Painting isn’t often a collaborative process, but for very practical reasons Jason Kronenwald has enlisted the help of others to help him mix his paints. The practical reason is that Kronenwald’s paint is chewing gum, and the way the colours get mixed, you guessed it, is by chewing together various brands and flavours. The result is ‘Gum Blondes’, an impressive series of portraits portraying pop-culture blondes using only gum applied to plywood.
The mood and atmosphere captured in Andrew Carr’s paintings has made me a huge fan. I’m also a huge fan of the way he addressed the “bio” section of his site.
Adriana Varejão appears to be greatly inspired by tiled environments, and that’s a good thing because the resulting work is an impressive combination of graphic line work and exploration of space.  Her site was a little slow to load but well worth it.
Ernestine Tahedl’s painted landscapes are more concerned with exploring colour and light than they are with capturing a specific location.  That makes sense considering that she also works in stained glass (and does so  incredibly well I might add.)
Vicki Shuck has a great daily painting blog going on, and one of the great things about it (beside the excellent work) is the fact that she posts paintings in process as well as finished pieces. I always love seeing other artists’ working methods, and it’s evident in her writing that Vicki gets a lot of joy from the process.
I was spending a little time over at Loose Leaf Tigers (a pretty great blog celebrating all things creative) when I came across a post about Casey Weldon. Â It didn’t take me long to realize he was one of my new favourite artists going. His twisted take on pop culture, sly sense of humour, and fantastic colour palette were just a few factors in that decision.
I mentioned Melanie MacDonald in a previous post about the Queen West Art Crawl, but her incredible work, and the fact that much more of it has been added to her site since then, makes it necessary to give her paintings a post all of their own. The new “Skids” series in particular makes a visit worthwhile, whether you considered yourself one in high school or not.
I’ve previously posted about Scott Waters’ amazing series of works inspired by military life, and now those paintings exist in a new form. His illustrated memoir ‘The Hero Book’ looks like a great way to experience life in the Canadian infantry, without all the hassle of having to experience life in the Canadian infantry. Â I’ve got to get my hands on a copy.
I know it’s not actually the first day of summer yet, but it is the first day of the first month of summer, so I’m willing to say that today’s post is doubly appropriate.  How is it firstly appropriate you ask?  Simple, today’s post is about another fantastic painter creating fantastic paintings.  His name is Colin Martin, and his camping inspired series of works are full of quiet stillness and peculiar beauty. I couldn’t find a personal site for the work, but you can find this particular series of works over at the Fenton Gallery site.  Enjoy!
