Swizz Beatz, The Dean Collection & Thoughts About Treating Your Business Like A Business

 My latest Instagram crush is a surprising and welcomed find --- Swizz Beatz, and his latest venture with the Dean Collection. I can't say I knew anything about him, although I'm definitely familiar with his work (DMX was a staple in my Discman growing up) but what I'm really fascinated with is his fabulous contemporary art collection. Ok, so I know Kehinde Wiley (his painting featured above, a whopping 8'5" x 25' piece!) is probably the most famous contemporary artist of the last 10 years but what I'm really excited about is SB's interest in up-and-coming artists. As much as I enjoy Andy Warhol's faces and Damien Hirst's dot paintings, it's refreshing to find someone seeking out new, sometimes little-heard-of artists, purchasing their work, and adding fuel to their hype. 

Tryptic by Maya Hayuk, part of the Dean Collection

Not to mention I think he has pretty fabulous taste.

After finding his Insta feed, I pursued the internet looking for more information about SB. I got a charge after reading this interview with him and it started a chain of thoughts about how I approach my own artwork and looking at the business side of it. 

It's been over a year since I decided to prioritize my art life and now I'm starting to feel the need to really establish it as a business, as much in my own head as anything.  Until now, I guess I was just doing it to see what could happen and now that I've figured out what I'm doing, established myself a bit, and gotten some feedback, I feel ready to take things further. I've gotten to a point where what was started as a hobby, has now become something more, I want it to be more, so I need to reframe some of my intentions towards where I want to go with all of it.

Works by Saner Edgar, part of the Dean Collection

For one thing, I need to stop underselling myself NOW. You can only short-change yourself for so long before you become thoroughly sick of it. I'm setting prices and sticking to them -- I still want to be accessible to all kinds of people so that means making art within a variety of price ranges, not adjusting prices to what you think the crowd can afford. Or feeling bad about valuing your art at a certain price point. If you don't value it, can you expect other people to? 

Another one is making sure I show up in my studio like it's a job. Frequently, my studio time can get bumped to the wayside, especially since it is at my home and I could run to the grocery real quick to get food for dinner, or I could start that load of laundry -- NO -- I need to create working hours and stick to them. It's amazing what you can come up with when you're surround by all your tools and materials, even if you don't feel all-together inspired. My biggest hurdle right now is making as much as I can. My smaller pieces (like the houses and toothbrushes) have proven to sell when I make them...so that means I need to keep making them. Like Swizz said he learned from Peter Max, art is like manufacturing your own currency.

Even this blog, it started as something that I only wanted to do as it pleased me, allowing it to be an organic expression. If my art is a business, then I need to make it a priority to share what I'm making regularly here, and my other social media outlets. This blog has become so much more for me over the past couple years. Not just a place to share but a place to process my journey, to document my learning curves, and help express myself through writing. When I first started blogging, I hated writing anything -- I felt like I sounded so dumb -- and would just post pictures. Now I have the confidence to verbalize in ways that I was too shy to do before. And the greatest thing is, when I meet people in person, I know how to verbalize to them what I'm doing because I've taken the time to do it here. Seriously.

BUT anyways, really excited to see a guy like Swizz Beats buying art instead of cars and I am interested to watch where he goes with The Dean Collection. I don't know if I have the gumption to go back to school for business like he is doing but I will do my best to put my business hat on more frequently. It's almost kinda fun sometimes, I mean not knitting fun but a girl's gotta give her hands a break sometime :)

Got any Instagram crushes you wanna share?

I had a chance to work on a fun collaboration this past month with an artist I look up to and a guy I'm grateful to call a friend. I have been admiring Oliver Hibert's art and career for years now, and, through the wonders of the internet, we developed a fast friendship that has bridged the 2,000 miles between us. Now, what started as a casual Instagram comment, has turned into my largest knit piece to date!

"Dead! Dead! Dead!" materialized as a limited edition screen-printed run for Oliver. I instantly saw its knitted potential with the amount of thick color-blocking he used. At the time, I didn't think the bottom half would be doable. How could I knit all those drips without having my own skull melt out my ears? Then I just haaad to go and be ambitious -- I didn't want to change his image so I decided to just figure out how to make it work.

