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Thursday, September 7, 2023

Caitlin McCormack Crochets a Speculative Future in the Wake of Environmental Catastrophe

A circular composition of crocheted fiber that looks like tiny skeletons on the ground.

“Swim Team.” Photo by Jaime Alvarez for Fleisher Art Memorial. All images © Caitlin McCormack, shared with permission

From humble, crocheted thread emerges Caitlin McCormack’s alternate reality featuring tiny carcasses, encased objects, and mysterious figures. Ideas related to the cycle of death and life, mutation, and overgrowth permeate her work, most prominently through her ongoing series of skeletons (previously) resting on beds of botanicals, often arranged in groups as if a single event wiped them out simultaneously.

Through a speculative view of a post-human world, McCormack imbues her work with a sense of foreboding that contrasts the medium of crochet and its comforting, nostalgic associations. Her current exhibition at Elijah Wheat Showroom titled SOUVENIRS OF THE WASTELAND, a duo show with Kat Ryals, also considers ideas around tacky novelties, sci-fi, and the impact of textile industry waste.

SOUVENIRS OF A WASTELAND is presented through the lens of “a pseudoscientific museum exhibition chronicling the influx of strange new life forms that have appeared in the wake of humanity’s demise,” McCormack tells Colossal. “The concept explores our complicity in environmental destruction and questions what will happen to our trash when we are gone. Turns out, things will get real weird.”

A crocheted figure wearing a hat with fringe on his arms.

“Libidinous Drifter.” Photo by Stacey Evans for Second Street Gallery

Increasingly focusing on freestanding, sculptural works reliant almost exclusively on stiffened, crocheted material, McCormack has started to depart from her earlier wall-mounted relief compositions. “In 2020, I started building assemblages out of found objects, carefully upholstering the structures with hand-sewn velvet and adorning them so that their surfaces grew heavily-textured with an abundance of fiber sculptural relief forms,” she says. “The crocheted cotton is occasionally dyed with natural pigments sourced from my surroundings during hikes and time spent in the woods at rural residencies.”

McCormack will include a large-scale piece at the Jewish Museum Milwaukee as part of Women Pulling at the Threads of Social Discourse, which opens September 8. And at SPRING/BREAK Art Show in New York, she has co-curated a presentation titled Come, Dance With Us and Our Dead in the Rainbows (If It Makes You Feel Good) alongside Heather Renée Russ and Christopher M. Tandy, which will be on view through September 11.

SOUVENIRS OF THE WASTELAND continues in Newburgh, New York, through October 1. Find more on the artist’s website and Instagram.

An abstract crocheted sculpture of a hand-like green feature with mushrooms growing from each digit.

“Manicure at the End of the World.” Photo by Jason Chen

A circular composition of crocheted fiber that looks like tiny skeletons on a neon yellow background.

“Go Home Magna Mater, You’re Drunk.” Photo by Jason Chen

Detail of a composition of crocheted fiber that looks like tiny skeletons on the ground.

Detail of “Swim Team”

Crocheted fiber that looks like tiny skeletons on the ground.

“The Only Witness to a Vanished World”

Detail of “The Only Witness to a Vanished World”

Embroidered pillow with a fringe on the bottom. Text on the pillow reads "You Know He Told Everyone"

“You Know He Told Everyone.” Photo by The Wassaic Project

Crocheted netting around a cluster of objects.

“They Come Back, But They’re Never the Same.” Photo by Jason Chen

“Prince of Nothing”

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article Caitlin McCormack Crochets a Speculative Future in the Wake of Environmental Catastrophe appeared first on Colossal.

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Take Your Practice to New Heights With SVA Continuing Education

Artwork by Selena Pacheco, Artist Residency Alumnus ‘23. Image courtesy Xuemeng Zhang

Ready to take your practice and creativity to new heights? The Division of Continuing Education at the School of Visual Arts (SVACE) has the resources and expertise to help you go to the next level. With more than 200 courses and 10+ artist residency programs, you’ll find everything you need to achieve your goals and actualize your potential. Whether you’re looking to advance your career, explore new artistic avenues, or simply deepen your practice, our experienced faculty will provide the guidance and support you need to grow.

