Paper Art 5 – Paper Beards

This one is strictly for fun. It seems there are a lot of folks, young and old, who would like to see themselves in a beard without the maintenance or the mess beards create […]

Paper Art 4 – Books as Portraits

When I first thought of doing a series on artists who worked in the medium of paper, I did not plan to focus on just those who created portraits or human scenes/clothing, but when […]

Paper Art 3 – Maps as Portraits, Maps as Clothing

Native New Yorker Matthew Cusick was born in 1970, graduated from The Cooper Union with a BFA in 1993, and his work began to be exhibited internationally within just three years. His resume is […]

Paper Art 2 – Life-size Figures in Cardboard

Warren King is an American artist living and working in Stockholm, Sweden, particularly known for his life-size figures constructed from cardboard. In 2010 he traveled to China for the first time and visited Shaoxing, […]

Paper Art 1 – Toilet Paper Roll Portraits and Tales

I would venture to guess that in any home that doesn’t include preschoolers programmed to save such goodies for craft projects, toilet paper rolls are not generally looked upon as a serious art medium, […]

Variations on Mona Lisa – Unusual Portrait Media – Part 5

If you want to discuss portraits that have been created in unusual mediums, no one can outdo Leonardo da Vinci’s 500+ year old Mona Lisa. We began this series by noting Phil Hansen’s amazing […]

And That’s Not All – Unusual Portrait Media – Part 4

Each category of artists featured in this blog is meant to highlight five people, but this post brings our “Unusual Portrait Media” group to nine because each person I read about intrigued me more. […]

A Passion for Pixels – Portrait Art – Part 2

As we noted in the previous blog, Ken Knowlton created portraits using the pixel possibilities of dice, dominoes, Braille, seashells, jigsaw puzzle parts, crossword puzzles, and spools of thread. What’s left? Plenty! #1 -The […]

Creating Portraits with Unusual Materials – Part 1

Ken Knowlton is a fellow Sarasotan whom I met through mutual friends from Michigan, and who quickly made it to the top of my list of artists I wanted to feature. “improv artist” tends […]

Crocheting Playgrounds

We started this 5-part series on improv artists doing needlework with yarn bombing – a form of street art whose primary purpose is to produce smiles. We end it with crocheted playgrounds – an […]

Men Who Knit

From yesteryear’s Cary Grant to this year’s Ryan Gosling, a number of male celebrities are known knitters, but few are known for their creative knitting. Franklin Habit and Kaffe Fassett are two men who […]

Colorful and Complex Brains

Laura Bundesen is a western Massachusetts-based artist whose mission “is to spread joy and wonder through my works of art – and a little brain education too.” That makes her a perfect fit for […]

Crocheting Coral

Yarn bombing takes the art of crocheting to the streets. The Crochet Coral Reef Project takes it underwater. Yarn bombing is usually done with the lighthearted purpose of adding fun to our daily lives; […]

Fabric and Needlework Artists – Quite a Yarn

This next series of 5 improv artists blogs is focused on artists whose medium is fabric or needlework. We took you outdoors for the last series on street art, so it makes sense to […]

A Potpourri of Street Art Whimsy

Another large art element in public places is the RedBall Project, created by American artist Kurt Perschke. This traveling, award-winning public art piece is considered “the world’s longest-running street art work,” and has been […]