to be hit in the face with his art again.

While perusing the latest issue of Surfing Magazine, on the last page where they usually feature the work of some up and coming artist, Otto’s art literally stared back at me. He has officially permeated nearly every aspect of my life. I really need to get me some of his art, soon.

Filed Under: Art Tagged With: art, eric otto, erik otto, graffiti, obsessed, street art

Sara Lando is a “Hooker With a Heart of Gold”

We’re chatting today with Sara Lando, an Italian artist and photographer who I stumbled upon while browsing Flickr. What attracted me to Sara’s work were her collage pieces, truly inspirational and far beyond anything I was doing, both compositionally and conceptually. The minute I saw her work, I knew I wanted to talk with her, so please give Sara a warm welcome.

Standard question first, but give us a little background history.

I was born and raised in a small town in the north of Italy called Bassano del Grappa, near Venice. I moved to Milan to study Design, spent the last year of university at RISD in Providence (RI) and came back a photographer. I lived in Milan for 10 years and then moved back to Bassano when I got married. I’m a small town girl at heart.

How did your creativity start? How old were you when you started doing art, how did it begin and flourish?

My parents are both artisans. There’s always been fabric, wood, tools lying around the house, I loved playing with those and no one ever forbade me to do that. They never pushed me towards a creative direction, but they fed my imagination with stories, games, books. I had a vivid curiosity and they kept on encouraging it. I had imaginary friends, I loved to draw, I loved to build little things out of paper. My favorite thing to do was to create little dioramas into showboxes and cut small holes so that you could look into the box and visit another world.

What were you doing before you started pursuing/selling your art? What is your most successful venue for selling?

I used to work in an advertisement agency as a graphic designer. I still do commissioned work for clients: that pays the bills so that I don’t actually have to sell my personal projects for a living. Knowing I’m not depending on it to survive, gives me creative freedom.And to be honest I still don’t know where I stand when it comes to the market of art. Photography as a medium isn’t made for limited editions, IMO. It doesn’t make sense, to me. I believe I’m more of an artisan than an artist, so there is stuff I make for money and there is stuff I make for love. I’m a hooker with a heart of gold

Any areas of art promotion/sales you want to pursue that you haven’t yet?

I would love to explore the book medium more. I love how intimate is a person’s relationship with a book, much more than the one they can have with something that is hanging from a wall. I already make little books with my work but I’d love to add a deeper tactile dimension to them.

What would you say was the tipping point for your success? Was it a gradual success or can you pinpoint a certain series of events that launched your business?

I would hardly say I am successful, actually. Having my name thrown around a lot isn’t success. Being asked to be interviewed for magazines, having someone write about me and publish my work, even making money from my work isn’t really success. I’m still working on finding my distinct voice, something that make people long for what I do when it’s not there. I’m just a vague blip on the radar right now, I don’t think anything I have done so far will be remembered in 10 years. It matters to me, but I still haven’t got something that can transcend the personal level and become universal. As for what has launched me, I think I owe a lot to the Internet and the people behind those monitors. In several points in my career, someone I didn’t know but came across my work from the Internet helped me evolve and helped me improve or proposed me an interesting project.

Can you talk a little about your inspiration for your most current work?

I am working on several projects at the same time. On a more photographic level I’m doing what I call my “blackboard project”. I ask people (friends, relatives, strangers) to come into my studio dressed in black and write what they want on the big blackboard/wall. Then they pose in front of it. I’m loving how intimate the whole process is proving to be.

On the other side I’m working on a more complex project, exploring identity and memory. Each week I randomly pick a theme from 10 words a word randomizer gives me and I take a self portrait (usually using a rolleiflex). I then use the print as a part of a composition that can be a collage or a diorama and photograph it. I am mixing digital and analog but only use photoshop for cropping, developing raw files and resizing for the Internet. I announce each theme publicly and there are other people joining me in this adventure, developing the theme in their own ways. This huge participation keeps me on my feet and makes everything more fun.

Who or what inspires you most to create? Do you have any rituals/habits that go along with producing art?

Things I see, things I dream. I keep a little journal with me all the time and take notes of things that capture my attention. Sometimes these notes keep spinning in my head for a while and then crash into one of the other little thoughts wandering about and something completely different comes out. Music inspires me a lot, movies, comics.When I go to sleep I usually imagine taking the pictures I have in mind, over and over. I select everything, from lighting to props, to gear. Sometimes when I’m driving I realize I am thinking about post production. If you’ve ever dodged and burned someone’s pores, you know how senseless this is. I think that’s like defragging for my brain.When I actually take the picture, I feel like I have already rehearsed it a hundred times; it’s like the physical act of producing something is just an extension of daydreaming about it.

