Pictured at the top is local artist Van Der Luc’s mural for the 2022 edition of SHINE Mural Festival in St. Pete.
He is one of the artists at The Studios @5663 in Pinellas Park. It’s a great place to see what local artists are making and working on.
On the fourth Saturday of the month Pinellas Arts Village hosts a block party with vendors, open galleries and studios, crafts, live music, and food. It’s a fun event that offers the opportunity to check out what local artists are working on.
This wall of murals was created for the 2015 Pinellas Park Better Block event.
The artists who created these murals are- Derek Donnelly; Zulu Painter; Justin Wagher; James Oleson; Scott Hillis; and Sebastian Coolidge.
In addition to being a local muralist, Derek Donnelly also runs the Saint Paint gallery (formerly Donnelly Cove), also in Pinellas Park.
Thomas Couture’s Soap Bubbles, ca. 1859, on view at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
From the museum’s website about the work-
A schoolboy, identifiable by the books on the desk, contemplates soap bubbles, traditional symbols of the transience of life. A wilting laurel wreath on the wall behind him suggests the fleeting nature of praise and honors. The word “immortalité,” inscribed on the paper inserted in the mirror, reinforces the painting’s allegorical content.
Couture was an influential teacher known for his opposition to strict academic instruction. Among his pupils was Manet, who in 1867 painted his own, more naturalistic, version of this subject (Museu Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon).
Interestingly, there is a very similar painting to this one, Daydreams, 1859, also by Couture, that is on view at The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, Maryland.
This time the writing on the paper in the mirror reads “Le Parasseux indigne de vivre”- the lazy one unworthy of living.
The Voyage was by Matt Kress for the 2018 SHINE Mural Festival. The mural was sponsored by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers football team (note the football under the skull). For more of Kress’s work, also check out his Instagram.
This weekend the annual Gasparilla Pirate Festival continues with The Parade of Pirates which includes floats, marching bands, dance groups, and, of course, pirates.
Now it Makes Sense
iFA Peddler
Conquering Pride
Internal Dialogue
Currently at the Tully-Levine Gallery at the ArtsXchange ( part of The Warehouse Arts District Association) is The Wiz Reimagined a collaborative art exhibition by iBOMS (Jabari Reed- Diop) and Zulu Painter.
The imaginative paintings accompany sculptures and an installation which also at times includes video projections.
Tonight (1/25/23) there will be a screening of The Wiz, hosted by Hillary Van Dyke of Green Book Tampa Bay and an artist talk with both artists and Scott Terry of Mahogany Gallery.
Florida artist Jane Bunker’s Mandala, is one of several of her paintings of lilies on view at Soft Water Gallery in St. Pete, Florida.
Proceeds from the sales of her work will be donated to the Woodson Warriors Scholarships Fund. Administered by The Carter G. Woodson African American Museum of Florida, the fund distributes scholarships to local African American college scholars. Bunker established the fund in 2019 while she was a volunteer at the museum.
We Are Going to Be Friends was created by DAAS for the 2018 SHINE Mural Festival.
From the St. Petersburg Arts Alliance website about the work-
DAAS: “I’ve kind of been doing these murals of this young girl. I kind of like following the story of her life, her youth and just her experiences interacting with nature, animals and things like that.
“Everything is like a playful scene or moments where she’s contemplating, you know, future things. This is a long story I’ve been developing. This one is just part of the story.
“All the colors that are here are supposed to vibrate. They’re supposed to represent positive emotions, they’re supposed to elevate.”
Which part of the story is this mural? Where is this in her storyline?
DAAS: “Well, I’m still developing it. I’m kind of following it as it goes. I just started doing it about three murals ago, so I’m still kind of in this process of figuring it out. What is this story after this one? I’m starting to focus on that. I need to really lay out the whole idea.
“But I want to keep her the same age, you know? So my next mural will feature her, and until the foreseeable future, I’ll keep using these experiences. I guess it’s kind of a way for me to kind of go back in time, just reflect on less hectic, closer to nature kinds of feelings that I don’t really get much in such a big city all the time. I don’t really get to experience that, so I’m kind of following it.”
Where are the other three murals that you’ve painted with this girl?
DAAS: “There’s one in Italy and there’s two in China.”
Born in Jacksonville, Florida, DAAS lives in Japan. His bold designs blend cubism and abstract techniques. He does canvas work in his studio and paints murals around the world.
DAAS uses an intricate taping process to scale his rendering on a wall before he starts to paint. This mural was completed in 7 days with only spray paint, and became one of the artist’s favorite designs in his career.
Today is the beginning of the Lunar New Year and it is the Year of the Rabbit, so it seemed like a good time to post this mural. Hopefully this year will be a good one and new friends will be welcomed into our lives.
Lucky You, by Jimmy Breen and Anthony Freese was created for the 2019 SHINE Mural Festival in St. Petersburg, Florida.
For more work by Jimmy Breen, also check out his Instagram.
Anthony Freese’s Instagram is also worth a look to see what he is working on currently.
Artist Alex Katz created this mural, Bill 2, a portrait of modern dancer and choreographer Bill T. Jones, in 2019 for Murals of La Jolla in San Diego. Murals of La Jolla is a project started in 2010 by The Athenaeum and the La Jolla Community Foundation. It commissions artists to create work to be displayed on buildings around La Jolla. A map of all the murals currently on view can be found here.
From the Murals of La Jolla website about the work-
Alex Katz’s mural, Bill 2, celebrates Bill T. Jones, one of the most noted and recognized modern-dance choreographers of our time. Executed in Katz’s bold and simplified signature style, Bill 2 depicts Jones’ visage, through a series of distinct expressions. The repetition of his face has a cinematic and lyrical quality, reinforcing his place in the world of dance, music and film. Portions of the face are dramatically cropped, giving the viewer only quick and gestural glimpses of Jones. Bill 2, is a striking homage to two artists, Katz and Jones, both renowned in their respective fields of visual and performing arts. The mural’s proximity to the new Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center gives a nod to the interconnected worlds of art, music, and dance.
The Guggenheim museum in NYC is currently showing Alex Katz: Gathering, a retrospective of the artist’s work from the late 1940’s until the present. The exhibition will be up until February 20, 2023.
From their website about the exhibition-
Emerging as an artist in the mid-20th century, Katz forged a mode of figurative painting that fused the energy of Abstract Expressionist canvases with the American vernaculars of the magazine, billboard, and movie screen. Throughout his practice, he has turned to his surroundings in downtown New York City and coastal Maine as his primary subject matter, documenting an evolving community of poets, artists, critics, dancers, and filmmakers who have animated the cultural avant-garde from the postwar period to the present.
Staged in the city where Katz has lived and worked his entire life, and prepared with the close collaboration of the artist, this retrospective will fill the museum’s Frank Lloyd Wright rotunda. Encompassing paintings, oil sketches, collages, drawings, prints, and freestanding “cutout” works, the exhibition will begin with the artist’s intimate sketches of riders on the New York City subway from the late 1940s and will culminate in the rapturous, immersive landscapes that have dominated his output in recent years.
Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company has numerous performances every year. Conceived and directed by Bill T. Jones, and choreographed by Jones with Janet Wong and the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company, the latest work, Curriculum II, will be performed at on March 10, 11, and 12, at the Institute of Contemporary Art Boston.
Jones also hosts the series Bill Chats at NYC’s The New School. On January 30th, he will be in conversation with Bessie Award-winning theater director and performance artist, Niegel Smith and curator, producer, and director, Kamilah Forbes. For more events check out the New York Live Arts calendar.