Remember my first foray into Intarsia color knitting? With the "Aloof" pieces? Well, because of those projects, this piece was significantly easier, even though at my most complicated section I got up to 32 BALLS OF WORKING YARN ON MY NEEDLES, as seen in the picture above. Fortunately, a lot of the drips were small moments of color that I could start and stop relatively quickly before the yarns got completely tangled and hindered my progress. I had found in the past that placing the yarn balls in their respective tins helped with organization but really just keeping your balls small and being able to pull them through potential knots is what keeps this technique, and you project, from failing.

I also knew I would need to use acrylic yarn for this to get the brightest colors possible. I can't believe how nice (and cheap) this yarn was! I always associate acrylic yarn with the scratchy afghans my great-grandmother used to make, but yarn technology has come a long way since then. And since this piece is not intended to keep a body warm, you don't have to worry about its lack of insulation.

Here I am after I got back down to only the background color, and couldn't resist laying it out and getting a photograph. The main way I achieved the results I wanted and stayed true to Oliver's drawing was the sneaky use of duplicate stitch, a process where you go into the knitting after it's taken off the needles and "change" the color of certain stitches. Some colors worked better on top of other colors and some illusions were more successful than others. And I love how the duplicate stitch creates slight dimension in the piece that adds a whole nother level of interest for in-person viewing. Sorry, Internet, some things can only be appreciated in person!

Here is the piece in its (almost) final state. It won't be fully realized till it is stretched into a frame. That'll be way more attractive than this old piece of contour foam I have it pinned to for now.

One design element that I can't seem to learn yet is that knitting is not a perfectly square thing. If you design a piece on graph paper, and knit it exactly as you see it, your image will come out wider, giving it the appearance of being squished. That's why you see designs in books that look stretched out. I even told myself this as I was still transposing this image to a working knit pattern but didn't make any changes. I figured that since I would be stretching it into a frame then I could stretch it into its proper proportion. And I will mostly be able to do that but I kinda wish I had just made the small adjustment when I had the time. Why do we do these kinds of things to ourselves??

 I love it!! Getting to finally step back from this project has been so enjoyable, I can't wait for Oliver to finally see it in person. Alas, our lives don't have many opportunities to cross paths but mailing art is a lot cheaper than a plane ticket. Who knows, I feel like 2014 will have lots of exciting things in store for both of us.

On a final note, I wanted to say that Oliver and I met through us reaching out to each other via e-mail, phone, and social media. If I can offer any nuggets to chew on, I want you to not be afraid to reach out to someone you found on the Internet that you admire. Express your enthusiasm, ask questions, or just say hey! You never know what kind of response you'll get back but I find that those who look like huge successes are also just people, making it through their day-to-day. And you can create a fabulous website but it doesn't mean you have any idea who is actually looking at it. Many have warned about the isolation that can come from the computer, but I also see the potential to connect to people with similar interests that you would otherwise never get a chance to meet. Hey, you might even find a new friend :)

Nasher knocked it out of the park on this one!

So glad I caught this exhibit, featuring 15 years of work by African-born, Brooklyn-based artist Wangechi Mutu.

A search for female identity through collage, paint, video art, and installation. When you first walk in, you become aware of the sounds in the room. Nature, singing, roars, and waves, coming from various videos playing throughout the space; it really created a unique atmosphere for looking at her work.

I became completely obsessed with the way she incorporated this felted, recycled, almost-industrial fiber with her art, using it to cover entire walls. In one way, an art show is simply hanging art on walls, in Mutu's way, she thought beyond the typical, creating atmosphere and texture by using this textile. I was so inspired and you KNOW I love a good textile. What can I say, it perfectly complimented her work.

