November Facebook Featured Artist: Susan Melrath

There are some artists whose work I’ve been following and admiring long before my blogging days.  I first spotted this month’s Facebook Featured Artist, Susan Melrath’s work in print form during my art consulting days in Florida.  I was always drawn to the beauty in her limited palette and the way her distilled compositions were powerful in their simplicity.

Party Table, acrylic on board, 22×19

Charger, acrylic on board, 12×12

In her Figurative series, Susan takes those quick little moments that often pass by unnoticed, capturing the sweetness of this particular day, that particular party.

Landscape, acrylic on panel, 30×25 framed

Although her shapes are simple, Susan uses color and pattern to create depth and visual texture, especially evident in her Garden series ( although she’s now playing with pattern in her Figurative series as well! ).  Her use of floating, layered patterns give her florals a colored gossamer effect, leaving them distinct yet beautifully distorted.

Memory of Magnolia, acyrlic on paper, 20×26 framed

To see more of Susan Melrath’s work, please visit her website and be sure to check out her gorgeous cover image and album on the Artsy Forager Facebook page.

All images are via the artist or her website.

October Facebook Featured Artist: Margie Livingston

If you are a painter, you no doubt know the joy of gazing upon piles of paint freshly squeezed from their tubes.  Perhaps you’ve admired the loveliness to be found on your palette after a day of painting, when the colors have mixed together in a riotous symphony.  The work of this month’s Facebook Featured Artist, Seattle’s Margie Livingston straddles the worlds of painting and sculpture, in which the paint becomes sculpture.

Painting Folded Into a Square, acrylic, 20x20x4

Using paint both as medium and subject, Livingston’s work transforms what is normally a two-dimensional vehicle into one that exists in three-dimensions.  No longer content to merely represent an image of an object, the paint actually takes on an object’s shape.

Plank, acrylic, 97 5/8 x 1 5/8 x 3 1/2

Coiled Layered Strip, acrylic, 9x9x3

Negative Cube, acrylic, 8x14x14

Margie’s Painted Objects has taken center stage at Greg Kucera Gallery in Seattle ( supported in part by a 4Culture Individual Artist Project Grant and a CityArtist Project grant from the City of Seattle Office of Arts & Culture ) and will be on exhibit through November 10th.  Go see it!!  I’ll be far away in California, so I can’t go, which means you MUST!

To see more of Margie Livingston’s incredible painted sculptures, please visit her website and be sure to check out her gorgeous cover image and album on the Artsy Forager Facebook page.

Featured image is 90 Color Test, acrylic and grommets, 90 squares at 8×8 each, 78×96 overall.  All images are via the artist’s website and the website of Greg Kucera Gallery.

Material Matters: Margie Livingston

If you are an artist, you know the joy and delight your materials bring.  The smell of fresh paint, the glow of molten glass, the feel of earthen clay.  Seattle artist Margie Livingston is one artist who obviously enchanted with her unique properties of her chosen medium– paint.

198 Angles, Mostly Yellow, acrylic, 33.5x29

Her paintings are not only explorations into the characteristics of the paint– color, texture, sheen, etc., but also studies in shape, form, line and space.

263 Angles, Neutral Over Red, acrylic, 33x24.5

She’s also taken this investigation of medium a step further– creating actual sculptures from paint, genius!

Paint Strip Tied In a Knot With the Ends Tucked In, acrylic, 4x13x10 ( via Greg Kucera Gallery )

Study for Spiral Block #3, acrylic, 6" cube

To see more of Margie Livingston’s adventures in paint, check out her website.  If you’re in Seattle, you can see her work in person at Greg Kucera Gallery.

Featured image is 414 Angles, Mostly Red and Yellow, acrylic, 32×24.  All images are via the artist’s website, unless otherwise stated.