Well maybe I'm a mini-artist...except I'm tall.

"Recently there has been much written about minimal art, but I have not discovered anyone who admits to doing this kind of thing. There are other art forms around called primary structures, reductive, rejective, cool, and mini-art. No artist I know will own up to any of these either. Therefore I conclude that it is part of a secret language that art critics use when communicating with each other through the medium of art magazines. Mini-art is best because it reminds one of miniskirts and long-legged girls. It must refer to very small works of art. This is a very good idea. Perhaps “mini-art” shows could be sent around the country in matchboxes. Or maybe the mini-artist is a very small person, say under five feet tall."

 Sol Lewitt, "Paragraphs on Conceptual Art"

Tiny, tiny, dirty pictures

Hello my wonderful friends!  So I finally got around to photographing the miniatures that I started working on up at ChaNorth (which I'm actually returning to on Wednesday...it's a long story, I'll explain later).  So here's what you've all be waiting for!

Tiny mementos! Painted with very tiny paintbrushes on very tiny pieces of ivory!

 

This image is a little bit bigger than a quarter (32 mm)

(43 mm x 30 mm)

(75 mm x 50 mm)

(65 mm round)

(75 mm x 50 mm)

(95 mm x 65 mm)

All of them are watercolor on ivory (except the last one which you've already seen, which is watercolor on ivorine).  Stay posted for many, many more cellphone captured whispers of sweet nothings loving rendered and preserved for all time.  Because I promise, there are many, many more to come...

Open Studios in the countryside

So it turned out that the play write that was supposed to replace me at ChaNorth had to postpone his visit, so I got to stay a little longer out here with the chickens.  But just in case any one happens to be driving through Dutchess County on their way to Columbia County (or something like that) the residency is having an Open Studios this Saturday the 30th.

I somehow forgot my camera this trip, but I have to head home for the evening tomorrow, so I promise I'll take some pictures then and show everyone the tiny, tiny paintings of dirty, dirty people I've been working on.  They're coming along quite well, if I do say so myself.  And as a surprise for everyone that just happens to be passing through, you'll get to see them before everyone else since they'll be hanging somewhere where hopefully people will notice them...they are awfully tiny...

It's hot in the countryside

It's been a crazy month.

July 4th in Maryland, eating as many crabs as I could with the family, then whisked off to a fabulous wedding cum mini-RISD reunion in Sonoma, to finally end up in Dutchess County, New York at a residency in the middle of nowhere.

It's been a crazy good month.

It's great up here, hotter than balls, but from what I hear it's hotter than balls everywhere in the Northeast, and I have the freshest organic produce (that we helped grow and harvest) to eat, chickens to pet (when I do venture outside) and a lake nearby to cool off in (while working on my suntan). Oh, and art to make.  I'm off at  chaNorth, a great little residency that normally last a month, but I'm here for only 2 weeks.

Here's an image of my hectic little studio space, and when I'm not melting I'll post a few pictures of what I'm working on...it's just too hot to do that right now...

Tradition at it's finest

So I've started this new project of miniature portrait paintings on ivory.  And I am so excited about it.  I mean, really excited about it.

Let me preface this a little bit.  About a month ago, when I came up with the idea I turned to my plethora of wonderful, exhibitionist friends and sent them this email:


My dear, dear friends...

It's not often that I make such requests of you, and no, this time I'm not asking you to go out there and steal paint chips, but I need your help with a project...

I've decided that I want to do a series of traditional miniature ivory paintings.  A little historical background: Portrait miniatures began to flourish in 16th century Europe and the art was practiced during the 17th century and 18th century. They were especially valuable in introducing people to each other over distances; a nobleman proposing the marriage of his daughter might send a courier with her portrait to visit potential suitors. Soldiers and sailors might carry miniatures of their loved ones while traveling, or a wife might keep one of her husband while he was away.

So how do we make this contemporary and where do all my wonderful friends come in, you say? Well, I've been thinking that we have a version of this: dirty cell phone pictures.  You send a picture to a lover when they're away, or introduce yourself to a new lover, and they can carry it with them in their pocket and take it out to look at whenever they miss you.  Yes. I want you to send me your cellphone dirty pictures so I can immortalize them in delicate watercolor on thin sheets of ivory (or real calf skin vellum since it's cheaper- I'm getting some samples to test out).  They don't even have to be of you! Better yet, send me pictures that other people have sent you as little mementos to remember then when they can't be near.

No names necessary, feel free to take some new picts of yourself to have on hand in your phone to send out at the spur of the moment, send me some picts of you and your partner, picts of your partner, picts of whatever it is people send each other to illicit warm, happy thoughts (down there). And I know and as always appreciate that some of you over the years have already sent me dirty pictures just to make me smile in the morning, which they always do.

You know you wanna do it...it'll be like we're all high school kids sexting things that are parents would NOT approve of!

Thanks!

Katie 

And the pictures started coming in.  Oh my Lord, did the pictures start coming in.  They're great.  But I just wanted to share with you the first one (that looks good, there was one finished before this one, but I'm not happy with it).  

So for your viewing pleasure, here it is! Miniature #1, it measures 3" x 2.5" and is watercolor on ivory.  

OK, back to the studio to get working on the next one!

Woohoo!

Because I'm so prim and proper, and would never gloat...never...I'm just putting this on here because it's such an interesting read.

http://magazine.saatchionline.com/magazine-articles/artnews/behind-the-canvas-saatchi-online-interview-with-katie-commodore

Or I'm so excited about it I want to shout from the rooftops! Look! Saatchi Magazine interviewed me! Woohoo! AW-E-SOME!!!!

OK, I'll stop now. I'm sorry I've been so quiet since I got back to Brooklyn. It's been crazy busy. I never got around to telling you about 4 operas, crazy random encounters with boys from Prague, learning how to paint traditional ivory miniatures, the excitement of creating a real mailing list, and Lord knows what else.

But, don't worry, I won't let the interview go to my head...much.

Back to Brooklyn

I may have completely forgot to mention that I left London and am back in cloudy, chilly Brooklyn.  And although it makes me long for the days of lounging in the sunny London morning on Kelly's terrace with a cup of coffee and a dog or three curled up on my lap, truth be told, it's nice to be home and able to wear something other than the weeks worth of clothes I packed.

But just for nostalgia's sake...here's the view from the terrace.  I'll see you soon, Shoreditch.