Greetings Art Lovers,

We’re all family here. Whether you peruse UGallery or prefer browsing Paperwork, the artists on both sites make one awesomely creative unit. Mario Sughi, or Nerosunero, is a Paperwork patriarch. His newest addition, “Family of Immigrants,” is a tribute to the UGallery and Paperwork community.

In “Family of Immigrants,” Mario hits home with his Kundera-like satire and pop flairs indicative of David Hockney. The three members of this family stand together with pride. They are confident in their identity despite the mish-mash of cultural symbols surrounding them (local food, a newspaper, a samovar, a flag, and a church belfry in the city’s skyline).

For Mario, this piece is more than a social commentary. “Family of Immigrants” makes a visual impact with its “space, the sequence of colors and a sense of quietness all around and a sense of elegance.”

Rekindle your own family history with an insider’s look at ours!

Artfully yours,

Kurt

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So much can happen in one week. Before the weekend comes, let’s take a moment to review news from the art world.

-Did you know Amy Winehouse could do more than sing? She could paint! Kinda. Her collaboration with Pete Doherty fetched $54K on the art market. It had her blood on it. {The NY Times, ArtBeats Blog}

-Banksy strikes again. A brand spanking new piece of graffiti turned up this past weekend in London. Speculators believe it’s a dig at the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. The mural depicts an Asian boy hunched over a sewing machine. {The Telegraph}

-For all the Bay Area people, if you haven’t planned which San Francisco art fair to attend you can take a look at our Art Fair Invasion and decide. Options include: ArtPadSf, San Francsico Fine Art Fair, artMRKT

-Today is International Museum Day! Celebrate this weekend by going on a date to your favorite museum.

-The Huffington Post reports that today is “allegedly” Ai Weiwei’s 55th birthday. Happy Birthday Ai Wei Wei. {The HuffPost}

As part of our weekly wrap-up, why not highlight all the hardworking citizen art lovers? On a daily basis, we come across some amazing content on Pinterest and Instagram. It’s so cool seeing what piques an individual’s design eye. We have selected our favorite pinner and favorite Instagram shot of the week!

Mindy Albert has a smorgasbord of boards that will tickle anyone’s fancy. This quote caught my eye. “I never get tired of the blue sky,” by Vincent Van Gogh. Awesome. It’s so true, too. Looks like she found it on an equally artful tumblr site, Hey, Oscar Wilde! Keep an eye on Mindy Albert. She was born to pin!

As for this week’s Instagram shot, it was too easy. Here is a shot of the Phoenix Hotel and the Federal building behind it from lostinthe415. The shot has such a great composition and we couldn’t resist the subject matter. The Phoenix Hotel is the location for ArtPadSF. We will be instagramming like crazy there tonight. It is only fair to give a shout out to lostinthe415.

Hope you all have an artful weekend! I wouldn’t recommend painting with blood or marking public property, but I highly encourage you to pin and instagram!

Every Thursday, we welcome a batch of new artists and artwork to UGallery. This series of blog posts highlights each week’s new artists. The four this week run the gamut from scary guns to pretty landscapes.  

Our new artists are Ignacia Biskupovic, Janet Dyer, Rob Hooper, and Marshall Jones. Read on below to learn more about each of them. Leave them a nice comment on their profile pages to welcome them to UGallery!

Ignacia Biskupovic. Santiago, Chile

Ignacia is a photographer and a flaneur. According to Charles Baudelaire and Walter Benjamin, a flaneur is a wanderer who travels in a contemplative and reflexive state. Her photographs document a journey from start to finish. No matter where her travels take her, Ignacia is determined to capture spontaneous moments to embolden the traveler inside each and every one of us.

Janet Dyer. Suffern, New York

Janet Dyer’s paintings grow from the post-impressionist traditions of Paul Cezanne. Her bucolic renderings border the slightly abstract and the intensely real. The ease with which she plays with horizon lines is indicative of a truly great landscape painter. In her paintings, the foreground and background playful add power to each other for an overall breathtaking composition. 

