Lara Stein Pardo

Because I am not only majoring in Studio Art, but Art History as well, I cannot help myself when it comes to reading about art. I was browsing through some short articles on the Smithsonian Museum of Art when I came across Lara Stein Pardo's article on women and art in the Caribbean. And if that's not fate then please, pinch me. Her short article (which I've provided a link for at the bottom of my post), discusses her research on how female artists with a Caribbean background work in the U.S. and navigate themselves through their creative process of identity in culture and art. Pardo makes the argument that art enables "in-between" female artists of Caribbean decent in the U.S. to engage in their public environment and provide a sense of balance to the the multiple roles they carry. In a way, their art provides them with a connection to  not only familiar places, but to a people as a whole.

http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/5Rz7zE/americanart.si.edu/exhibitions/online/wonders/

Feather Paintings

I went ahead and found some examples of Folk Feather Art. Now understand this. First of all, these literally use the feather as a canvas and exemplify the extent of detail that one CAN actually put on a feather. Personally, I intend to maintain some qualities of the feather and allow it to sort of do its thing. Not cover the entire feather to the point where it looks like paper. Secondly, just about everything I found that is published on the internet is Native American, not so much Caribbean. I also realize that a lot of this is kitchy. BUT, that being said, this is in essence feather painting.

I actually pulled these images from blogs of people who have travelled and bought their own feather art from the locals. And the bottom one is from a blog on Native American culture. 

Leonid Afremov

The inspiration of light translated into quick brushstrokes. Oh hey that sounds familiar, sort of like one of the most popular movements in art to date: impressionism. Once upon a time I stumbled on painting by Leonid Afremov, and I stared at it for like an hour on my computer screen. Probably burned my eyes a little bit. The piece was titled Alley by the Lake.

Broken color, bold clear strokes, and saturation caught my eye immediately in this piece. I absolutely love when artists successfully compose their pieces of strong brushstrokes. So I did a little more digging into Afremov and I had to say... I don't think I've ever googled an artist and had 8 pages full of pieces with no repetition of any of the artwork. I kid you not, pages and pages of art. All together, his pieces really begin to run together in terms of color and subject matter. But a few stood out to me, not just because I admire his style, but because they strayed from the romantic walk-in-the-park feel.

Obviously, I've chosen a bunch of boats. Boats = lifeline in the Caribbean and they make up a great part of everyday life. In playing with light, Afremov's use of color and subject matter in these cases looks like a hybrid of European and Caribbean painting to me, in terms of choice of medium, style of painting, color choice, and the subject matter.

Joe Fenton

So hey. I love Stumble Upon. They, and my Caribbean Art textbook, have been my lifesavers for research. Today I stumbled on Joe Fenton, and this was actually not the first time I've come across him in my stumbling. I've seen his work multiple times. But, now that I've gotten a little more in depth with my research, and now that I've done some traveling, I'm seeing his work in a new way and I'm especially appreciating the amount of detail that he puts into his pieces.

Wooooah Daddy!

So my very first reaction was woah, cool, but not my thing. And since I've sort of dove in to all of this, I've started observing my project in new ways. I know because what I will be working with is small, I'm going to have to pay attention to details. And boy does Joe Fenton have an eye for detail. But the piece that drew my eye the most was actually one of his simpler pieces.

He stares into your soul.

That little dude's face is creepy right? That's the part I love the most. In Pre-Columbian art in both Caribbean islands and Central America, it's very common to see figures baring teeth and with scary wide eyes. So even though he's a little odd looking, he's sort of a Clasico Caribe! These creeper dudes are all over Fenton's work. As well as skeleton-like figures, which is a huge motif for life in the Caribbean (yes, life, not death) AND the figure behind him has some really elaborate costuming going on. Whether or not Joe Fenton intended to include such traditional Caribbean symbols and iconography, I don't know, but he's definitely caught my interest now.

Leaf Cutouts.

I think I'm turning into a hippie over here. I found this awesome and inspiring for a two-fold reason. Simple.
1. it's sort of the reverse of how I want to go about my project; they deduct from a leaf to achieve their vision, while I will add to a feather.
2. the use of pattern. A pattern can say so much about cultural origin, especially when it's paired with a traditional medium.
And it's that simple as to why this caught my eye. Pattern by itself, eh. Pattern with a unique medium, interestinnng.