If you had to give up your art today, what would you do instead?

That’s a tough question. I really have no idea.I could live without photography, probably. If I didn’t have photography it would be writing, or sewing, or drawing, or arranging flowers. I don’t think that my medium is my art. Eradicating it altogether doesn’t make much sense, to me. It’s a language. If you cut my tongue I’d find other ways to communicate, but the things I’d say wouldn’t be much different. What you ask is “if I took from you anything that counts, anything that makes you what you are, what would you do?”. Truth is, I’d hit you in the head and take it back.I keep on doing what I’ve been doing since I was a kid: I build little worlds into a box, cut a hole, ask people to watch and I am delusional enough to think that they’ll want to watch.

What does the future hold for you and your art? What projects are on the horizon?

I just want to be amazing

On a more serious note, I am working on a monster project I have been fiddling with for years and now needs to come to life. It’s killing me, but I still haven’t found the right angle for it. I have a.l the elements but I can’t see the finished product. After so much time I’m probably just afraid it’ll suck … I’m also trying to get a O1 VISA to move to California for a year or two and explore photography in a completely different environment, but finding a sponsor isn’t that easy.

Finally, where do people go to find you? Website, twitter, Facebook, whatever others.

My website is saralando.com, my twitter handle is bruko, I have a flickr account and I have just started a Behance account as well.

Thanks for your time Sara. These are some compelling answers to my banal questions and I appreciate you indulging me and my readers. Oh, and yes, I have burned and dodged pores before, so I get what you’re saying. Thanks again.

Filed Under: Art Tagged With: art, collage, conceptual, Design, illustration, italy, photography, RISD

Illustrator Jen Renninger of Please Be Still Likes Birds, Words and Old Folks

Today’s chat is with artist, illustrator and designer, Jen Renninger of Please Be Still. I’ve been a fan of Jen’s work since I first stepped foot in Etsy’s doorway, but when I finally got around to chatting with her through the site, I found her to be one of the most pleasant and inspiring individuals I’ve come across. So read what she’s got to say, take in some of her work and then give Jen a shout to see how awesome she is for yourself.

Give us a little background. Where are you from, born and raised?
I was born in Pennsylvania but by the age of 3 I was living with my Grandparents on the west coast of Florida. It was a pretty casual upbringing. Having moved to a vacation town every day felt a little like a get-a-way and I think that helped to make me who I am. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Art Tagged With: art, Design, etsy, illustration, interview, surreal, typography

Artist Liese Chavez Talks Layoffs, Fairy Tales and Monkey Butts

Today we’re chatting with Liese Chavez, artist and illustrator who runs a couple of Etsy shops, each with somewhat different points of view, but both spectacular. Give it a read and if you have any questions for Liese, post them in the comments. Enjoy!

Liese, how about starting with a little background. Where are you from, born and raised?
I lived in Massachusetts until about 11 years ago, when a cross-country trip landed me here in Colorado. I now live and work in Manitou Springs, it’s a great little artsy town at the foot of Pike’s Peak.

How did your creativity start? How old were you when you started doing art, how did it begin and flourish?
I’ve always made things. As a child it was mostly to entertain myself or make my Mother smile. When I got a bit older I created most often because I was too broke to buy people gifts. heh.

I’ve only been painting since 2005, but I’ve gotten more serious about it in the last few years. The narrative work I’m doing now didn’t really begin until the start of 2010, I finally feel as if I’ve found a way to express things that suits me. I’m self-taught in all the media I use. There is a wealth of information in books and on the internet these days, thank goodness.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Art Tagged With: art, black, elegant, etsy, fairy tale, illustration, interview, muted, surreal, white

Art Exposed – Interview with John W. Golden

Pines for You Art block

Today we’re chatting with John Golden, an artist/illustrator based in Wilmington, North Carolina. I’m a big fan of John’s work, both from a content standpoint, but also from a business point of view. I love his work, but I also appreciate that he stays true to his style, but doesn’t limit himself to a certain muse or genre. The work is commercial, but not commonplace and when it comes to making art for people to connect with, he hits it out of the park.

Give us a little background. Where are you from, born and raised?
I was born in Boston while my dad was going to school there. Lived there about 6 weeks before heading back to be raised in Huntington, WV, Charleston, SC and Wilmington, NC. The bulk of my childhood was spent in Wilmington and the South.

