Artists Talk With LVA: February 3, 2022

Margaret Archambeault & Carter Brown join us to discuss their work on exhibit at Tim Faulkner Gallery. Tune in to WXOX 97.1 FM/Artxfm.com each Thursday at 10 am to hear Keith Waits talk with artists.

Margaret Archambault is an abstract painter and the Gallery Director at Tim Faulkner Gallery in Louisville. She describes her work as three distinct approaches: Direct Experience: or what I call “Depictive Abstraction” Straight Expressionism, and Historical Collage Paintings. She has exhibited widely in Louisville and the surrounding area and in 2021 exhibited as a part of Purely Primary, Van Der Plas Gallery, New York, NY.

Carter Brown is a Louisville-born abstract expressionist artist working various mediums trying to “invite as many people in as possible His work is positive and full of whimsy. He has a studio space on East Market Street.

The February exhibit at Tim Faulkner Gallery will feature new paintings from:
Carter Brown
Grant Goodwine
Joshua Bleecker
Mark Zanni
Margaret Archambault

This show will run through February 28th.

Artebella On The Radio: January 16, 2020

Brennen Cabrera's exhibit "Colors of Humanity" opens at Tim Faulkner Gallery on January 19 and Diana Grisanti's play "Lawbreakers: A Fast & Furious History of Women's Suffrage" opens at Stage One February 1. Both came in the Artxfm studios with Keith this week. Tune in to WXOX 97.1 FM, or stream on Artxfm.com each Thursday at 10am to hear Keith Waits talk with artists.

Artist Brennan Cabrera, will have work on exhibit for this weekend ONLY. Colors of Humanity is a one-person show at Tim Faulkner Gallery. 991 Logan Street. This is a limited opportunity exhibit and will hang from January 19th through January 22nd.

As Brennen describes, his intentions as an artist are to create "Depictions of the human condition... primarily in the fields of psychological health, emotionality and sexuality. I am deeply impacted by my own experiences and my compassion, desire, need, and understanding of the lives, stories, and acts of other people."

Playwright Diana Grisanti was a Playwright in Residence at Theatre [502] in Louisville, Kentucky but she is NOW, along with her husband, Steve Moulds, C-=Artistic Director of that group. She is an Affiliated Writer at the Playwrights’ Center in Minneapolis. Her plays include The Patron Saint of Losing Sleep (Actor’s Theatre of Charlotte), River City (NNPN Rolling World Premiere), Abilene, Semantics, and Mandatory (Weber State University). She was a contributing writer on the bluegrass-inspired anthology That High Lonesome Sound (Humana Festival at Actors Theatre of Louisville) and her new play, Lawbreakers: A Fast and Furious History of Women's Suffrage opens at Stage One Family Theatre February 1 and 8 at 2:00 pm. At the KY Center – Bomhard Theatre.  For more information: Stageone.org

Vignette: Laurie White

“I find the practice of comic writing and drawing to be much more rigorous and to stretch my imagination further than my fine art pursuits.” - Laurie White

“The Biscuits” by Laurie White, Digital illustration, 12x16in, 2018

The line between “fine art” and “illustration” might be a slim divide when one focuses on technique, but there is often a qualitative distinction in which high-minded aesthetes choose to look down on the latter for its reliance on commerce-driven creation. Laurie White frequently confronted such attitudes in studio classes.

“In my undergraduate program, as a student seeking degrees in both painting and graphic design, I felt like a misfit. My painting classes sought a fine arts focus and my pieces were often critiqued as being too narrative and literal. I also struggled with the mastery of simple shapes necessary to communicate in my design program. After graduation, I realized that my true path was to explore and further my talents and propensities through illustration, comics, and political cartoons. Here is where my knack for narrative and my interest in design could harmonize.”

Artists as celebrated as N.C. Wyeth, Winslow Homer, and Andy Warhol occupy museum walls but were labeled illustrator earlier in their careers. The art of visual communication in advertising has grown more and more sophisticated moving into the 21st century, and there is a long tradition of book illustration that is well represented today in the variety of graphic novel concepts being published, so White’s ambitions lead her into a heady, competitive world.

