changes in advertising

In my previous post I shared some interesting images that I "harvested" from a series of books collectively entitled "The Encyclopedia of Photography" (1962), which were given to me by fellow collagist Trish Craig. I've only just begun going through these books. Here's a very interesting image which had the following caption: "Humor in graphics advertising has proved to be successful in advancing sales of a product. Increasingly, the models used are 'interesting' rather than ideal". Gee, I wonder if the pendulum is swinging back to "the ideal" these days. BTW, The photographer who took this image was Edgar DeEvia, but the 'model' was not identified.

sources of images

If you are reading this post, you are obviously interested in collage and I suspect you get excited when you find sources of good images for your work. I just had to share some images and talk a little bit about interesting sources. A fellow collagist -- Trish Craig -- shot me an e-mail letting me know that she had some old books I might find useful for my collages. Little did I know at the time they would be such exciting sources. Some of what she gave me was a series of books called "The Encyclopedia of Photography" (from 1962):

These books include great images in that any of the photography is taken from angles that are not common in normal magazine photos. There are also some great technical photographs as well, such as these:

Great stuff! THANKS SO MUCH TRISH!

Learning & Memory (July 2013)

It's difficult to express how excited I am to have made the cover for the up-coming issue of the journal "Learning & Memory". This is basically a psychobiology journal focusing on research investigating issues related to learning and memory (pretty explicit title, isn't it?). I earned my doctoral degree from Binghamton University and have published my scientific research in similar journals. Never in my wildest imagination back in those days would I have thought that one day my artwork would be featured on the cover of such a prestigious publication. Really cool how life unfolds... http://learnmem.cshlp.org/content/20/7.cover-expansion

experimenting again

I have been trying to do more experimenting this week. Not exactly sure why this piece is so compelling to me... but it is. I haven't "finalized" it yet, but that may happen.

back in the saddle

I had a really nice time in San Francisco; but it is now time to get back to work (school work and artwork). I'm tying up some loose ends (i.e., some already-started pieces) so that I can move forward. I'm happy to be "feelin' it" again after several months of a bit of an "artist's block". Here's my latest, entitled "Lakshmi Suburbia" (8.5" x 8.5").

One night only!?

Wow! I went to a small photography exhibit this evening at Utica College which brought tears to my eyes. This exhibit should be up for an extended time so that more folks could experience it... really. So here's the deal. My friend and colleague Linnea Franits is a faculty member of the Occupational Therapy program at Utica College. She worked with a group of OT Masters students on a project for which each student provided  a camera to an individual who had "life compromises" (my terminology, not hers). Each individual was asked to take photographs which represented how their life had changed since their "compromise". Some of the individuals had cancer, some had children with cancer, some had been in prison. Linnea selected representative photographs and associated quotations for the exhibit. Here are some shots from this evening. Some words to describe this exhibit: "powerful", "touching", "human", "inspiring". One of the most powerful was a photograph taken by a mutual friend of ours -- Lisa Davis -- who died this past semester after a LONG and courageous battle with cancer. Thank you Linnea Franits, for keeping the humanity in academics. Bravo to you and your students on a great show! Again, this exhibit needs to be seen by a wider audience.

"Apophenia"

I'm very pleased with having finished my submission for the annual "Wish You Were Here" postcard exhibition of the National Collage Society (the bluish lunar one). It's entitled "Apophenia" (as a teacher, I'll let you look-up what that means). I had been focused on a totally different type of piece ("experimental" elements shown below

). It wasn't until I had the negative space of the head and torn name and address scrap that I started playing with another idea. And it all came together within an hour too. It amazes me how this creativity stuff works sometimes!