We all agreed this video was amazing. I mean, c'mon, she projected from the ceiling onto wood pallets that were sitting on more fiber. A great way to take this piece to another level, finding a new way for the viewer to watch it. Her press-on 'talons' ripping into a 3-layer cake, a very literal address towards overconsumption; she was absolutely engaging and entertaining. When, as she eats the cake, hair starts to get stuck in her mouth, I found myself giggling out loud. She made me rethink my blasé approach to video art.

Beatiful, huge collage on Mylar paper gave a unique dimension to her work and an interesting texture to her paint.

Love that repeat pattern!

Mutu definitely allows in a certain amount of gore, but her femininity shines through in bright red glitter and high heels!

How gorgeous is this? Her recycled fiber grows down to the floor with the help of packaging tape. 

Being an artist myself, I need to remember that regularly attending exhibits like this is so important, not only to understand what other artists are doing around you, but also for the sheer inspiration and beauty of it all. Not to mention it makes me feel a whole lot better that she's been working on all this for 15 years. I guess my pace is not so slow after all!

Wangechi Mutu: A Fantastic Journey

Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University

Love, love, LOVE this so much.

I found this because one of my favorite contemporary artist, Micah Lidberg, designed the above rug for this collaborative collection. I've always felt like his work should be translated to textiles. Now I just have to figure out how to not spend all my money on these.

Real life's been a little hairy. Got pictures, will post soon. Until then, enjoy Anna Dewey Greer...

DEWEY for President

I'm not sure why, but I need this new print from Rifle Design (aka Anna Bond). Their stuff is great and I love to look at their blog.

(via A Ervilha Cor de Rosa)

Rachelle Vasquez finally has a website up with pictures of her awesome crochet scarves. I saw her work at the BUST Craftacular last month -- I'm obsessed!

I'm in a total knitting and crochet mood right now. I found Vanessa's blog, Do You Mind If I Knit, and have been enjoying being inspired by her projects and choices of color. It was hard for me to pick just a few pictures.

Makes me want to live a technicolor life!

Than and I went to the BUST Craftacular yesterday. My favorite vendor was this artist, Nancy, who did beautiful little illustrations. She also transfered her drawings onto ceramic dishes and bowls -- I got a couple.

My other favorite vendor was Rachelle Vasquez, who crochet-ed animal scarves and I can't stop thinking about how cool they are. Unfortunately she doesn't have any kind of the website or blog. I really wanted the one shaped like a skunk.

As if I needed another reason to love Jeff Bridges ---> JeffBridges.com
His website is so fun and interesting! Who would've ever thought that the bad guy from Iron Man could draw such entertaining little doodles. And his photography and his music....this guy is talented in ways I never knew about.

Than's most recently finished project is up on the Starter homepage. He did all the lighting for the CG clothing that get torn off Tony Romo's sweaty, football body. He's so impressive!

Pink & Blue
Megan Burchett
intaglio print

Fangs For The Memories
Megan Burchett
woodcut, intaglio

Ice Cream, Baby!
Megan Burchett
watercolor

Hair Portrait #1
Megan Burchett
watercolor, graphite, spray paint

All these pieces were collaged together to make a large cross with fresh carnations surrounding them all. It was really beautiful and made for a great focal point in the room.

Love You
Megan Burchett
pulp painting on homemade paper

The mask is being held up by a cast of Megan's hand, propped on a salvaged piece of vintage housing. It's impossible to see here, but over the eyes is a rope impression spelling out "Love You".

Isn't This The Most...Megan Burchett
watercolor, graphite

Things That Make Noise...
Megan Burchett
watercolor, pastel

Five Years Running

Ann Tilley
acrylic, sharpie on masonite


Weird Kids -- Not So Strange
Megan Burchett
watercolor, graphite on paper

Julie & FruffAnn Tilley
acrylic, felt, dog hair, sewing machine

Lee Ann & Malone
Ann Tilley
acrylic, felt

The dog masks hang in front of the ladies, enabling you to lift them up to reveal the face underneath. Unfortunately, I failed to take a picture without the mask and apparently the pictures I did take were not in focus, so hopefully this can be rectified and new pictures will be up shortly!Stay tuned...

All artwork from the Art Show.