“Part of my love of illustration rests in its intimate personal consumption and accessibility in print, book, or digital image forms,” she explains. “Specifically, I've found that comic work is much more evocative and emotive of a moment in time or relationship, than the mystique of a work created in the parameters of ‘fine arts’.”

“Benedict” by Laurie White, Digital Painting, 10x15in, 2016

“Displaying work in a gallery often made me feell out of sync with the public outside of the critical arts world. As someone with the pedigree to be considered an insider (both of White’s parents are artists), yet still feeling like an outsider, the type of post-undergraduate work that I produced made me want to bridge this alienating gap between gallery walls and the average art appreciator and consumer. My foray into illustrative work has been reaffirmed with individuals approaching me for a variety of personal commissions and freelance work ranging from tattoo design to pet memorial portraits to character style sheets.”

White recently participated in the Samhain exhibit at Tim Faulkner Gallery in October of 2019, but her more personal work still utilizes that communications design sensibility: “I produced a grid of almost sixty symbols that served as a self-portrait, representing both literal and metaphorical objects that commemorated memories, relationships, and lessons in my life (this work is featured next to me in my artist portrait). By returning all of this literal and specific imagery to the gallery walls, this piece represented the perfect marriage of my past artistic insecurities and showed my unabashed emotional and creative growth since my college graduation.“ 

Hometown: Louisville, Kentucky
Education: BFA in Painting and a BA in Graphic Design at WKU in 2014; also a graduate of WKU's Honors College.
Website: www.lauriemwhite.com
Instagram: laurie_m_white

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“Ruckus” by Laurie White, Mixed media, 14x19in, 2019

“Cat coloring book” by Laurie White, Digital drawing, 12x9in, 2018

“The Golden Compass” by Laurie White, Digital illustration, 10x15in, 2017

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Written by Keith Waits. Entire contents copyright © 2019 Louisville Visual Art. All rights reserved. In addition to his work at the LVA, Keith is also the Managing Editor of a website, Arts-Louisville.com, which covers local visual arts, theatre, and music in Louisville.

Vignette: Waller Austin

"Waller Austin works with childhood's preeminent medium, the crayon, but the uses to which he puts this pigment are anything but childlike. Waller melts, mixes, pours and burnishes his paintings. His aptitude for representational techniques is expansive, as is his gift for mimicry, so the devices of schoolbook illustration are often uncannily attached to compositions and subjects referencing contemporary art; Pop Parody, if you will." – Buzz Spector

"Prosaic (dis) appearance" by Waller Austin, crayon, gesso, linen, poplar, mylar, stainless steel, 48,648 paper wrappers, 2016-17 (contact for pricing)

Interdisciplinary is, arguably, the most crucial term on contemporary visual art, although even that claim underscores the essence of the word, as it points to the persistent breakdown of definitions of cultural disciplines. Today’s art lexicon now includes the designation “creatives” in places of artist, poet, musician, etc., a further reflection of the fluidity that confronts working artists.

Waller Austin uses the phrase to delineate his own artistic identity, connecting to a strain of installation artists that dates back to the early 20th century.

"snowed in" by Waller Austin, crayon, gesso, linen, wood, 12x12in, 2017, $900

“All of my art can be summed up as post-conceptual self-portraiture, though it may be difficult for untrained eyes to recognize and/or acknowledge. With a Postmodern attitude, I address challenges of post-colonial times by actively engaging structures of mimicry and hybridity via the appropriation of common themes in contemporary art. I stress that the identity I deliver through art is to be recognized as apocryphal - simultaneously indulgent and self-abasing. Through an interrogation of originality and authenticity, I challenge the viewer to examine their own systems for consideration and interpretation of any prescribed visual language or learned norm.”

“My works incorporate processes of decision making that revolve around play and leisure with a conflation between art history, humor, and mythology. I address an open range of content stemming from an interest in identity, mimicry, and hybridity. As an artist, my goal is to muddy and force a complication of information, and to incite intuitive and inventive thinking within my audience.  Elevating the ‘riff,’ I work almost exclusively with ‘readymades’ in terms of image, esthetic, idea, and process. Exploring notions of ownership, I commandeer screenshots of intellectual property and transform defining information into new tangible objects that bare my unique signature.”

