NEW PAINTINGS IN MY SHOP!

My Etsy shop, Paige Anderson Art has several new (and a few old) paintings in it. Most of them are affordable little oil on paper paintings of Bologna. Check it out HERE.

Now available

I'm venturing into a new place in art. I okayed the proof yesterday to reproduce one of my paintings. I had all sorts of moral battles over whether or not I should go here, reproductions often struck me as something that cheapen work. But I've come to terms with it, and have a better understanding of what reproducing a work of art allows you to do: share your art with more people. Which is never a bad thing, right? I feel good about this new journey.

Scattered at the Time, 30" x 40"

The painting above is available full-size as a giclée pigment print on William Turner fine art paper. The edition is limited to 50 and each print will be signed and numbered.

Email me if you are interested.

swing and a miss

Sometimes this blog is so sad and neglected it makes me feel sad and neglected.

Remember how around this time a year ago I was doing art for 8, 9, 10, 12 hours a day? Me too. I miss it some days. Most days I forget about my former self and get wrapped up all over again in my current self. My mother self. This new self I'm trying to figure out how she relates to her former-self self.

But I want to do more art.

Sure I've started a few sketches/studies here. I did a watercolor I sort of like--got a bit over worked but has some redeeming qualities. For the most part though, I've felt completely saturated visually (this city is stunning) but nothing has translated on paper or canvas.

I think I need to collage. And sketch.

I'm going to strip down what I've been trying to do--paint--and see if painting will come organically after I've channelled some creative energy into consistent little projects. Right now painting is on my to-do list. I do it after I've checked the blogs I read, the dishes are done, I've swept for the umpteenth time . . .

I sketched today for the first time in a while. I opened my sketch book a few days ago and saw written on the inside cover: Bologna - Vol. I.

I laughed to myself. Try Volume ONLY. That's okay. I'm learning to lower my standards in some areas because they have to be so high in others. I can only do so much (I should write that phrase ten times daily as to not get so discouraged so often).

But back to sketching today . . . I tried sketching Ada. I always want to sketch Ada. She's so beautiful and I see so many people I love in her. But she's ACTIVE! not just active. So trying to sketch her as she ACTIVE!s around the room is always challenging. I tried drawing from a video still. It looked like an old man without a neck. Then a photo. It looked nothing like her.

Then I decided just to draw her eye. Then another eye. Then maybe her nose . . So I had this little face staring back at me that looked more like Ada and less like someone else's kid.

I challenged myself to sketch for 15 minutes every day this month. I missed the first day. But today I started sketching and looked up at the clock nearly an hour later.

It's been so long since that has happened.

Things I love:

textiles
string
organization
collections
form

I think I need another installation project...

Artist: Janet Echelman

I can't get enough of this woman's work. And I love that she mentions in the middle of her talk that she has two kids. Art + kids = excellence. I think I might paint today (or at least prep for a painting...)

my website is up!!

Brian Mortenson did my website (I keep having him tweak things and I'm sure he's getting pretty tired of me by now) but it's up! It's beautiful! It's awesome!

Check it out: www.paigeandersonart.com

 

Want Brian to do your site? He's great to work with and has an awesome eye. To contact, email him at bgmort@gmail.com.

women: relationship and identity

I'm back from my blogging hiatus. While I haven't made much art, I've been working on writing a lot about it. It's such a cathartic and clarifying experience. It enables me to both look more objectively about what I'm making, and also finally find the roots of the ideas that I've been exploring.

Two paintings got accepted to a show in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I'm learning the ins and outs of shipping artwork (and how expensive it is! Holy Moses!)

All Assembled Awaiting 

An Innumerable Company

The show is entitled Women: Relationship and Identity. Below is a description:

Women: Relationship and Identity is a fine art exhibition juried by Rachel Epp Buller, and a visual conversation about the role relationships play in the identity of women.  Whether implicit, explicit, self-imposed or from a Western sociologic construct, women are generally regarded as the more relational gender. Participating artists examine the various relationships women share, the ways those relationships contribute to their own sense of identity and the impact they have on other’s perceptions – ultimately leading to a broader understanding of the role and identity of women

Click HERE for a link to the show (that includes a list of participating artists, exhibition dates, etc.)