Rob Hooper. Ferndale, Washington

Rob Hooper’s paintings have been described as an intense kaleidoscope of color and emotion. A sense of urgency emanates from the canvas and his perfected layering of color. Perhaps this energy is founded in Rob’s necessity to paint. Rob says, “I have an emotional need to paint and express myself. It calms me and exhilarates me at the same time.”

Marshall Jones. Guttenberg, New Jersey

For Marshall Jones, women wielding guns is far from a cop out. He takes inspiration straight from the streets for raw portraits of urban females. Each painting is a clean depiction of the ruggedness of modern American life. The feminine figures juxtaposed with iconic street symbolism makes for a powerful dichotomy. Whether or not his subject is wielding an AK-47, Marshall’s paintings mean business. 

There’s something strange in the air. Whether or not you believe in UFO’s, there is no denying that at SFO (and throughout the city) something alien is going on. San Francisco is launching an art invasion. In the next week, the free and loose spirit of SF artists will collide with an international round up of galleries and artists. San Francisco nods to NYC’s art scene with not one, not two, but THREE art fairs in the same weekend. Read about each fair below, pick your favorites, and get your SF art on.

San Francisco Fine Art Fair, May 17-20, 2012, Festival Pavilion, Fort Mason Center

The third time is a charm. This is year three for The San Francisco Fine Art Fair. This fair claims to return art credibility to San Francisco. The fair will cull its contemporary art from around the world. With 70 plus galleries, this fair promises to offer art for a wide range of tastes. The SF Fine Art Fair is located on the pier, which guarantees a picturesque experience no matter what is being displayed.

If you go, check out:

ArtHaus. The passionate pair of James Bacchi and Annette Schutz are seasoned gallerists who try to emphasize the intimate connection art can create with a diverse selection of contemporary art.

artMRKT, May 17-20, 2012, Concourse Exhibition Center

The art world can be a competitive place. As written in ArtBlouin Info, artMRKT is the result of an old partner of SF Fine Art competing to claim space in the SF art realm. Max Fishko wants to do a fair himself and do it right. Fishko told ArtBlouin, “I’d rather we be known as a company that can successfully create new brands.”

If you go, check out:

Peter Black Gallery has got it all. Since 1993, PBG has provided Orange County with the best modern abstractions in the area. Just when you thought OC wasn’t hip enough, you find a sleek and sophisticated gallery like this one. 

ArtPadSF, May 17-20, 2012, Phoenix Hotel

If you want cool, ArtPadSF is the fair for you. Let’s start with its location. ArtPadSF is in the hot bed of emerging artists. Nestled in the Phoenix Hotel of the Tenderloin, ArtPadSF plans to be the most provocative option in this week’s fair war.

If you go, check out:

Unspeakable Projects. In Room 40 of the Phoenix Hotel you can see some cutting-edge art. Unspeakable Projects is the epitome of ArtPadSF – contemporary, emerging, and cool.

Samantha and I will be attending ArtPadSF and ArtMRKT. We will be taking note of the art that piques our interest. You can stay in loop by following us on instagram and twitter. Let us know when you’ll be attending and we can peruse together! Stay tuned for the Fair wrap-up coming next week.

Greetings Art Lovers,

Do you find yourself edging past the doughnut display when getting a morning cuppa joe? Justin Wheeler makes the sweet, decadent smell of chocolate glaze and sugary sprinkles attainable (and guilt-free) with his doughnut series.

Justin’s experience as a commercial food photographer and his passion for all things edible give him the artistic substance needed for tangible and glamorous food shots. 

He succeeds in his goal to “show the most stereotypical ‘naughty,’ no frills, down and dirty doughnuts in all their sinful glory.” There are no sugar substitutes in Justin Wheeler’s photographs. He says, “I start with the best possible looking food for the shoot, take my time styling it, and use ‘stand in’s’ for lighting and composition purposes.”

Pair Chocolate and Sprinkles with Justin’s earlier coffee series for a breakfast of champions…and artists!

Tastefully yours,

Kurt

Want the inside scoop? Sign up for our Paperwork newsletter to receive our Paperwork collector’s message via email. Just add your email address to the nifty little the envelope icon on the right side of our Paperwork header to get involved.

Remember our post about abstract art? Stacy Raine proves that abstract art can be fun and playful if you let it.