“Paint is simply pigment and binder. Artists have the privilege to choose how to further define these two elements. Over the past three years, I have dedicated much of my studio practice to utilizing Crayola crayon as a both paint and sculpture material. The resulting works occupy a place in the art historical cannons of encaustic painting and wax sculpture. They catalyze a nostalgic phenomenon for older audiences and flatten high and low art, providing understandable access to a younger audience.”

 "eleven (hybrids)" by Waller Austin, crayon, gesso, linen,poplar, 120x72in, 2016, $4600

There will be a Closing Reception for Waller Austin's current installation at The Tim Faulkner Gallery
Friday, January 26, from 6:00-7:00 pm.

Hometown: Louisville, Kentucky
Education: MFA in interdisciplinary studio arts, Washington University, St. Louis, MO; BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
Website: www.walleraustin.com
Instagram: @walleraustin

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"mouth of a gift horse" (installation detail) by Waller Austin,  mixed media. variable dimensions, 2016 (contact for pricing)

 "Superman Ice Cream Paintings" (installation detail) by Waller Austin, mixed media. variable dimensions, 2015-17, $200-$900

"lil homies" by Waller Austin, crayon, gesso, linen, wood 12x12in, 2017, $900

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Entire contents copyright © 2018 Louisville Visual Art. All rights reserved. 

Are you interested in being on Artebella? Click here to learn more.

Vignette: Whitney "Bloom" Olsen

“The optical quality of glass is my muse,” – Whitney “Bloom” Olsen.

"Rosy Retrospection" by Whitney Olsen in collaboration with Keegan Kruse, Light refraction photos, 7 - 22x22in frames, 2017, $500 each

Whitney Olsen, aka as Bloom, is a multi-dimensional artist working with glass, light, mixed media and “…multiple dimensions to indulge in the conversation of being.” If your first thought of glass art takes you to a place of vessels, Bloom’s work will upend those expectations.

“My work exists in the intersection between the corporeal and the imagination, where the fixed and infinite collide through tangible and intangible layers of energy. The optical quality of glass is my muse, translating our ephemeral understanding of the here and now through veiling multiple materials. Illusion is the gateway into my liminal world…”

"Absolute #3" by Whitney Olsen, Mixed media on wood, 58x30in, 2017, $1500

Bloom’s glass pieces are most often components in larger installation sculptures in which light is an active medium. The glass becomes a lens almost as assuredly as if we were peering through a kaleidoscope, and the work begins to shape the viewer’s perception of the environment the piece occupies.

“There is an energy that we possess that feels like butterflies fluttering inside us, it feels like we are going up to the top of a roller coaster. It’s an unsettled, scary but thrilling, anxiety that is beautiful and basic, and it’s so real because it’s your body telling you that you are alive. It’s called passion; the moment when you finally go outside of your comfort zone and you really start to listen to what you want, and you go for it. To be dangerous because it is necessary, and you are happy all the time since you are not missing out on what life has to offer because you are living the way you want to live. To be yourself; being wholly, soulfully, be-you-tifully YOU, like a flower. I want everyone to bloom.”

Since graduating from the Hite Institute at University of Louisville, Bloom has studied glass and neon at Penland School of Crafts and Pilchuck Glass School.

In 2017, Bloom exhibited as a part of Crossing Borders at the Huff Gallery at Spalding University, and had a solo show, Perennial Being at Tim Faulkner Gallery in Louisville.

Age: 25
Hometown: Crestwood, Kentucky
Education: BFA in 3-D Studios, Concentrations in Glass & Sculpture, University of Louisville, 2015
Website: www.whitneyolsen.com
Instagram: whitnaastyy

"Day Dreams" by Whitney Olsen, Blown, cold worked, slumped, etched glass, metal and light, 48x72in, 2015, $12,000

"Ethereal Study #3" by Whitney Olsen, Hand blown glass, video, dimensions vary, 2015, $8000

"TH(is) you and me and everyone else" by Whitney Olsen, Mixed media installation, dimensions vary, 2017

"Neon Bloom" by Whitney Olsen, Neon glass & painted plexi, 14x28in, 2017, $650

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Written by Keith Waits. Entire contents copyright © 2017 Louisville Visual Art. All rights reserved.

Are you interested in being on Artebella? Click here to learn more.