Sarah M. Newton

 "Gino's Liquors" multiple plate aquatint  8" x 6.25"



































"16th & Bryant"   aquatint  7" x 9"





























"23rd & Potrero"  aquatint  7" x 6"

"K & B Liquors"  aquatint  5.5" x 7"

"Super Lavar"  reduction woodcut"  7.25" x 10"

Sarah Newton's prints are an exercise in the processing of observation. Almost all of her images are from locations a mile or less from where she lives; seemingly ordinary street corners, and rundown businesses. By limiting her focus to the mundane within her immediate vicinity she explores just how much there is to see and how little we see it. She takes reference photos as well as doing sketches of locations for her initial studies, then returns to the studio to make her prints. In her own words, "Hand drawn on woodblock or metal plate, the prints are created slowly, through cutting, scraping, burnishing and proofing the plates or blocks. The attention that goes into the development of the image constitutes a meditation on details and spaces that normally don't receive more than a passing notice". But it is not merely the place upon which her meditative process is built. There is also the light, the time of day. With exquisite subtlety she captures the nuances of night lit scenes and the shimmering quality of early morning. The prints are small, a size that requires only a single viewer at a time. Small art can, in this way, create a sense of intimacy with the viewer and the very nature of her work is perfectly suited to this.
Go to her website: www.sarahmnewton.com to see more.

(as you may have noticed I am now putting my short little essays at the bottom of the post so the work comes first. Visual art should speak for itself first and foremost).

Ellen Altfest

"Sleeping Man"  15 x 17 inches, Oil on canvas, 2007

 "Green Gourd"  12 x 12 inches, Oil on canvas, 2007

"Rotting Gourd"  11 x 11 inches, Oil on canvas, 2007

"Log Pile"  29 x 50 inches, Pastel on paper, 2004

 "Tumbleweed"  42 x 52 inches, Oil on canvas, 2005





























 "Pipes"  20 x 38 inches, Oil on canvas


The artists I post here vary greatly when it comes to their professional status. A few are little more than enthusiastic hobbyists posting on free sites like Flickr. But some, like Ellen Altfest, have reached a fairly lofty position in the art world. She shows in New York (at Bellwether Gallery) and in London (at White Cube). Her 2007 show in London also saw the release of her first monograph, a catalogue of new and older work which can be purchased here. So I guess you can say she's made it. And deservedly so. Her work is realist, but her focus is so tight on the fine details that it's easy to see right through the subject matter and lose yourself in a world of abstraction. An earlier series of decaying objects; rotting gourds, rusty pipes, etc., seemed to suggest that this somehow mirrors the nature of reality, that all things eventually break down into their constituent parts, and if we observe closely enough we can see the entropy inherent in everything. Her figurative paintings are less about the human form than they are about the textures of skin and hair, wrinkles and folds, and veins lying just below the surface. Some of the paintings are of mere parts (a butt, a penis) and here her attention to detail is a challenge to the viewer to see past the shock value of the subject matter and examine almost clinically how paint can mirror the texture of flesh.


(I'm going to start posting my short essays at the bottom of the posts from now on. After all it's all about the art, not my thoughts, right?)

Scott Brooks

I generally avoid posting the most provocative images by an artist. While I myself cannot remember the last time I was actually offended by a picture, I prefer not to put off those whose sensibilities may be more delicate. And I have done the same here. Believe me. But the work of Scott Brooks is not for the squeamish or prudish. His work is a full frontal assault on cultural norms and prejudices. He takes on politics, morality,  and religion with conversation-stopping bravado. He's like a man crashing a state function and telling off color jokes in a loud voice. What makes it work is that the jokes are both funny and true. His background is in illustration, and for his personal work he does not shy away from it's methods or aesthetic (as if he would shy away from anything). He embraces caricature and the pop sensibility. He uses narrative to make his point. His illustration work has been primarily for children, and has probably been subtly and insidiously corrupting our youth for years. Okay, subtlety may not be his strong suit. He is incredibly prolific, and there are quite simply hundreds of paintings and drawing to look through, which I strongly urge you to do. www.scottgbrooks.com  There is more work that can be viewed larger on his Flickr page.




"Separation Anxiety: an Allegory for the Conflict Between Good and Evil"  oil on canvas  8' x 4'  2010

"Liberty Leading The People"  48" x 36"  oil on canvas  2010

"Nativity on Demand"  oil on canvas  30" x 40"  2008

"'Til Death Do Us Part"  oil on canvas  20" x 38"  2006

From a series of drawings depicting the deadly sins and cardinal virtues (despite my caveat above this may be one of the more provocative images from the series):
"Gluttony"  graphite and pastel on paper  9" x 12"  2004

Paul Ching-Bor

Paul Ching-Bor was born in Guangzhou, in southern China but currently lives and works in New York City. His monumental watercolor paintings capture New York's world of girders, bridges, concrete and high rises, with an impressionist atmosphere and the vitality and energy of expressionism. It is a haze filled twilight world somehow suggesting at once both oppressiveness and romance, the very nature of the siren song of major cities the world over. These cold impersonal architectural compositions are at the same time alive and breathing, the heart and home of millions of human beings. He has also recently explored doing figurative works, inserting actual people into his vivid cityscapes, but I prefer the purely architectural work. Somehow it seems to better convey the dichotomy of life in the city; the teeming millions all living in such close proximity enhancing the sense of one's singular experience. The city can seem the emptiest of places, a powerful psychological backdrop to the inner life.
Go to his website to see more: www.paulchingbor.com

"Apprehension I"

watercolor on Arches paper 80x60 inches in two panels 2005

"Motion in L. I. C."
watercolor on Arches paper 80x60 inches in two panels 2005

"Currencies - Hudson I"
watercolor on Arches paper 40x60 inches 2006

"When The Boats Came"

"Insomnious Lights - Woolworth Building I"
watercolor on Arches paper 114x103 inches in two panels 2009