Circles, lines, and Leslie Feist

ON THE WALL II

Following the success of last years On The Wall exhibition at the Sydney's Finders Keepers Design Market, the lovely ladies from Australian design store Leeloo are back for a second year.

Last year's entry by Enyaj     (Photographer unknown)

Framed artworks will be for sale at the markets happening next weekend (Friday 2nd Dec 6pm to 10pm and Saturday 3rd December 10am to 5pm)  via the Leeloo stall opposite the artworks.

This years amazing home grown line-up includes:

"Supporting independent artists allows the industry to stay alive
and helps to maintain the local culture." - Leeloo.com.au

Interview: CARLA FLETCHER

When did you first pick up a pencil?

I can't remember but have been using them a lot recently 

For the pieces in your upcoming show "Premonition", you mention using animals and nature as symbols that reflect our humanity.  Can you elaborate
on some of the references?

There are specific traits within other species that can symbolise our own. Courage of a lion or loyalty of a dog -

certain life changes and forces happen to us all. I have used images such as birds to represent determination and dreaming, lizards as our fight or flight instincts and skulls for transformation in our selves.

What else influences your work?

Different music, different people and different techniques

You've used customised circular wood pieces for this exhibition, what was your reasoning behind the choice of medium?

Nick Blackmore is a furniture designer and one of the funniest men I have met and he framed my last show in Melbourne.  Nick has some circular wooden pieces kicking around his studio that he had done for another artist and I could not get them out of my head.

I still can't get them out of my head, they are amazing.


Are there other mediums you're itching to explore?

Sculpture and paste ups

Describe an average day for Carla Fletcher?

Coffee. a shite load of drawing then dinner ; )

If you could go anywhere right now, where would it be?

Tasmania. I'm heading there in a couple of weeks for the first time, can't wait.

Any advice to aspiring artists out there?

There are no rules, even the ones you make for yourself can and must be broken at times.

Premonition (Fight or Flight)

Looking into this emerging artists future, it all seems to be shining very brightly! Since Carla Fletcher's selection as a finalist for the 2010 Archibald Prize for her amazing portrait of blues singer C.W. Stoneking, she has been thrust into the Australian art scene's limelight, drawing fans such as Joel Edgerton, Dan Sultan, and Anthony Lister.

This month, Flectcher will exhibit her highly anticipated solo show Premonition (Fight or Flight) at Friends of Leon Gallery in Surry Hills where she follows, and delves into the inner world of dreams and premonitions - a visual dialogue with the unknown.

Fletcher has a beautiful and captivating style. Her painstakingly detailed pencil illustrations combined with layers of liquid pencil, hot coloured spray paint and burnished graphite makes her latest works visually arresting. Premonition showcases her paintings on 8 wooden circles specifically handcrafted for this show by furniture designer Nick Blackmore.

“In our contemporary life we can still experience the subconscious, the intiuitive along with the ancient traits
that bind us as humans. 

As symbols, animals and nature can reflect our humanity - they can represent behaviours or experiences that are common to us all.

This collection of works are symbolic for the experiences that are in the forces of nature -

Fight or flight, growth, love, desire, freedom and death” 

PREMONITION opens
Thursday the 17th November
from 6-8pm
Friends of Leon Gallery
82 Marlborough Street Surry Hills
runs until the 4th of December
more info: www.friendsofleon.com
   

Sunday Eighteenth

DIRTY DOZEN - Stormie Mills

A SOLO EXHIBITION OF NEW WORKS BY STORMIE MILLS

8-25 SEPTEMBER, 2011

FRIENDS OF LEON GALLERY, SURRY HILLS, SYDNEY

‘‘With spray paint what doesn't hit and stick to the canvas falls to the floor to mix with the dust and dirt - I use this mixed with an acrylic paint to make paintings. ‘’

Perth artist Stormie Mills will be heading to Sydney on September 8 to open his new solo show Dirty Dozen at the Friends of Leon Gallery.

Following on from a sell out show in Perth, and an extremely successful Melbourne exhibition, Dirty Dozen continues Stormie’s ongoing quest to explore all sides of the human mind
 and it’s development in his work.

 Mills is a drawer, painter and street artist, known for his use of humanised characters that often convey elements of loneliness and isolation, which he describes as -  

"celebrations of beauty masked by the layers of life."

 

"Black=Dirt, 
White=The attempt to remove dirt, 
Grey=Concrete, Silver=Dreams..."

The Wilhelm Scream

Start of my first drawing in what feels like forever. 

My biggest one yet.

Who needs luck

When you have fate.

The beginnings of a new painting, on a circular piece of chipboard I found on the side of the road today

Fallow Up

Follow/Fallow

You're the one I follow, 

follow to the middle, 

middle of the shadows, 

Far away from all the sorrows.

GIRLS & GHOSTS

Girls & Ghosts is the first Australian solo show by Swedish Illustrator Anneli Olander, to coincide with Sydney Fashion Week. Opening night of the show at Friends of Leon Gallery was actually last night, but her work will be exhibited there until the 28th of May. 

Olander is one of the world's leading female illustrators, with works published in magazines, books and apparel companies, as well as exhibiting internationally, however it was actually while studying at the University of Newcastle that she learnt her earlier skills.

Her latest collection Girls & Ghosts deals with the beauty of the imperfect:

"it could be anything, from a non perfect personality, to shattered dreams that become a bittersweet memory, or the joy or something quite ordinary.  And of course about the more colourful spirits inside in a nerdy girl."

High

You've got my head soaring above the clouds,

Maybe I'll never return to the ground.

Sugar Mountain (Brisbane)

About to do a bit of collab with the hottest kids in Brisbane, descending sweet sounds from the summit into your tympanic membranes.

Theyve got a heap of shows coming up in Bris, so keep an ear and an eye out...

s u g a r  m o u n t a i n

Weeping Willow Tree

I have been reading about Willow trees of late, a little random, but mostly about their associated folk law.  There is a long list, and a lot of ancient Asian and also English folk law, as well as Taoist witches.  Mostly they are associated with mystery, hidden within their long, sweeping branches. Some say that the weeping willow once stood upright and strong, but the death of star crossed lovers so touched the heart of the trees that they bent in abject grief and were never able to straighten themselves again.

Series 2010/2011

The line up so far...

More to come.

SUPAKITCH & KORALIE for POSCA

A Plug for POSCA art markers, but also a nice vid and insight into the creative process of designers/street artists SUPAKITCH & KORALIE

SUPAKITCH x KORALIE x POSCA from elr°y on Vimeo.

LUNGS

Finished. For now. I think...

Hello David Gomez

With LMFF finished for another year, and Drawn From Fashion presented by Leeloo beginning this Saturday, I thought it would be perfect timing to post about the runway show for PETROU/MAN (NY) fall/winter collection by Nicolas Petrou, inspired by the amazing texta portraits by David Gomez.  Gomez's fashion illustration and design work is inspired a lot by tribal/indegenous patterning and mystical cultures, and I'm liking it a lot a lot a lot. (Images sourced from http://davidgomezmaestre.blogspot.com/)

New lungs

The start of a new piece for a group show happeningz in May

Climbing vines

Bits and pieces collected from vintage stores.
Family Doctor dictionary from the early 20th century.
Wooden trinkets.
A bit of paint. A bit of ink...

Huddle Formation

Resolutions resolve