Tag Archives: nature art

Art Work Chosen for Still Life Exhibition

I am pleased to be included in the Texas-based Envision Arts Gallery online exhibition titled Still Life. The chosen still lives range from more traditional to whimsical paintings, photography of expected and unexpected objects, and digital collage.

In Contemplating Chrysanthemums, above, I challenged myself to merge digital drawings and flower photography. To start with, I manipulated the photo to progress outwardly from its black-and-white center to various intense shades of violet. Then, I intermingled the photography with the digitally drawn and painted interpretations of the blossoms for an intricate effect. I decided to enter this image because I could imagine taking these flowers from the garden and placing them on the dining room table for a pleasant accompaniment to dinner.

The exhibition runs through the end of November.

Creating a Still Life in Pastel

Along with my digital work, I have been drawing and creating pastels of natural forms. This allows me to work out various ideas with line and color. When working strictly in a digital format, I missed the more direct, hands-on work that drawing and working in pastels afford me. At the same time, I have developed ideas while jumping between the two media. Let me know if you would like to see more pastels in the future.

Summer Remembered

Before we face colder weather, I would like to recall last summer by describing this new digital collage. I was inspired one July evening by a multitude of beautiful lights among the flowers. Not only were the patterns intriguing, but I have also since learned that these flashes function as the insects’ mating language. How could I portray these fireflies’ dancing lights in an art form, I wondered? Well, first I took several photographs of hosta flowers. Then, almost by accident, the line-work in my digital painting morphed into an image resembling lights in motion. Therefore, I was satisfied that I had captured this magical scene.

Summer Exhibition at Envision Gallery

The gallery was searching for work that embodied the essence of summer.

I am honored to have been selected for Envision Arts online gallery, based in Dallas, Texas, titled Summer II. One of my chosen works is featured above. The gallery was searching for work that embodied the essence of summer, be it subject matter, color, or feeling. It’s a contemporary show, with artists from various US states and Moscow, Russia, Sao Paulo, Brazil, and Barcelona, Spain. Although the exhibition went online in June 2021, you can view the show here in the gallery’s archive.

Joyful Blossoms

These chive blossoms were the perfect subject for my new collage series because I love color, pattern, and oval shapes. I was intrigued by the sense of whimsy these botanicals demonstrated as they sprung from the earth. In addition, the flowers are environmentally friendly, attracting bumblebees. They are even edible, adding a mild garlic flavor to food. Finally, to complement the beauty of these florals, I added green and purple graphic elements.

For me, this colorful cluster represents the joy of spring and summer coming forth. At the same time, they are analogous to our new path; the need for social distance is lessening, and people are gathering again.

A Cautionary Tale

Yet, let other countries tell a cautionary tale. Early in 2021, the government of India imposed few restrictions on crowds because they thought the virus had peaked. Then the latest COVID-19 Delta variant appeared, and illness increased rapidly. It is more contagious and affects younger people in more significant numbers than the original virus. Of course, many counties also lack access to the vaccines that we have.

Lurking (above) is also composed of purple and green colors but has a more somber tone and feel. I created it in October 2020, when we were in the thick of the pandemic. This image blends thistle foliage with a portrayal of the coronavirus. These spiky, intertwining plants could be symbolic of a place where the virus still lurks among us.

Do seahorses have horsepower?

Seahorses are magical fish that seemingly float up and down, back and forth, and gracefully twist and tumble through their watery world. These dancers of the sea achieve their swimming power from one constantly moving dorsal fin.

On a visit to the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago, Illinois, I observed these social creatures swimming in pairs. They gathered in groups, using their curly tails to cling to sea grass. Did you know that the male of the species carries the babies during gestation?

These beautiful creatures served as an inspiration for my latest digital collages. In the first print, I silhouetted the seahorses and then filled them with cars, packed in traffic. The name of the work, Horsepower, is a play on words between our vehicles, their carbon emissions, and the affected seahorses.

Like all marine life, seahorses are experiencing changes brought about by our warming planet. Much of the atmosphere’s heat and carbon dioxide are absorbed by the ocean like a sponge. Therefore, the climbing temperature is eroding their shallow tropical water habitat of sea grass and coral. In addition, excess carbon contributes to ocean acidification, which causes their bony structure to lose strength. Other hazards include: getting caught in fishing gear and being harvested for traditional medicine and souvenirs.

Celebrating marine life

Betty Butler, Colorful Seahorses, 2018

In order to celebrate seahorses and all aquatic life, I was moved to create a companion art print that was fun and colorful. It uses many of the same graphic elements as the first digital collage. Rather than cars, I filled the silhouetted animals with bright colors. In a bit of good news, Starbucks and McDonald’s are intending to switch from single-use plastic to paper straws by 2020. This is because of consumer demand. It feels good to know that the public can make a difference to reduce the tide of our environmental problems.

Exploring the nature of red white and blue

As Memorial Day and the Fourth of July approaches, I would like to explore the color palette of red white and blue. In addition to being a patriotic theme, I have used this palette in the two prints that I am featuring today. Often times, blue refers to themes of water, as it does in Ocean Disruption (above). Wintry Tulips (below) utilizes the color to express season and mood. In the first piece, the red is mostly used for contrast, and in the second, it portrays the natural, spring-like color of the flowers. White appears as either waves or snow, in the two prints.

