Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Artists' Websites: Katie Miller

Painting by Katie Miller


Child Standing on a Dresser. Oil on canvas, 46x70" c.2007 by Katie Miller

I recently juried an art exhibition for VSA Arts in Washington, DC - the show will be at the Kennedy Center... more later on that - and during the jurying process came across the fantastic paintings of Katie Miller. I had never heard of her, but Katie Miller is a young artist in the Greater Washington, DC area and she received her B.F.A from Maryland Institute College of Art in 2007.

Visit her website here.

Opportunity for illustrators

The Chester River Press is looking for an experienced artist to illustrate a fine letterpress limited edition publication of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. Illustrations, fullpage in theme of black figure Greek vase paintings, should be accurate quality reproductions of the various Homeric forms. Approx. 50 full page illustrations are anticipated. Qualifications: quality artist,strong working knowledge of Iliad, Odyssey, Greek Homeric period painting and drawing. Familiarity with Greek language a definite plus. Project dates: June to Sept. 2008. Not an 'in-residence'position. All welcome. If poss. include resume, work sample, and comp. requirements.

Contact:

Gerard Cataldo
Chester River Pres
Chestertown Old Book Co.
113 South Cross St.
Chestertown MD 21620

Mangravite on Prestegord

Gregory Prestegord at F.A.N. Gallery in Philly is reviewed by Andrew Mangravite:

Gregory Prestegord’s city scenes get right down to business. He doesn’t do the sort of work that you have to stare at and stare at, trying to decipher its message.
Read the whole review here.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Gopnik on Dumbachers

The WashPost's Chief Art Critic Blake Gopnik pops in with a terrific profile of the Dumbacher brothers, whose work first made a debut in 1999 at Artomatic and by 2001 had evolved dramatically was a hit at the Corcoran...

Looking at the brothers, their oneness comes as no surprise. They're only fraternal twins, but you'd swear they were identical. They have precisely the same athletic, 6-foot-something build. They also have the same shoulder-length brown hair. And the same attractive face, just a bit too quirky to be model-handsome.

There are differences. John's a touch slighter, sunnier, more sociable; Joe's a bit more solid and remote. Joe's sunglasses, always dangling from his neck, hang over clothes that are California casual. John's ever-present sunglasses tend to pair with sporty-chic outfits.
Read this really good profile by Gopnik here.

Museums and buying art

...should museum staff be free to advise board members (or other collectors) on what they should be acquiring themselves, and should those board members who are also active collectors be free to acquire works informed, in effect, by the insider knowledge that they are making the same bets or judgments as the museum on whose board they serve?
Read the article by Adrian Ellis for the Art Newspaper here.

Radcliffe Institute Fellowships

Deadline: October 1, 2008

The Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University awards approximately 50 fully funded fellowships each year. Radcliffe Institute fellowships are designed to support scholars, scientists, artists and writers of exceptional promise and demonstrated accomplishment, who wish to pursue work in academic and professional fields and in the creative arts.

Applicants must have received their doctorate or appropriate terminal degree by December 2006 in the area of the proposed project. Radcliffe welcomes proposals from small groups of scholars who have research interests orprojects in common.

Please check this website for more information. The stipend amount is $70,000. Fellows receive office space and access to libraries and other resources of Harvard University. During the fellowship year, which extends from early September 2008 through June 30, 2009, residence in the Boston area is required as is participation in the Institute community.

Fellows are expected to present their work-in-progress and to attend other fellows¹ events. Applications must be postmarked by October 1, 2008. For more information, visit their Web site at www.radcliffe.edu.

Trash People

Earth Day is a week away... and I've been hearing good things about a new art installation that opened last week at the National Geographic Museum: "Trash People by HA Schult."

Starting in 1996, the German artist HA Schult created 1000 life-size figures made entirely of trash with the goal of spreading the word about human consumption and waste. His army of figures have stood at the Pyramids at Giza, in the Red Square in Moscow and on the Great Wall of China.

Though they didn't have room for all 1000, the NGM is displaying 50 of them in their courtyard, and they've stirred quite a reaction from their visitors, several of which have emailed me. With Earth Day a week away, it may be a great time to visit this show.

Supplementing the 50 “trash people” will be a selection of still photographs from the new National Geographic Channel film “Human Footprint," which I have seen and it is terrific.

Go see this show.