How did your creativity start? How old were you when you started doing art, how did it begin and flourish?
My mother was something of a child prodigy in art. She moved away from art in college and taught in English for a while afterwards. We did projects together, and I remember an amazing Halloween costume she made (for me) where she painted a skeleton on a black bodysuit.

When we moved to Charleston, SC my mother began to do craft shows with her Bread Dough jewelry and Macrame. I learned how to make Macrame Owls and Pot Holders. We spent a lot of time at craft shows. It was 1976, the bicentennial and eventually there were revolutionary period costumes involved. That’s right, we bridged the gap between the American Revolution and Macrame. My mother took up watercolor while we lived there.

When I was 11, we moved to Wilmington, NC and and my mother opened a gallery downtown there. She gave me a corner of the shop and helped me to make a few linoleum blocks that I would print and sell there. I had always done art in school, drew instead of paying attention, but “John’s Corner” was the start of my professional art career. I spent my afternoons (for a few years) at the gallery, and messing around Downtown Wilmington. I really feel my love of texture came from spending so much time in a somewhat urban area that was decaying and being torn down.

Bird Collages – Set of 4

What were you doing before you started selling your art? How did you transition from that to selling on Etsy?
When I started Etsy, I was freelancing in Broadcast Design. It’s a mixture of Graphic Design and Motion Design/Animation, but basically graphic design for television. I had been working in the design field for about 16 years, and I was fortunate to have worked on some pretty visible projects with some really talented people.
I really felt like freelance work was beginning to slow down for me, and my wife had clued me into Etsy. I was still selling my work in our gallery, and was in a good position to get my work out via Etsy. I spent about a year and a half finding my feet on Etsy before sales there were good enough for me to say, I can do freelance, or I can do Etsy, but not both.

The equipment I used to freelance is pretty much the same equipment I used to create the finished pieces I was selling at the time, so the transition mostly involved learning the ins and outs of Etsy and order fulfillment.

You’re a full time artist now, the dream of many on Etsy. What would you say was the tipping point for your success? Was it a gradual success or can you pinpoint a certain series of events that launched your business?
One day, it occurred to me, “I’m doing this now, this is what I do”, and it was like I was committing to being a full-time working artist. Two days later, I was contacted by a publishing company, which has allowed me to get my work out to people in a way that I could not do on my own. I feel like committing to making my living from my art opened the door to opportunities that I might not be able to embrace if I were not giving my full focus to being a working artist.

This has been a gradual process with enough significant opportunities and events to keep it going. Getting some of my work into catalogs has helped a lot to get my name and work out there. Having my Dog Series picked up by Target.com was instrumental in creating widespread exposure. I just had two pieces based on my Lunastrella Series become available in Target Retail stores, and I expect that will make my work more recognizable.

City Blocks – Five Burroughs

You’re work is quite diverse in subject matter, from domestic pets to typography. Can you talk a little about your inspiration for the different series’?
Everything I make stems from my affection for something. The Dog Series was born out of my own dogs. I love Tin Toys, and we did my son’s nursery in that theme in the late ’90s. We could not find a lot of wall art to fit that, so I started making some. The By Order of the Management Series was started for my children, and inspired by my desire for them to grow up to be good people. Typography has been such a big part of my life for so long, I had to make some art with it.

Who or what inspires you most to create? Do you have any rituals?
Inspiration comes from everywhere for me. I have an extensive library of books featuring old advertising and illustration that has inspired much of the styles I use. The only ritual, if I have one, is to try and create a style that fits the subject matter. Then I ask my wife for her opinion. If she likes a piece, it generally does well for me.

Lowtops Red on Baby Blue

If you had to give up your art today, what would you do instead?
If I had to stop creating my art, I would like to teach others how to create theirs. If I had to switch careers, I’m not sure what I would do, but it would need to be something that makes people happy.

What does the future hold for John Golden? What projects are on the horizon?
Hopefully, continuing to make my living from my art. Definitely continuing to get my work out in front of people. Project-wise, I have some new pieces I want to create within my current series of work, and I have some new series I would like to start. And I have a few series that I need to finish. The list of dogs left to do is a mile long.

You can find John’s work on his Etsy Shop and follow his words on Twitter.

Filed Under: Art Tagged With: art, birds, cities, collage, converse, dogs, hearts, illustration, interview, print, wizard