Art, Breonny

Aesthetic Perfection (or the Tale of Art and Cake)

Tonight, I am hosting my second event curating Zubar on Greenville in Dallas. I am so. proud. of this show. I have tremendous respect for all three artists, both for their work and for their person. Nicole Dildine’s vibrant, watercolor portraits of iconic women are flooded with life that spills off the page and into the viewer. (More about Nicole here.) Erika Krivda’s colorful pieces provide me the texture I crave in oil paintings. I want to crawl inside them. Or maybe lick them. (Erika’s site here.) And when you look at Jonathan Davis’ intense portraits of women, it is clear he approaches his beautiful subjects in sincere reverence. I find this awfully refreshing in today’s in-your-face art world. (Jonathan’s site here.) The work on the walls is undeniably amazing. I am truly honored to have had the privilege of hanging these incredible pieces. And I have a couple more to sneak up on the walls before the doors open tonight! I’m so excited about seeing it all come together, I have tingles!!

But there’s more to it than just that! It gets even more exciting! In addition to all the glorious art, Brian has made a giant, beautiful  red velvet cake in honor of my rapidly approaching 30th birthday. That’s right. I turn 30 this Saturday. The romp of my 20s has drawn to a close. I guess it’s time to grow up and be an adult and stuff now. Yes, you read that right! There will be cake! Or more accurately: CAKE!

CAKE and ART?!!? What more could you want?!

I can’t wait to see everyone tonight!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (You can RSVP on Facebook here!)

Music

UNSILENT NIGHT!!

Tomorrow night at 7:00 p.m. I’ll be participating in the coolest holiday music event ever. Every year, for the past 20 years, people have gathered en masse in different cities across the world to play Phil Kline’s four-part harmonic piece Unsilent Night. Wednesday evening, the Dallas group will meet downtown at the DART Akard Station with boomboxes, mini amps, cell phones, and any other device that can play the MP3s that comprise the piece. The files are randomly distributed, so that the four different parts are represented relatively evenly. We will begin the tracks in unison and stroll through downtown listening to the sounds as they bounce off brick walls, glass windows, and wind through the streets. Brian and I joined in the fun in 2010 and I’m thrilled we’re able to participate again this year. It’s a living, breathing soundscape adventure that truly must be experienced firsthand to understand. The intricate dance of the sounds harmonizing as the move through the streets is beyond my ability to adequately describe in words.

I grabbed just a very few shots when Brian and I went two years ago. Naturally, pictures do nothing to convey the wonder that is Unsilent Night. Come out and enjoy this one-of-a-kind marvel for yourself. It’s free for everyone. The music can be downloaded here. And the Dallas Facebook event page can be found here.

 

 

Art

Art is…Giving

I’m thrilled to be participating in the first Art is… event this Friday at Connective Hub in Addison. From 7 p.m. to 12 a.m. the place will be bustling with people enjoying works from over a dozen artists, (several of whom will be creating live!) as well as live musical acts! and refreshments! In the spirit of giving, the proceeds from the silent auction are split between the Dallas Morning New Charities and the artists themselves. (I mean heck, we’re artists. We’re charity, too. Right?!) I’m looking forward to seeing all the beautiful works, the beautiful people, and what promises to be a good time–Dallas art scene-style. :) The event details are all on Facebook here. And you can get your hands on tickets here.

 

 

Art

ArtCon!

This was my third year to participate in Dallas’ coolest charity event, Art Conspiracy, and by far the most personally exciting. This year’s event boasted two beneficiaries for the first time–Girls Rock Dallas and W. T. White Academy of Visual and Performing Arts. My piece turned out fantastic and did well with the crowd. (Edit: After reviewing the complete auction list, at $550 my piece was tied with one other for the 5th highest selling piece! Wow!!) The idea for this piece was hatched a year and a half ago, in the midst of the iPhoneography 365 project. To be completely honest, I can’t take full credit for this one. Brian contributed significantly to the overall direction of the image. A huge thanks to him for tremendous encouragement, creative energy and direction, and for those beautifully tied knots.

As an interesting side note, the making of the piece was quite an adventure. Brian and I had to go out twice, since the first time we got run off by the police. :-o I guess they thought we were a couple of hooligans. I don’t think the officer knew what to make of my story about creating an art piece for charity. So we found a more discreet location and got just what we needed on the second go round.

Here’s the finished piece the night of the event:

And a few more shots we got of each other:

Art

Yes, it’s a photograph.