And if you want to share the event on Facebook, HERE's a link to that as well.

It's fun to start exhibiting my work. I've only exhibited out of state a handful of times and it's exciting to do it again! I think the show sounds beautiful. Mikey wanted to surprise me with plane tickets so we could be there for the Artist conversation (which I would participate in if I were there), but I told him flying 10 days before my due date is a really bad idea. In fact, I doubt they'd let me on the plane. However, if you happen to be in Minneapolis, you should definitely check it out! (and let me know all about it).

The Turning (it's finally here)

My final show is up! We (me and my cohort of friends and family who have donated hundreds of man hours in my behalf---thank you, thank YOU, THANK YOU!) got it all done in a day. A very long day.

After Mikey and I put the tools away, picked up the garbage and packed up our boxes, I realized how my entire body was throbbing. I'm pretty sure I hobbled all the way to the car.

But it's up! (and will stay up through the 14th of this month).

And you are all invited to the opening reception tomorrow night, December 3 at 6.

And to whet your appetite, here's a sneak peak at what we did yesterday . . .

Our magic car with all 25 paintings, 3000+ hexagons, tools, odds and ends and everything else all inside. It's sort of like the Barney Bag.

Even if Santa isn't real, his elves are. Here they are in action, stringing together the 20th generation back on my dad's side. (Side note: Someone asked me if the paper was a bracket of some sort. Retrospectively, I wish I would have answered, "yeah, it's all the possible outcomes for March Madness. I'm sort of a super-freak.")

You've got to see it in real life. And smell it. And look closely at the names. And listen more closely to hear them.

Hope to see you tomorrow night!

things keep moving

Today I have spent 5 hours writing inscribing the names of my ancestors on wax hexagons. The hexagons that I spent all last week making. The hexagons that half my family came over to help punch and tie (bless you, bless you, bless you...)

And now I can't feel my middle finger.

I noticed that I was writing slower and slower. I punched out a generation and a half before lunch, and I've barely done one since. I remembered this whole blood sugar when you're pregnant thing. And drank some orange juice. It's Mikey's special. (Thanks dude). And I'm feeling much better.

I planned on doing my hair today but it has been in and out of several buns, pony tails, and braids all day. Maybe not doing my hair isn't saving me time in the long run. Isn't that how it is with everything though? You think you save yourself by shirking something and end up having to deal with it later (in a bigger, more tangley way).

After this show is hung I'm declaring a personal holiday for the following week. Do you think I can get my professors to go along with it?

i'm taxing my whole family

Cassandra Barney came a gave a lecture in my Business Practices for Artists Class. She said several things that impressed me. She was articulate and smart. Savvy, even. But one thing she said stuck out in a major way. She said, "My schedule affects everyone around me. If I’m over booked, it taxes my whole family.”

 I almost laughed out loud because Tuesday night half of my family was at my side helping me cut out hexagons, punch holes, and tie them together. We tied over 500 hexagons. This installation project is much bigger than I had anticipated (and I'm blaming in on Typewriter Grandma's sister who is busy-as-a-bee--pun intended--finding more progenitors) and I think I've brought on a case of The Worries among my family members. (Sorry guys).

I'm confident I can finish (or, we can finish...) and I'm hoping it will be as powerful as it is time-intensive.

Fingers crossed.

in progress

i've got over a dozen paintings in progress. it feels good and it's nice to think that i'm making progress, but at the same time, mikey's plea to "just finish a piece!" is ringing increasingly loud in my ear.

here are photos of some of the "in progress" paintings.

i was critiqued in class today and it went really well. they felt (as do i) that so far my installation is more successful on several layers, but i'm working on getting my paintings up to speed. they need some tlc.

after i went straight to my studio and a kid from my class came in a little while later. he told me he "appreciated hearing the dialogue on my work" because before he thought i was "painting for the marriott"

i asked him, "the marriott?"

