Naked Ladies

Naked Ladies, mixed media, collagescape on board, 8”x8”

Every time I post Naked Ladies themed art, I see a surge in visitors to my blog.  I think some folks might be searching on something other than the pink summer flowers in California.   These ones were inspired by one of many hikes down the Bear Valley Trail at the Point Reyes National Seashore.

This is one of a series of four pieces that will be in the upcoming 22nd Annual Pink Week Exhibit at Warehouse Artists Lofts in Sacramento.  The show will be up from November 13 to December 10, 2015.  At the same location and dates, I am the curator for a Pink Mail Art show with mail art from over 100 artists around the world.

Dahlia Time

Dahlias, mixed media, collagescape on board, 8”x8”

Inspired by the Dahlia Garden (Dell) in Golden Gate Park which is a place I visit often at the end of Summer when the dahlias are blooming.  It’s one of my favorite places in the park.

This is one of a series of four pieces that will be in the upcoming 22nd Annual Pink Week Exhibit at Warehouse Artists Lofts in Sacramento.  The show will be up from November 13 to December 10, 2015.  At the same location and dates, I am the curator for a Pink Mail Art show with mail art from over 100 artists around the world.

Another week's worth of Pink Mail Art

Here is the latest batch of pink mail art arriving in response to the call for pink mail (the deadline is September 30th, so send them in).  A big thank you to everyone who is helping make this upcoming show a big success.  You can see the pieces in detail here.

More than Pink

Plenty of mail art has been coming in for the Pink Mail Art Call, but there has been also a lot of other great mail art in my post office box this month.  Some of the highlights include:

1. Some Mail art via Burning Man from CeCe Chan.
2. Jennifer Utter sent two pieces including one that was sent via Burning Man.
3. Two new prints from Nico Van Hoorn.
4. Gina Visione sent an envelope full of things that I might need to repurpose.
5. A fashionable mannequin was featured on the latest piece from Torma Cauli.
6. Kerosene made a Romaine Lettuce Print.
7. Less is More No. 7 arrived from Helle Pollas in Denmark.
8. An Oakland Garden Center piece from Fleur Helsingor.
9. R.F. Côté incorporated a slide into a postcard.  We need to use more old slides before they all are forgotten.
10. The first Halloween car of the season from Peggy Eigler.
11. A simple but effective Change of Address piece of mail art from Julie Crossman.

Thanks for all the fantastic mail and keep an eye on your mailbox, something will be arriving soon.

Pinked Postcards

With all the pink mail art arriving for the upcoming show in Sacramento I felt inspired to make some pink postcards to send out.  These are from a series of old postcards that just needed to be pinked up a bit before they went out in the mail.

A Post Office Box Full of Pink

The deadline to send you art for the Pink Mail Art Show in Sacramento is September 30th.  This week the post office box was overflowing with the mail you see here.  You can see the pieces in detail in the flickr album.  The show opens in Sacramento on November 13th, 2015. 

Landscaped Postcards

What happens when you take something like ordinary, unused, old postcards?  You can enhance them by adding some paint or “landscape” them.  Now you have a new round of mail art to send out today.

Armin Hansen might be the best artist you have never heard of

Shark Fishers, Armin Hansen

Yesterday a friend and I paid a visit to one of the cities with the most happening art scenes in California.  No, sorry L.A. it wasn’t you and yes San Francisco, we know how much you love yourself, but no, you’ve been pushing all the art out.  But a 90-minute drive away is Sacramento.  We took some time to explore some of the open studios at the Verge Center for the Arts.  This weekend was Sacramento’s big open studios event and we barely scratched the surface.  Sacramento still has room for working artists to have studios to make and show art.  I also got see the new space that will be hosting this year’s Pink Week show as well as the upcoming Pink Mail Art show I am curating in November.

Our main goal was to get to the Crocker Museum to see the exhibit Armin Hansen: The Artful Voyage.  I had read the book before seeing the show and familiarized myself with Hansen’s work.  The catalog is beautiful, yet the printed pages cannot really do his work justice.  He was one of those artists whose work you truly have to see in person.  The museum website has a few images and the review in the Sacramento Bee has some additional images to give you an idea (the image shown above is from permanent collection and not part of the special exhibit).

One could describe Armin Hansen as the west coast’s Winslow Homer.  It would give you an idea of what to expect if you were unfamiliar with his work.  But it might be better to put Hansen in a league with Herman Melville. Melville could write about life on the sea so well, in part, due to his experiences as a crewman on merchant ships and a whaler.  Like Melville, Hansen was able to approach the sea as someone who had worked it – as a fisherman.  Many of his seascapes were not painted with a view from the shore but instead from how it would look far out in Monterey Bay.  I kept looking at them from across the room and they almost started to move.  It took me me back to being out in a small boat on rough water – something I have not experienced for decades.    The most surprising thing about Armin Hansen is that he is not more famous.  After seeing his work, I would expect he would be one of those American artists that most everyone has heard of — a name in a category with Georgia O’Keeffe, Edward Hopper, Andy Warhol, etc..  Yes, he is that good.  But alas, the bias against West Coast artists by the New Yorkerati has been going on for over a century.

There is always art to see in Sacramento, but if you want to discover Armin Hansen, you have go to get up there before the show closes on October 11.