A Pioneer in Water Color Tattooing Amanda Wachob is a New York City-based artist who is internationally known for her innovative and conceptual work with the tattoo medium. Her canvases include fruit, leather, linen, and skin. She has done projects with The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the New Museum, the Museum of Arts and Design, The Clyfford Still Museum, the Rubin Museum of Art, The Museum of Contemporary Art Denver, and The Whitney. Pioneering the watercolor tattoo movement and actively bridging the gap between tattooing and fine art, she has exhibited her work in galleries and museums worldwide. In an interview with Coveteur she stated, “Initially people thought that I was totally insane. [They] didn’t really understand what I was trying to do, especially when I started to make a lot of the abstract work. I had the idea that perhaps an abstract image is more capable of representing something intangible, like an emotion, since so much of who we are is an abstract thought. People would bring in a photograph of a flower from their garden and want it to look like [that]. It didn’t make sense for me to make [the tattoo] resemble a cartoon and throw a black outline around it. It was a very intentional act of rebellion and defiance against my industry to work that way. There is a lot of group-think, and it’s actually very conservative. There are right ways to do things, and there are wrong ways to do things." Watercolor Tattoos: These days, her method for creating some of the larger abstract tattoos begins with a painting for each person. “I tell people I’ll make three, but I usually wind up making ten to fifteen. I always ask [them] to bring a reference for me, [like] a photograph of a sunset, or a piece of fabric—anything that contains the colors they’d like to see in their tattoo so I can get a better sense of what they want.” I actually discovered her work back when I was in high school circa 2015. As a watercolor artist myself and a tattoo blogger at the time, I always found her work to be fascinating. Watercolor on skin!? What a concept. She goes on to say that, "[I love] just about anything involving a tattoo needle. On canvas, some fruit. I love the weight of the machine now. I feel like it grounds me." Alternative Canvases: I love her description of the marbled canvas, "This painting is a surrealistic technique called decalcomania. Max Ernst was one of the painters that used this technique. It’s kind of like a Rorschach." If you're here you know I am always looking for crossovers between psychology and art so it was exciting to find that connection point with Amanda's work. How often can one say that you and an artist that has inspired you both made works (while unaware of each other's project) that were inspired by the same thing [Rorschach's Ink Blots]?
I have to mention one more set of work by Amanda before ending this post because it has been one of my favorite tattoo series by her thus far. Protective Evil Eye Talismans:
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A Pioneer in Ceramics Gary Holt, an artist and owner of a pottery studio in California, uses a technique called “setting the color” in which his porcelain pieces have to be bisque fired between each layer of water-soluble metal salt (WSMS) application. Compared to traditional glazes, WSMS are simpler solutions and can be applied in a similar manner as watercolor. Holt, has been perfecting his method for more than twenty years and developed it through trial-and-error since research on WSMS was slim. Holt’s work has a colorful yet muted palette with soft brush strokes. There is an air of simplicity and serenity due to the organic nature of the forms.
I want to focus in on the first piece in the photo set above for a moment. It, much like the others, has a gentle presence about it and really highlights the salt marking effect. I was drawn to this piece because it reminds me of Wassily Kandinsky’s “Several Circles” (1926). Like Wassily, Holt’s piece has several orb forms and makes use of muted blues and pinks. The delicacy of his hand is very obvious and the time spent on each one is undeniable. Holt is a pioneer in his modern technique for application of the water-soluble metal salts and his work has left a mark on both ceramics as an art form and me personally. Pieces can be purchased from his studio Gary Holt Ceramics. 1449 Fifth St, Berkeley, CA 94710 Sources: 1. Chiara Bautista aka "Milk" is a 38 year old Mexican artist currently residing in Tucson, Arizona. She has a bachelor's degree in Graphic Design and worked as an illustrator for many years at Arizona Daily Star (newspaper). While her color usage and unique style is phenomenal the part of her work that draws in so many admirers stems from the characters and heart-wrenching stories she has created. The Mermaid and the Skeletal Crow: The Bunny and the Wolf: The Octopus and the Man: When asked where her inspiration for the characters came from she replied, "The characters and their ongoing stories are made as gifts for people I love. They are usually born from conversations, most of them from a single sentence said at the right time." Chiara and her muse, Ilka, have held an online relationship for years but never officially met. It is speculated that the emotion people feel when looking at her work is that of her own personal sorrow due to a long distance relationship. It is also apparent that her love of music and religious background play a role in some of the works.
Where exactly did she start? This is what she had to say when asked a similar question, "I've always liked drawing and painting, and since I was a little girl I knew I wanted to work on something related to that field. As for my personal work, I create the illustrations in order to work as part of a small conversation and use them to express something I can't find the right words for. After more than a decade of condensing big amounts of text into single images on a daily basis, I find using visual communication as normal as any other language. We can say things through music, words and actions. I'm one of those who like to say it using figures and colors." Like writing a paper her work consists of many revisions and refinements, "I always start with something I need to say, usually a feeling I can't put into words, and that's why I have to use images. I never sketch a final version of an illustration because I always end changing almost everything. My work process is messy and I go back and forth, changing stuff constantly while I'm working. It's like... when you're writing an email to an ex-boyfriend, and you have to go back and read again that last paragraph, and after reading it a couple of times you change something here and there because you don't want him to misunderstand your words. Yes, it's just like that. My [messy] work process includes: pencil & paper, a basic sketch of the main layer, scanner, computer, a vector program (Freehand Mx/Adobe Illustrator), and Adobe Photoshop." Bautista is quite the elusive artist, giving little insight into her personal life, and no one is quite sure what she looks like either. She currently has many projects in process and would love to pursue comic books and graphic novels in the future. If you are interested in seeing more you can check out her Facebook page. Sources: 1. 2. 3. |
AuthorHaven Wright Archives
February 2021
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