Head to sva.edu/ce to explore our offerings and get started.

Artist Residency Programs & Intensives

Online and on-campus courses are available in:

Registration Details

Course Advice
If you need advice or have questions please email ce@sva.edu to connect with one of our course advisors.

About the School of Visual Arts
School of Visual Arts has been a leader in the education of artists, designers, and creative professionals for seven decades. With a faculty of distinguished working professionals, a dynamic curriculum, and an emphasis on critical thinking, SVA is a catalyst for innovation and social responsibility. Comprising 6,000 students at its Manhattan campus and 35,000 alumni in 100 countries, SVA also represents one of the most influential artistic communities in the world. For information about the College please visit sva.edu.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article Take Your Practice to New Heights With SVA Continuing Education appeared first on Colossal.

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Wednesday, September 6, 2023

Florals and Landscapes Redefine Vintage Portraits in Han Cao’s Embroidered ‘Silhouettes’

“La Lucha.” All images © Han Cao, courtesy of Paradigm, shared with permission

Known for her signature embroidered photographs, Han Cao (previously) examines intersecting ideas of identity, memory, and nostalgia. In her new body of work, the artist begins with vintage images, replacing faces and garments with flowery landscapes and sweeping skies.

Comprising the exhibition Silhouettes at Paradigm Gallery + Studio, the portraits overflow with foliage, storm surf, and bucolic meadows. The show marks a new direction for Cao’s practice, expanding her interest in introspection and internalization, especially over time. She explores “how our sense of self can be affected by memory, social structures, and a connection to nature,” says a statement.

For the first time, Cao has produced double-portraits that incorporate the same photographs, scaled up and applied with the same embroidery patterns as the smaller original. She draws attention to the materiality of fiber, emphasizing how its detail and immediacy read differently depending on the size, inviting the viewer to consider similarities and differences between nearly identical representations.

Replacing faces with trees, fields, and surging waves, Cao visualizes the metaphorical emotional capacity of each figure, likening the depths of their memories, feelings, and thoughts to traversable terrain that is deep and lush with color. Cao says, “I am always trying to change the story of the photo, but this method allows me to transport the figure into a different world.”

Silhouettes is on view in Philadelphia through October 1. You can view and purchase pieces on the gallery’s website, and find more work from Cao on her site and Instagram.

“New Skies”

“A Self-Portrait Outside”

“Baret and the Bougainvillea”

“Jacaranda”

“Sweetheart”

“Surge”

“The Windswept Dreamers”

Detail of “The Windswept Dreamers”

Detail of “The Windswept Dreamers”

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article Florals and Landscapes Redefine Vintage Portraits in Han Cao’s Embroidered ‘Silhouettes’ appeared first on Colossal.

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In ‘American Grown,’ Tiffanie Turner Roots Out Personal Memories and U.S. Exceptionalism

“Excerpt from Still Life with flowers on a marble tabletop” (2023), paper mâché, Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, and cardboard, 29 x 30.5 x 21.5 inches. All images © Shaun Roberts, shared with permission

In preparing for her newest body of work, Tiffanie Turner sowed three ideas: to expand the standard shapes of her sculptures, to draw underrecognized connections, and to unearth a long-held concern about American culture.

An architect by training, the artist (previously) is known for her incredibly lifelike paper flowers that explore beauty standards and aging through dramatic decay and flawed growths. Her interests in recent years have largely been universal, questioning the nature of imperfection and human vanity or the impending destruction caused by the climate crisis.

But in American Grown, Turner turns toward the personal. Two and a half years in the making, the series comprises ten massive sculptures made with the artist’s signature crepe-paper petals layered in dense masses. The flowers embody both an artistic challenge—one of the three principles behind the collection was to leave behind the circular, wall-mounted form in favor of more conical, gravity-defying constructions—and a deeply introspective look at Turner’s own life. “After spending over two years with this body of work, thinking almost every day about where this idea of the United States being ‘the greatest nation’ in the family I grew up in, I think I figured it out,” she tells Colossal, sharing that she’s circling around how American exceptionalism is deeply rooted in culture and often passed through generations.

