I have just finised a 4-week artist residency at the Vermont Studio Center in Johnson, Vermont. I am very grateful to the Dedalus Foundation for providing my full fellowship and the George Sugarman Foundation for providing me a grant for the purchase of paint and enrichment of my artist career over the next year. One of the best gifts that can be given is the gift of time and by doing a residency, artists are given a studio, living space, and 3 meals a day so they do not have to be distracted from anything but their work. Over 50 artists — visual artists and writers — a month are at the Vermont Sudio Center.
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Technorati Tags: artist residency, Vermont Studio Center, Dedalus Foundation, George Sugarman Foundation

Last weekend, as I was changing 2 ½-year-old William’s diaper (when do they become potty trained?), he said “I want to go to Chicago.” He was visiting from Oak Park and that didn’t make any sense to me, and I said, “You are in Chicago.” He looked at me puzzled, seemingly contemplating what I said, but neither one of us, at least at that moment, understood the other. I began to get it though when later the same day my daughter and her husband came to pick him up early to take him back to Oak Park. The weather people had forecasted icy roads, and our day with William ended before we could fulfill my promise to visit the Notebaert Nature Museum. And William was angry with me — as he left our condo strapped into the car seat, he turned his head away from me, refusing to look at the person who promised “Chicago,” and then took it away.
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Technorati Tags: Chicago

Chicago painter Brenda Barnum was born in 1955 in Hartford, Wisconsin. During the 70s, she was employed as a layout artist in the advertising department at Boston Store in Milwaukee. She attended The Minneapolis College of Art and Design from 1978 to 1980. In 1980 she transferred to the San Francisco Art Institute and lived in San Francisco until 1984. In 1984 she relocated to downtown Chicago.

Exhibiting nationally and internationally since the early 80s, she is represented by Thomas Masters Gallery in Chicago; Butters Gallery in Portland, OR; and Walter Bischoff Gallery, Stuttgart, Germany. She lives in Rogers Park with her partner, Steve Press, their dog, Elote, and Bob the parrot.

Brenda Barnum Demonstrating Her Painting Technique

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Technorati Tags: Chicago painter

Dale Washington has turned his cozy apartment into a self-made gallery with his paintings, drawings, ink work, assemblages, and new art hanging on nearly every square inch of wall space. His work deals with everyday people and situations from nudes to landscapes, from jazz clubs to fish fries, and everything else in between depicting the urban Chicago lifestyle. A self-professed “obsessive-compulsive,” Washington creates when he is driven to do so and is talented enough to work “in all media” or uses “whatever is available at the time.” Featured in Daniel T. Parker’s book African Art: The Diaspora and Beyond, Washington has exhibited at Gruen Gallery, Steele Life Gallery, South Shore Culture Center, Southside Community Art Center, Beverly Art Center, Hyde Park Art Center, and other galleries in Chicago and throughout the U.S.

Landscape. Oil pastel on panel board. Courtesy of the artist.

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Technorati Tags: Chicago lifestyle

Bob Krawczyk, an architecture professor at Illinois Institute of Technology, specializes in new media art with a focus on algorithmic art to generate 2D and 3D art. Instead of brushes, paint, and canvas, he uses custom-designed software and his computer monitor and printer to create his art, and occasionally a laser-cutting machine and a fabrication shop to generate his 3D models. His BitArt website discusses the intricate models that he uses to generate his Escher-like geometric art. Krawczyk’s related projects can be found here.

Polar Flowers. Courtesy of the artist.

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Technorati Tags: new media art, algorithmic art, 3D models