Our (lucky) thirteenth post of the series, Artists in the Time of Coronavirus includes Pia De Girolamo, Tyler Kline, Lady Be, Dolores Poacelli, and Florence Weisz! Thank you for all who submitted! And if you want to participate, send your statement (250 words max) and 2 photos to support@theartblog.org. More details here. Stay safe and stay positive, and come back in the days to come for more “Artists in the Time of Coronavirus.” We have a wonderful community and are so proud of being able to share everyone’s art. (We have gotten ~200 submissions, so if you haven’t seen yours yet, don’t worry- it is coming, and we can’t wait to post it!)
Pia De Girolamo
Normally, when I start painting, the first 10-15 minutes I do something very loose to which I have no attachment or goal. During this time of pandemic and shelter in place, when I have been glued to online news and worried about loved ones, it has been difficult to get myself into the studio (though it is in my house) much less to warm up with some random painting. So I decided to set myself a very small task; I started to paint concentric circles of related colors on a leftover square scrap of canvas. I found that this was calming and helped me focus. Then I was able to go into my other paintings in the Arctic series I am working on. So for now, I do this every time I go into the studio to start painting. I have included a picture of the circles (which I refer to as mandalas) as well as a 12” x 12” acrylic painting on panel, Berg, that I finished today.
https://www.instagram.com/artdoc07/
https://www.facebook.com/piadegirolamopaintings
My website is piadegirolamo.com
Tyler Kline
I explore instantiation—how our technologies cascade through our central nervous systems and etch marks in our flesh. My work documents the arrival of the Chthulucene epoch: post-Anthropocene, tentacular, multi-optic, and multi-specied.
In this novel terrain we consume and digest rapidly shifting currents of change, at velocities that thwart literal articulation. I generate forms to translate these vibrations and extract hyperbolic form from flickering ephemera, blurring the porous boundaries between myth, documentation, artifact and artifice.
Here is a virtual studio visit with other artists and myself before the Shelter in Place.
New Paintings and Installation photos are up on InLiquid.org:
https://inliquid.org/artist/kline-tyler/
Lady Be
Lady Be lives and works in Rome. After the Art School and the Academy of Fine Arts, her Contemporary Art starts with artistic use of recycled materials. Since 2010 she exhibited in major art exhibitions in Italy and abroad. In 2013 she staged a curious performance: all the spectators were called to remove the pieces from the installation leaving the subjects completely “naked.” In 2014, the turning point came with two major exhibitions: one in New York and the other on the Eiffel Tower. She’s present in several art fairs, art magazines, catalogs and numerous newspapers talk about her success.
www.ladybeart.com
https://www.facebook.com/ladybeart/
instagram @letizialadybeAbout her last work (in attachment)
“Corona Jesus” is the title of the last work created by the artist Lady Be, an international mosaicist who uses small pieces and recycled plastic objects to make her works instead of weaving. Already in 2016 he had created a strong work, the Swollen Barbie, the portrait of a Barbie with the signs of Violence to say no to Violence against women.
Corona Jesus, the suffering face of the christ that instead of the crown of thorns bears the representation of the Corona Virus (similar to that seen under the electron microscope, represents the sacrifice of God who becomes man today, in each of us.
Coronavirus becomes a symbol of man’s atonement. Each of us makes a sacrifice: doctors and nurses on the front lines as soldiers, sacrificing their health and sometimes their lives for other men. The elderly, adults and children of any sex, religion, and in many parts of the world, forced to stay at home and not to go out so as not to contract and transmit the virus which can sometimes be lethal.
People who, despite being ill, will not find a place in hospitals already collapsing. Men who lose their jobs. Workers at home without earnings. Entrepreneurs who fail.
Each of us today is atoning for sacrifice, the evil of humanity.
Humanity that has ruined the planet for years, with pollutants in the air and tons of plastic in the oceans.
The same plastic that Lady Be, for years, collects and divides by color to then create her works.
Lady Be, Pop artist creator of works of art with recycled plastic objects, is known in Italy and abroad for her special technique and her works are in collections of important companies such as Disney, Bottega Veneta, P&G and Enegan.
Dolores Poacelli
I start my statement by saying:
Relationships
are never easy…
especially those between color, shape, texture, space…
and especially tension.No matter what the medium or material – everything from recycled aluminum press plates to cardboard – I attempt to create a tension in each piece. Althought I have been working for thirty-some years I have never done “message” art. The work is mixed media abstract and in search of an essence. Even when I have drawn the figure there has always been a strong orientation toward shape.
I work in my studio four days a week and teach one day. It’s a studio in the Italian Market with six other people so it’s probably a good idea to not go there.
Now I am working from home with limited supplies and maybe the isolation and news is fueling my negativity so I decided to turn it into collages. Can’t predict what will come next. I know I am one of many artists right now who have shows somewhere that will go unseen. We work hard and sometimes for years to produce the work and occassionally we get lucky enough to find a venue that will exhibit it.
It’s wonderful that the internet can fill in this empty space.
Florence Weisz
In an effort to distract myself from thoughts of the coronavirus, I have been concentrating on making new art. What better subject than pretty flowers to calm the soul? So I created my collage, “New Garden.”
Putting this collage out to the public was a very interesting experience. Once again, I noticed the confusion in some viewers between the subject and the content of an artwork. I posted it on FaceBook and got a variety of responses. Some got the irony of my remarks and others said they thought the flowers were, indeed, very pretty. One person asked where she could buy them.
For some people I needed to explain: The “flowers” are various representations of the coronavirus I printed out on glossy 4 x 6 photo paper after Googling “coronavirus – images.” This process has been therapeutic for me…immersing myself in what I fear.