Wifredo Lam

Ahh Wifredo Lam. The Father of Caribbean Art. And who doesn't love a little bit of voodoo to spice up their life? Lam has been a huge influence on me since the first slide Dr. Moran showed us of The Jungle back in Caribbean Art. I literally connected with the subject matter in a way I never have before as a student, and since then, my life has changed. Please enjoy my elevated venacular in describing specifically how Wifredo Lam inspires me as an artist.

The Chair

Wifredo Lam

I don’t know how I could look into Caribbean art without drawing inspiration from the Caribbean’s most famous artist, Wifredo Lam. Especially given that my heritage is primarily Cuban and Lam is a Cuban artist who embraced his Afro-Cuban heritage in his artwork. Lam’s hybrid figures definitely catch the eye, but not only are they bizarre and abstract, but they tie Lam back to his spiritual and cultural roots. In his travels as an artist, Lam himself was inspired by some of my own favorite artists, including Henry Matisse. Through the sense of surrealism he adapted in his travels and studies, he returned to Havana to create his art. His work reached out to the common man of his culture making his concepts heavily accessible and wildly popular in his subject matter, which often included elements of Voodoun, as in The Chair.

Wifredo Lam floors me. His style, his color, the clever use of motifs. His pieces are like puzzles, you can look at them over and over and find something new about the piece almost every time without failure. Some of his pieces are super complex, like The Jungle, which distorts human body parts to blend in with the chaotic scenery of the jungle. Other pieces are simpler in appearance, but just as heavy in motif, such as Satan. Most of his pieces involve voodoun motifs, some of which are subtle, and some of which stare straight at you. For example, The Chair distorts the motif of the stool into a European chair, not only hiding the real purpose of the painting, but showing a true hybrid between European and ancient Caribbean art. It’s that combination that intrigues me the most as an artist. Caribbean art has fascinated me for a long time, and when I took the course a year or so ago, I knew it was a subject matter I felt a deep connection to and that I wanted to pursue it however I could. I come from a Catholic family line and personally don’t get into voodoo or Santeria, but their motifs fascinate me none the less. Because I have a family line of wealthy Spaniards mixing with natives along the way, I fee a draw to the European-native style that is so common in Caribbean art. And as the father of that style, Wifredo Lam has already influenced me a great deal.

The Jungle

Satan

Along with his style of mixing cultural and stylistic differences in his art, Lam explores a variety of texture in his work. Although his primary medium of choice was gouche, I really admire his use of paint in his paintings. Especially in The Jungle, he uses texture to disguise body parts and make them blend with the foliage, and he also uses it to make specific parts pop so that you see a lot of feet, bare butts, and an occasional breast. At first glance, there’s a sense of pattern in his work, and I will be honored and beside myself if I can accomplish his use of pattern and surrealism to keep his view captivated by his work. I want my work to come together like his and stand out as a Caribbean piece. And I want to show my respect for those artists before me the way that Lam has in putting his own spin on what was ultimately a Pablo Picasso style of art (who was, after all, the largest source of his influence).

Alley, Ronald. Wifredo Lam. The MoMA Online. The Oxford Press. 2009. Web. 3 August 2011. <http://www.moma.org/collection/artist.php?artist_id=3349>.

"Spooky"

So I'm stumbling along the internet, stumble stumble stumble (I have literally been on the internet three times more today than I have ALL SUMMER LONG!!!) when I come across this page that says "Quilling - the Art of Turning Paper Strips into Intricate Artworks" and I go well THAT'S interesting, so I scrolly scroll down the page. This guy, or girl (the artist goes by "Spooky") curls strips of paper and arranges them so, so that the end result is this really intricate shape with all kinds of shapes and patterns going on in the middle. And, please don't get me wrong, I know some of this stuff is super cheesy. But the hand caught my eye.

Maybe I've been staring at a computer screen too long today and need to get myself a CATscan to check for brain damage, but the business (as in busy-ness, not the kind you get a degree for) of the interior reminded me of how artists show the foliage in Caribbean art. Lots of stuff happening, and a few distinguishable shapes. I may be losing my mind. But this seemed different and cool to me and I think Spooky, whoever he or she is, should do more stuff like this and with a more controlled color palette. But I'm thinking along the lines of our fingerprints here and where our fingerprints come from and that's where I bring in my heritage and the traditional painting styles and blah blah blah blah blah. I say blah blah blah because I'm getting the notion that I am repeating myself just a little bit. And when I look at this image in black and white, it suddenly has a new look to me.

Anyone else think that now that the color isn't so distracting it's got a jungly look to it? I like it, it's pattern all coming together to make something cool, and that's more or less what I want to accomplish. The coming together of pattern, but in a deeper way than just curling some paper.