Ocean Disruption, the winner of two awards in 2017, contains recognizable photographs of ocean waves, and although one can clearly see the ocean black-drop, there is pattern and texture, as well as pure chaos. The title refers to human influences that have disrupted our oceans with garbage: namely the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. It is one of several patches, swirling on each ocean, on huge rotating oceanic currents. The garbage, mostly plastic, does not disintegrate, and only breaks down no smaller than microplastics. These are then eaten by fish, birds and marine mammals, either killing them or allowing the plastic chemicals to travel higher into the food chain. A recent study, reported in National Geographic Magazine, has shown that much of the plastic consists of abandoned fishing nets, ropes and baskets. This fishing gear injures or kills innumerable marine animals every year.

On the brighter side, several organizations are working to monitor and pull the trash from the ocean.

Surreal blue tulips

Wintry Tulips (above) is part of a series entitled Seasons. This series invites the viewer to take a nontraditional voyage through the four seasons. In it, I hope to share my joy and contemplation of seasonal changes, and their analogies to the human experience. This print seems to be in the process of morphing from winter to spring. I have turned some of the tulips in a horizontal direction and transformed them into a bracing royal blue. They are shooting across a bleak scene of white snow and barren trees. Only fragments of the natural red tulips remain, suggesting that spring once existed, or will exist again.

In reality, spring’s warmth and blooming flowers have actually arrived. Enjoy the season!

The universe in a flower

The sight of cone flowers is common in the Midwest, but I never really saw their essence until an October afternoon in Door County Wisconsin. I was taken by their autumnal presence – void of vibrant color, yet tall, with prominent, round, spiky heads. Photographs of these skeletal flowers would become subject matter for some of my digital collages.

For my latest collage, Ocean Flower, (top) I have silhouetted the flowers and filled them with the colorful blues and greens of sky, water and botanical life. Finally, I added photographic hints of ocean waves. The ocean within a flower brings to mind the water cycle: a process through which water and water vapor rise from plants and bodies of water, into the atmosphere, and back to earth again in the form of rain or snow.

For me, these flowers, depicted in this way, embody a world or a universe. Besides, these frail flowers, seen at the end of their growing season, contain the seeds – the very life source – for their next generation. We humans are also the guardians of future generations. As the oceans warm and expand, glaciers melt and sea levels rise to engulf coastal regions, we must all concern ourselves with our future world, our universe.

Reflecting on sea, sky and weather

Extreme Weather (above) portrays threatening storm clouds that open, not to the sky, but to the sea. I hope to visually explore the concept that the atmosphere and ocean are inescapably bound together. The grayish-purple boarder with moving dots, could even represent molecules of H2O, transforming from a liquid to a vaporous state, as they rise from bodies of water to the sky. I trust that you will find this image visually satisfying as well as thought provoking.

Rising concentrations of carbon dioxide are warming the atmosphere. This increase in temperature results in higher evaporation rates, which in turn allows more moisture to be absorbed into the atmosphere. Consequently, we are experiencing stronger storms with heavier rainfall amounts.

Although climate change is not the cause of hurricanes, a small increase in the average temperature of the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico (which has happened this year) can increase their rainfall and strength. We are sadly reminded of this, as we witness the record braking destructiveness of Harvey and Irma.

Print juried into Koehnline Museum of Art exhibit

I am honored that Coral Grief (above) has been accepted into the exhibition, “Women and Anger: Resistance, Power and Inspiration” at the Koehnline Museum of Art. The jury was seeking art that made a statement concerning recent push backs in political gains made by and for women, other marginalized groups and the environment. My art print Coral Grief, addresses the environmental challenge posed by the world-wide bleaching and dying of coral reefs.

Koehnline Museum of Art, Oakton Community College
1600 East Golf Road, Des Plaines, IL, 60016
Reception: Thursday, September 28 from 5 – 8PM
Exhibit runs through Friday, October 20, 2017

Climate change and the oceans: one artist’s response

I have been thinking a lot about social issues since we have entered this new era in American political life. My special concern rests with climate change and its impact on the oceans. As the polar ice caps warm at an alarming rate, populations plan to evacuate island homes and Miami Beach experiences ‘sunshine’ flooding, climate change deniers abound.

Recently my art has explored the beauty of shells and seashores; therefore I have naturally extended my concern to the oceans themselves. This new series, Abstract Ocean Art, continues to employ digital collage of my acrylic painting and photography. Although semi-abstract, elements of ocean imagery and the titles inform the viewer of various environmental issues.

It is a deep feeling of apprehension for our future that has brought me to delve into this new series.

Creating a warm haven

An image for the New Year

I love creating a warm haven in the midst of a bitterly cold winter – even if only in the 2D format of a digital collage. As I combined my photographs of seashells, dried seaweed, water, acrylic painting and lighting effects, an imagined beach began to form. Consequently, I was pleased to see the emergence of a sunrise within the shoreline itself. I am hoping this sunrise is an omen for us all to have an abundant and peaceful 2017.

Reflecting on my art

Nautilus Beach, Digital collage, 18” x 18”

I have asked myself, why do I consistently use the rounded shapes of natural forms such as seashells and flowers as subject matter for my digital collages? In addition, I wonder why I am attracted to nature’s patterns in clouds and waves on water. I have concluded that not only is this subject matter beautiful, but it is calming and gives me peace. Of course, as an artist, I also seek an original perspective through color, line and form. Perhaps for me, combining both the meditative and the novel is the key to my motivation.