The idea for this body of work came about during the first year of the Covid-19 pandemic “when her shame about being an American was at an all-time high. A cartoon of an American was swirling in her head: a styleless, gun-loving, misogynistic, God-fearing racist,” a statement says. Like her earlier pieces, Turner returned to universality as she realized that these traits are not always unique to the U.S. Instead, she used that caricature as a starting point to explore this belief in superiority and to connect to “her childhood, comparing and contrasting the standards and safeguards around the raising of her two children with memories of her grandparents and parents, focusing on the past, present, and future, in the timeframe of 1950 to 2050.”

A pink paper flower with delicate petals

“Cockscomb Rose” (2023), paper mâché, Italian crepe paper, spray paint, glue, wood rods, cardboard, and soft pastel, 45 x 36.5 x 20 inches

Ephemerality is inherent in Turner’s blossoms, as she preserves the fleeting state of freshness in paper. But where earlier works featured browning petals on the outer edges, those in American Grown are central. A dark rot emanates from the inside of “Excerpt from Still Life with flowers on a marble tabletop”—this piece takes its title from a Rachel Ruysch painting—while the base of the towering “Croquembouche” is laced with decay, suggesting that there’s something insidious not on the fringe but directly at the heart.

The final tenet of the series is discovery and connection. Turner references the two-headed “Cocksome Rose,” which resembles a fasciated strawberry of the same name, and her desire to draw similarities between disparate objects. Even if viewers don’t connect the two misshapen forms, she hopes that “they will still wonder about the piece, and perhaps find something in it that [the artist] hasn’t yet seen.”

American Grown will be on view from September 9 to October 21 at Eleanor Harwood Gallery in San Francisco. Head to Instagram to glimpse Turner’s process and follow updates on her work.

Two images, on the left a dying bouquet hangs on the wall with a dangling ribbon, on the right a detail of the dead, dried flowers

“Originalism (December 15, 1791 – present)” (2023), Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, floral wire, chalk, vintage flag pole holder, and ribbons, 15 x 23 x 14 inches

Two pink flowers grow left and right with smaller greenish blooms on top

“580085” (2023), paper mâché, Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, cardboard, wood rods, and rubber balls, 33 x 32.5 x 15 inches

A white and black flower springs from the wall

“Byproduct/Burnt Offerings (Ranunculus)” (2022), paper mâché, Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, and Quik-Tube, 29 3/4 x 27 inches

A tower of pink roses with dead flowers at the bottom

“Croquembouche” (2022), Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, floral wire, chalk, chicken egg shells, hat stand, metal platter on pedestal, and epoxy adhesive, 26 1/2 x 15 inches

“Did I Win?” (2023), paper mâché, Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, steel aerialist hoop, and rope, 40 x 46 x 18 inches

A floral sculpture with pink and white petals

“The (Brown) Crown” (2023), paper mâché, Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, wood rods, wood skewers, cardboard mailing tubes, basketball hoop frame, misc. hardware bits, bungee cords, and velcro, 38 x 32 x 38.5 inches

brown petals are intermixed with pink and white

Detail of “The (Brown) Crown” (2023), paper mâché, Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, wood rods, wood skewers, cardboard mailing tubes, basketball hoop frame, misc. hardware bits, bungee cords, and velcro, 38 x 32 x 38.5 inches

Two pink flowers connected by lavender and white ribbon tied in a bow. the left flower is at full bloom and the right is decaying

“Soup to Nuts” (2023), paper mâché, Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, wood rods, cardboard, and ribbons, 36 x 46 x 17 inches

A canonical flower with pink flowers rests on a table

A work-in-progress image of “IIndurate (of a size that is remarkable)” (2023), paper mâché, Sonotube, Italian crepe paper, stain, glue, cardboard, basketball hoop, metal rods, metal bits, wood rods, and wood strips, 46 x 28.5 x 57 inches

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article In ‘American Grown,’ Tiffanie Turner Roots Out Personal Memories and U.S. Exceptionalism appeared first on Colossal.

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Graham Franciose’s Otherworldly Watercolors Revel in Misty Forests and the Symbiosis of Nature

A painting of a felled tree in a forest, with the interior glowing and a small figure reaching out to touch it.