Stacy can find inspiration from a number of sources. A simple song as well as an intense emotion can drive her to paint. While she juggles working for The Nature Conservancy, she uses art at as means of creative expression. Below, she explains the joys of abstract art. 

What is your earliest art memory?

Well, I’m not sure I thought of it as art at the time, but when I was very small, three or four perhaps, I was put in my room for a time out. In retaliation, I took some crayons out of my box and proceeded to lavishly draw what I now refer to as a mural of a thousand-legged spider. Needless to say, my parents were not proud of my work.

I’d love to see The Mural of a Thosuand-legged Spider. Anger seemed to be the driving force behind that piece. What feelings are the easiest to express?

It’s more about feeling the need to express my emotions through art.  Sadness seems to be one emotion that really needs to be put somewhere. One of my favorite pieces came out of my husband’s last deployment.  Of course, I paint when I’m happy too. I don’t know that anyone but me could really tell the difference.  I just hope that each painting speaks to the viewer in a way that works for them.

If your paintings could speak, what one word would they use to describe themselves?

Unrestrained.

What is your favorite piece on your UGallery portfolio? Why?

They go in and out of my favor!  I still love Set the Fire (I named it after the song that helped bring it to mind. The lyrics are in there). But if I had to choose, probably one of my new ones  – Playing in the Stars or Dandelions at Dawn. I’m enjoying their playfulness.  

Any anecdotes you’d like to share? Anything I should have asked?

I think that creating art isn’t the hardest part. What’s tough is allowing yourself to put it out there for the world. However, doing just that is slowly making me a braver person. It’s a difficult thing to put your creativity out there, to give something and ask for others to judge your work, which is usually so personal. I always have to remind myself that I paint because it makes me happy.  Hopefully my art makes others happy too!

What advice would you give to emerging artists?

I am an emerging artist! But I think that perseverance and a support system are crucial. You need people to look at your art, to discuss your art, to remind you of why you are making art.

I see you like Lady Gaga. For fun, which Lady Gaga song has the most potential to spark a new piece of art within you?

Well, Untitled No. 5 was actually one that came to my mind in some similar form when I was (loudly) listening to music on a run and You and I came on my playlist. Her music is so fun and makes me euphoric, especially when I exercise to it!

Stacy, thanks so much for sharing a little bit about yourself and your art. You have a safe support system here! We can’t wait to see what you come up with next. 

Every Thursday, we welcome a batch of new artists and artwork to UGallery. This series of blog posts highlights each week’s new artists. The three this week show that abstracted art as well as black and white photographs can ignite questions about America, architecture, and the human condition. 

Our new artists are Jennifer Goodwin, Thomas Rizzo, and G Matthew Saad. Read on below to learn more about each of them. Leave them a nice comment on their profile pages to welcome them to UGallery!

Jennifer Goodwin. West Vancouver, Canada

Jennifer Goodwin’s composites prove that art, like travel, can expand horizons. Thanks to a restless spirit, Jennifer discovers diverse material with a camera in hand. Her art starts with photography but quickly morphs into photomontage. Jennifer juxtaposes cut and cropped images into pairings that feel right. By following her instincts, she is able to make multilayered masterpieces. According to Jennifer, “the process of art is like the process of life.” 

Thomas Rizzo. Las Vegas, Nevada

This Italian Cowboy knows his color. Thomas Rizzo attributes his eye for color to childhood days spent on a wheat and cattle farm in eastern Colorado. His art evolves from the geometric into the abstract. He starts with photos of landscapes to create surreal scenes. For a wild Fauvism effect, Rizzo uses dark lines and bold colors to define shapes without sacrificing the overall composition. Thomas adds vibrancy and shape to the American artist landscape. 

G Matthew Saad. Altadena, California

G Matthew Saad finds a balance between pure artistry and austere professionalism. His photographs explore the symmetrical, yet disordered, realm of architecture. With a knack for finding moments of jubilee in an urban environment, G Matthew Saad imbues cold places with liveliness. He manages to snap empty spaces with enough zeal that the viewer can’t help but assume the park bench or office lobby in his photographs will soon be filled.