I know I have not been terribly diligent with the blog-posting this year. (Or really ever. Who am I kidding? Heh.) So for those of you who think I’ve been hiding under a rock, here’s what I’ve been doing in my cave:

I’m still deciding what to call these puzzle-esque pieces. (Or perhaps they speak for themselves and don’t require a name.) The effect is something of a reverse collage—a single digital image deconstructed into dozens of tiny files with the prints pieced tediously, pain-stakingly, lovingly back together by hand, one-by-one.

After years of wracking my brain in vain attempt after vain attempt to bring texture and dimension to photography, I have finally found something that achieves the texture I crave without compromising the integrity of the images I work so hard to perfect. The whole concept is so simple I feel (only slightly) frustrated it took me so. long. to find. I’m excited about where these are going and can’t wait to create more and more—ever bigger and better. I doubt it needs pointing out, but these are a bazillion times more impressive in person. The juxtaposition of the overlapping pieces make a dynamic presentation which has the viewer literally questioning whether they’re looking at a photograph or a painting. It’s absolutely the most frequent question I hear, “So… is this a photograph?”

Art, Breonny

Smoke

I grabbed this of Brian last week after a truncated trip to an extremely poorly executed murder mystery dinner theater…

And Brian’s started playing with the camera now!! :)

 

Art, Breonny

Underground 2012

A week and a half seems forever ago, as the rush of excitement dissipates. I was knee deep in preparations for weeks counting up to Underground 4. (The pre-show was a blast and the art looked ridiculously awesome, for the record.) But the night of the event itself was a glorious, hectic blur of people, energy, and art. The most rewarding aspect of the whole Underground experience, by far, was actively working with someone I love to create something entirely new. It was one of the most fulfilling creative experiences of my life. I’ve never been much of a collaborator in this way, but I found this an enlivening adventure and am looking forward to more of its kind.

For well over a year, I’ve been kicking around this idea for an outside-the-box approach to melding an artistic presentation with the precise, unforgiving nature of photography. The vision is a photograph seemingly floating, carelessly nailed to a board, with a protective sealant “spilled” across the image. It sounds simpler to achieve than it is and I am unwilling to sacrifice archival care of the piece in quest of the carefully sloppy look. As Brian, (who’s been my sounding board and partner in crime,) will attest, it’s an incredible amount of work. The sealant is exceedingly difficult to work with–obstinate and highly disrespectful. But! it can be done! After some minor finishing work, the prototype of this method is complete, with tremendous creative collaboration and assistance from Brian. (Thank you!!) And we have lots of ideas for how to improve on this and get better results in the future. I’m looking forward to making more.

Here’s a sneak peak of the not-quite-finished piece:

 

While I’m at it, I’ll take this opportunity to share a sneak peak behind the curtain: After working with this piece, I decided the image still needed some attention. So I dug up the original file and meticulously removed some distracting artifacts, as well as tweaking the overall image enhancement.

Here’s the black & white as it was before:

And this is the new, improved version:

Every time I show this image people ask where it was taken and seem surprised by the answer: This building is on South State Street in Salt Lake City. (I like to refer to this image as WTF SLC. There are so many easter eggs in the face of this building, I keep finding new things two years later!) In the process of digging up the file, I came across the other images I took of the barber shop and pulled out this one to work on. Here’s a never-before-seen angle of WTF SLC, and presented for the first time in color:

Art, Breonny

Underground 4 Preview Night — Tonight!!

It took a TON of hard work, and a fantastic team lending their assistance and expertise to get it done, but it is finished! Over 140 pieces are on display in the Janette Kennedy Gallery on Southside on Lamar. Come out tonight for the FREE preview, which includes live music, and a smattering of talented local artists creating work live. This is just a taste of what you’ll see at Underground 4 on February 11.

The Facebook event for tonight can be found here. I’m stoked! Can’t wait to see all the artists in attendance tonight!!

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Art, Breonny

New Work! And a Show!

This Friday, I will be participating as an artist in ArtLoveMagic‘s September Art & Coffee. Come see me at It’s A Grind in Deep Ellum Friday September 2nd from 7:-10:30. I will be unveiling a brand new style of presentation that is unique, geometric, and subtly 3 dimensional. On a quest to break out of the box of traditional matting and framing, and ever-seeking a blurring of the lines between photography and painting, this has been in the works for almost a year. I’m super stoked about finally having something to present to the public! I don’t even know how to adequately describe this. I’ve tapped every creative nook and cranny of my brain to find a way to create something completely unique that I can honestly say I have never seen before in any photography related medium. It really must be seen in person. Pictures just don’t covey the depth accurately. All I can do is tease. So come out and see for yourself!

And here’s the Facebook event page for the September Art & Coffee!!

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