“For All Your Years.” All images © Graham Franciose, courtesy of Gallery Ergo, shared with permission

In watercolor and gouache, a world of wonder unfolds in surreal paintings by Graham Franciose (previously). In his current exhibition What Is Inside the Tree Is Inside of You, It’s Inside of Me at Gallery Ergo in Seattle, the artist considers the climate of the Pacific Northwest, where he’s lived since 2017 and regularly hikes through the region’s temperate rainforests. “The life-to-death-to-life cycle has never been more apparent and obvious to me as it is illustrated by the numerous ‘nurse logs’ you will encounter on most trails up here,” Franciose says in a statement. He continues:

A (nurse log is a) fallen tree, or stump of a giant logged tree that has, in its decomposition, nurtured new life into existence. A new sapling sprouts from the remains, and eventually its roots will reach the ground, and it will continue to grow up and around the deteriorating lump of organic matter that helped bring it into existence.

Franciose’s fascination with the circle of growth, decay, and regrowth led to a series of works that focus on the inherent symbiosis between humans and the rest of the natural world. Figures sit on enormous logs, sprout botanicals from their bodies, and reach out to commune with glowing annual growth rings in enigmatic, metaphysical narratives. He says, “The pieces in the collection of work are not really essays about this subject but more visual poems, with the underlying thread rooted in the connection we have with plants and animals and the natural world as a whole.”

More pieces from What Is Inside the Tree Is Inside of You, It’s Inside of Me can be viewed on the gallery’s website, and you can discover more work by Franciose on Instagram.

A painting of a figure floating above a tree stump with a plant growing out of their chest.

“A Dream of a New”

A painting of a bird with a flower coming out of its beak.

“Humble Seed to Last Leaf”

Two paintings of abstracted figures with cacti instead of heads, and animals on their laps.

Left: “Bloom Together.” Right: “I Will Hold Space for Your Tender Heart to Bloom”

A painting of a female figure carrying a flag and riding on the back of a wolf silhouetted in stars.

“The Arrival of the Sun”

A framed painting of a male figure with a misty forest on his head.

“What Could Be”

A painting of a small figure sitting on a large log with a glowing center.

“What Was and What Will Be”

A framed painting of a figure wearing a brimmed hat, with a flower growing out of their chest and a bird perched on the hat.

“Something Unexpected Emerged”

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article Graham Franciose’s Otherworldly Watercolors Revel in Misty Forests and the Symbiosis of Nature appeared first on Colossal.

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Tuesday, September 5, 2023

Bird Photographer of the Year 2023 Highlights Avian Attitudes and Winged Wonders Around the World

A Glistening-green Tanager framed in a big leaf.

Nicolas Reusens, “Glistening Green,” Glistening-green Tanager (Chlorochrysa phoenicotis), Mashpi Amagusa Reserve, Ecuador. Gold Award Winner: Best Portrait. All images © the photographers and Bird Photographer of the Year 2023

The judges of the 2023 Bird Photographer of the Year competition (previously) sifted through more than 20,000 images submitted from photographers around the globe. With lenses trained on a variety of avians and their habitats, the makers of this year’s winning images highlight diverse behavior, sizes, colors, and environments, from enigmatic and elusive species to familiar backyard friends.

Jack Zhi’s grand prize-winning image catches the dramatic moment that a Peregrine Falcon attacks a Brown Pelican in mid-flight. “I love the eyes of the pelican in this image: surprised and scared,” Zhi says. “The action was fast and over in the blink of an eye.” Other category winners include striking portraits and rare observations, like Nicolas Reusens’ Glistening-green Tanager framed in a tropical leaf, Rafael Armada’s capture of a tiny Sword-billed Hummingbird, or Henley Spiers’ underwater sighting of a Blue-footed Booby with a freshly-caught meal.

The 2024 contest is now open for entries on the organization’s website, where you can also browse a gallery of this year’s winning photos. Follow BPOTY on Instagram for more updates.

