Archive for May, 2012
Nelleke Verhoeff is an artist based in Rotterdam, Holland, who creates quirky and playful illustrations for her and her partner’s multidisciplinary creative company, yepr. Coming from a circus-inspired theater background where she came up with performance productions using handmade masks, Nelleke’s passion for all things theater is clearly apparent in her artwork.
About eight years ago, Nelleke discovered and fostered a passion in painting. With her growing interest in painting, she realized that she would have to choose between theater and painting. She chose painting, but her love of theater plays a huge role in her work. Her subjects are believable in their expressions and actions, and they strike a chord because they remind me of a person, a place, or an emotion. Nelleke writes that the rosy cheeks donned by her characters are visual representations of the feelings of enthusiasm, shyness and excitement; emotions she is very familiar with.
“Assumptions are the termites of relationships.” – Henry Winkler
Create an image or write something around this quote and send it to us!
Maja Wrońska is an Poland-based architect in her fifth year at Warsaw University of Technology. She has taken on her mother’s trade of architecture and has been drawing buildings and castles since she was a little girl. Poland’s skill requirements for architectural school prompted Maja to attend drawing classes, which changed her attitude towards drawing and gave her inspiration as a developing artist.
I discovered Maja’s work through her site on Deviant Art and was first drawn to her work Girl With A Red Umbrella, particularly because of the detail in the building and its reflection on the street, combined with the skillful use of watercolor, and the concept of combining a structural concept with imaginative undertones. I first mistook the scattered white and red circles as raindrops, but during our interview Maja corrected me and said they were lampions as inspired by the lantern scene in the movie Tangled. Girl With A Red Umbrella is actually a depiction of Kupala Night in Poznań, Poland, a solstice celebration where thousands of lanterns float all over the city.
For this week’s Featured Artist we are presenting the work of a talented photographer who has generously shared with us the photos she’s taken during her travels.
Sheri Heller is a psychotherapist by profession who began taking photos as a teenager wanting to capture the beauty of her surroundings when she travelled. She credits her father’s artistry as well as her own interest in the Great Masters for giving her an affinity for the visual. Sheri says that traveling to new lands and being exposed to new cultures was a refuge for her from difficult circumstances. Photographing her travels allowed her to memorialize her experiences that sustained her, much like an author would jot down the details of important events. For Sheri, this ritual of eternalizing moments through photography is an ongoing process in her life.
She kindly agreed to answer some questions for Creativation Space below:
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The man in front of me was massaging his face using a fine-toothed comb. He hardly had a mustache, in fact it was a poor excuse for one, so I wondered if the intense grooming was for the purpose of growing more of it. I thought about how it might feel to have facial hair on my lip, if it would tickle my nose and how it would smell. I pointed my lips forward as if to sniff an imaginary mustache, but smelled only the distinct aroma of Chickenjoy.
I’ve learned not to do a double-take when a sensation reminds me of home, because other things might very well produce the same kind of stimulus. Brooklyn’s KFC (Kennedy Fried Chicken) probably used the same frying oil, and why would there be Chickenjoy, a Filipino fast food dish, on my packed downtown Q train?
Right then a man beside me ruffled his bags and drew my eyes to his feet. They were cradling a bucket of my childhood favorite fried chicken in a bag labeled Jollibee. (For the uninformed, some trivia: McDonald’s is the top fast food chain in every country in the world except for the Philippines, where an overly jolly bee is the mascot of a burger and chicken joint called Jollibee.) The bearer had just come from the Jollibee in Queens, the first in New York.
“Is the Chickenjoy any good?” I asked in Tagalog to strike up conversation.
“Oh! I didn’t know you were Filipino,” the man responded.
I laughed and repeated my question. Ronnie said he just came from his shift as a fry cook at the restaurant, where he makes Chickenjoy all day.
“How about you, Ma’am? Where do you work?”
I was embarrassed at the automatically applied term of reverence, but did not correct him. I answered him, learning in return that he was going to his second job at a Colombian restaurant in Brooklyn. He said that the chef there was a fan of the Filipino-style chicken pieces, fried naked to an unparalleled crispiness that cannot be achieved by the use of batter, coatings, or soaking in buttermilk (“Batter-whattt?!” a Pinoy cook would say.)
“This is for them,” Ronnie said.
“Come visit the store sometime and ask for me in the kitchen,” he went on, although I knew that Jollibee had been open for years and I never had the urge to go.
Maybe I was afraid to find out that what I remembered too fondly didn’t taste so good anymore. Or maybe I’d learn that it did, that I actually missed it, but that it would never taste right in New York.
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A response to the Creative Exercise : Travel Companion
Like many urban cities, New York is known for its convenient public transport system. Day and night, the subway and buses transport millions of people from one destination to another. Have you ever observed your fellow passengers and found a particular person whom you believe to be trustworthy during an emergency? If you have not, try to experiment with the idea this week. This person probably reminds you of another person in your life with similar characteristics or behaviors. Create a drawing or short prose about this person or fantasy this week.
Submissions will be accepted until Sunday, May 13th. View previous creative exercise submissions here.