"yeah, like hotel art"

and then he meandered off and i wanted to throw my paint brush at his head.

still inspired

Mmmm

Some more yummy images...

image credit

Monogold by Yves Klein

currently inspired by...

the installations by Chris Burden:

Reason for the Neutron Bomb, 1979

All the Submarines, 1987

the sculpture of Jackie Winsor:

Bound Grid, 1971-72

the scultpure of Ibram Lassaw:

Kwannon, 1952

the sculpture and installation work of Eva Hesse:

Sans II, 1968

the sculpture and installation work of Louise Nevelson:

Sky Cathedral's Presence I, 1959-62

Untitled, 1961

the collages and paintings of Robert Rauschenberg:

Mother of God, ca. 1950

individual v. community

Where have I been?

Making a bunch of studies, most of which I'm not happy with, and generally feeling discouraged about what I'm doing. The last month of my studio practice can be summarized by unrealized goals.

But.

Already this week I'm feeling more encouraged about what is going on. I'm still plugging away on a few paintings. Patterns have taken over my life. But I'm also exploring other mediums--I have started working on an installation with thousands of wax hexagons, began research for an audio (maybe video?) piece, and am continuing to refine my ideas.

I feel constantly inspired. I feels like everything relates to my ideas about connection and ancestry; the weightiness of being connected to humanity through a family.

I'm taking a contemporary literature class. After two days I already love it. In fact, when I left class today I was sad that I had to wait until Monday to attend again. It's that good. Seriously. Our professor is inspiring and brilliant. A girl turned to me the first day and said she had her class last semester and now wants to be our professor she grows up. Now I feel the same way.

We read an essay about universalism, how post-moderns view the ideal of universality or absolute truth as hard to swallow. I'm right there with them to some degree. Aside from beliefs that are directly tied to my religion, I find very few things that have a sense of universal truth. Regardless, this is a tangent...

The essay talked about how we as American's can't fully understand African literature even if we speak the language, know the history etc (and vice versa). It mentioned a story about a girl who was born into a family that worked as servants/slaves/maids to the French (imperialists, but that's my word). The family she worked for moved to France, so logically, she went with them as their hired help. She found herself disenfranchised by two cultures, she wasn't African, she wasn't French. Eventually she committed suicide to release herself from the slavery her family helped to perpetuate by essentially enslaving themselves.

The American sees this as a tragedy because she ended her life. Yes. True. But this is only part of the problem. To the culture in which the story was written, she has only temporarily released herself. She has trapped her ancestors, broken the cycle of life, and, if she is an only child, she has ended the family lineage. She has, in short, committed a terrible abomination, and the African reading is horrified by what she has done. the religious overtone relating to ancestral worship is completely missed by the Western reader.

After reading this essay I realized that my work is in part about this. We are connected in a community. The modern American society so much emphasizes the individual, the freedom of choice. But what it overlooks is the consequences on family, on community, on ancestry and lineage. We are connected deeply. Our choices affect those before and after us.

There are ideas about individual verses community at play in my head.

pound it

after a few critiques and a meeting with a professor i think that what i need most of all is just to create. i need to make stuff, whatever stuff comes to mind. i think this will help me in a variety of ways. the problem that i face is that i'm often driven by a "vision" of what i want a piece to look like before i begin. this gives me direction as i work. but i feel a little bit like i'll be creating in a vacuum without this sort of foreknowledge of what my piece will look like.

i think collaging was good for me for that reason. it's hard to conceptualize what it will look like, but it gradually takes shape as you continue to piece it together.

i don't think i'm going to give up chairs completely. and i've started really focusing on patterns as a way to describe "the stuff between." i think they do bring a form to ordinances, sacred connections, connections that are so significant that they tie into our personal salvation.