Qiuqing Mu, “A Mother’s Love,” Great Grey Owl (Strix nebulosa), Zhejiang, China. Bronze Award Winner: Bird Behavior

Rafael Armada, “Flying Sword,” Sword-billed Hummingbird (Ensifera ensifera), Bogotá, Colombia. Gold Award Winner: Birds in Flight

A black-and-white image of dead trees in water with a large bird at the base of the one of the trees.

Cheng Kang, “Morning Serenity,” Australasian Darter (Anhinga novaehollandiae), Northern Country, Victoria, Australia. Bronze Award Winner: Black-and-white

A Brambling perched on the stem of a dead sunflower in winter.

Mateusz Piesiak, “Sunflower Paradise,” Brambling (Fringilla montifringilla), Lower Silesia, Poland. Gold Award Winner: Birds in the Environment

A vertical view downward of six flying flamingos over a green expanse.

Paul Mckenzie, “Green Planet Flamingos,” Lesser Flamingo (Phoeniconaias minor), Lake Bogoria, Kenya. Silver Award Winner: Birds in Flight

Antonio Aguti, “No Way Out,” Purple Heron (Ardea purpurea), Lake Chiusi, Italy. Gold Award Winner: Comedy Bird Photo

A Great Grey Owl perched on a headstone.

Arto Leppänen, “A Moment of Prayer,” Great Grey Owl (Strix nebulosa), Helsinki, Finland. Gold Award Winner: Urban Birds

A Peregrine Falcon attacking the head of a Brown Pelican in flight.

Jack Zhi, “Grab the Bull by the Horns.” Peregrine Falcon (Falco peregrinus) and Brown Pelican (Pelecanus occidentalis), Southern California, United States. Gold Award Winner: Bird Behavior

A Blue-footed Booby underwater with a fish in its bill.

Henley Spiers, “Blue-Footed Fishing Dive,” Blue-footed Booby (Sula nebouxii), Los Islotes, Baja California Sur, Mexico. Silver Award Winner: Bird Behavior

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article Bird Photographer of the Year 2023 Highlights Avian Attitudes and Winged Wonders Around the World appeared first on Colossal.

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We’re Giving Away an Art-Filled Weekend in Chicago

a trippy gif of blue, yellow, pink, and green squiggles

Image for Colossal by Dave Whyte

Dear Colossal readers,

We’re interrupting your regularly scheduled stream of art and visual culture to say thank you. Colossal turned 13 last month, and as we pass this milestone, we’re reflecting on how independent arts publishing has changed over the years. What began as a personal blog in 2010 has grown into a healthy arts publication covering creativity and natural beauty from every reach of the planet with several contributing writers and millions of monthly readers.

In the first half of 2023, we published more than 400 articles, held six conversations with world-renowned artists like Amy Sherald and Christoph Niemann, hosted five workshops with creatives from around the globe, and curated an exhibition at the Design Museum of Chicago. We’re so grateful to do the work we do, and none of it would be possible without your support, particularly that of Colossal Members who are the lifeblood of this publication. So thank you. Thank you for reading, for learning with us, and for reminding us each day that art is essential.

To celebrate, we’re giving away a fun, art-filled weekend in Chicago! Become a Colossal Member before Friday, September 15, and you’ll automatically be entered to win the following:

A two-night stay at 21c Museum Hotel
A $500 travel voucher
Tickets for two to the Museum of Contemporary Art and the Art Institute of Chicago
A tour of Colossal’s exhibition At the Precipice at the Design Museum of Chicago
A signed limited-edition print from Chicago-based artist Liz Flores

All new Colossal Members will also receive a one-time discount for BLICK Art Materials and all of the popular perks like an ad-free reading experience, access to our Workshop Library, and an exclusive monthly newsletter with news, early registration, and plenty of giveaways.

No matter your level of support, we’re so glad you’re out there reading.

—Christopher, Grace, Kate, and Jackie

Become a Colossal Member.

a bean-shaped public art sculpture in chicago

NO PURCHASE OR CONTRIBUTION NECESSARY. Open to residents of the U.S. who are 18 years of age or older. Void where prohibited. Sweepstakes expires 9/15/2023. See Official Rules.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $5 per month. The article We’re Giving Away an Art-Filled Weekend in Chicago appeared first on Colossal.

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