today at the university forum the president of the united states catholic cardinals spoke, francis cardinal george. before he spoke a faculty member lead the congregation in a prayer--catholic style. before praying she explained why they feel it is important to pray together and how it ties into their theology about salvation. she said something to the effect that, "although we believe we are all loved and known individually, we believe that we will be saved as a community." i liked that idea of connection, of one affecting another in an indirect yet direct way. though i don't know my ancestors directly or personally, their salvation affects mine.

there is something interconnected with saving ordinances. i thought much about this as i was sealed to my husband and pondered how i am now sealed to him and his family, as well as my family. i visualized a complicated web of connections that bound all of us together. it's as if everyone will be bound and together, humanity will be saved through the connections that we have to eachother.

so i'm going to make. i'm going to spend one month (until the end of march) just creating whatever comes to mind (while i think about my ideas and ponder on the universe). i'm excited to do this and see what will come of it.

maybe nothing.

and if so, i'll pick up at the end of march and keep making until i make a break through. but i'm going to back off of my ideas, try to not contrive my work, but let it come out of more organic processes. i've been pounding my head too hard.

it needs a rest.

the stuff between

i've been pondering for days about what i'm talking about in my art. a long discussion with my husband a few nights ago has got my head spinning.

at a glance it's about ancestors. surely the piece i'm doing for the Education in Zion is about individuals, a way to sort of honor their legacy left on my family, a way to learn about them, feel a connection to them. the purpose that the stories serve in my process is helping me to feel a connection. but the art itself isn't meant to be about them. i don't want to do "chair portraits" per se, i want to talk about the stuff between.

what is between? what is between me and my fourth-great grandmother ellen? spirit, tradition, honor (thank you byu cougars), ordinances, strength, connection, legacy . . . intangible stuff.

so that is my challenge is just that. paint intangible forms. or, create a form that describes the stuff between. do i leave chairs completely? are chairs and i at an impasse? i haven't decided yet, but i do know that i need to figure out a way to give a form to these ideas that, right now, seem completely formless.

Visual AIDS

I entered a work into a show months ago and was accepted. That was pretty cool. But even cooler was that my piece was purchased.

Here's an excerpt from the letter I received:

Dear Paige Crosland Anderson, 

We write on behalf of Visual AIDS to express our heartfelt gratitude for your submission of artwork to the 12th annual Postcards From The Edge benefit for Visual AIDS held January 8-10 at ZieherSmith. . . As you know, all proceeds support the work of Visual AIDS. . .

We are happy to report that your piece was purchased. We requested buyers to provide this information in order to share it with the donating artists. Your artwork is in the collection of: Roger Braimon. . .

It's good to be able to put another show on my resume, as well as feel like I could help out in some small way through my art.

we feel fine

"we feel fine" is an exploration of human emotion by jonathan harris and sep kamva. it is completely incredible. i've spent way too much time looking at it.

i was first exposed to the project through a ted talk. so cool. watch the video. (even though it's 20 minutes long)





i feel like it has helped in my personal concepts about just the masses of people, how we're connected, how we affect one another. it may be a bit of a stretch, but it was completely inspiring to me.

power v. importance

i've been thinking a lot lately. i've been thinking about what i want my art to look like. i've been thinking about how it would be received in a larger context, how it would fare in the contemporary art world. i've been thinking about why art is important.

i remember last year hitting a wall and thinking, "what am i doing?! i am an object maker in the latter-days!" it seemed insane then. sometimes it still seems insane that i invest so much time in something that may end up being completely insignificant.

(is the only way to make art significant to make it a big deal on the "art scene"? there are a lot of things happening in contemporary art that i don't want to have stacked against my work. there's a lot of shock art, immoral art, art that propagates ideas that i find irrational or offensive. i don't want my art to need to compete with that.)

maybe a better question, rather than "is art important?" would be, "is art powerful?" i don't think that is even disputable. so how to i make my art powerful? if my art is powerful could it transcend the current art practices that i dislike and still be competitive? will it be important because it is powerful?

do power and importance equate? is something powerful inherently important? is something important inherently powerful?