My $15 print sale that is:www.bellavendetta.etsy.com Look, even the SF Weekly says you should hop to it. I only have a few left of each print, after that they are gone!
I will however, have a super-duper limited edition 11x14" gilcee print of this...

issued by Mahan Gallery early this summer. I won't be advertising or selling it on any websites, only my email list, so hit me up if you want to be notified about it: arabella(at)elephantstonerecords.com

Thanx!

I'll have two pieces in this show curated by www.creepmachine.com, should be pretty fun and I wish I could go. My two portraits of a character I call "Switchblade Sue" are just based in general off all the girl gang related teen exploitation movies I've seen over the years. Here are some clips to get you in the mood. High School Caesar is one of my favorites, although the clip doesn't show the gang leader's girlfriend with huge knockers and bizarre eyebrows. But boy, I wish I could have an "anything goes party!" like in the High School Hellcats. Maybe when I turn 30 in June?

Once upon a time when I worked at Herbert Palmer Gallery, I finally got some cash together to buy a silkscreen by Gerald Laing (since I didn't have the money for an Albrect Durer woodcut that may have been a fake). I bought a great piece from the Baby Baby Wild Things series he did in the 60s...

It is my favorite thing in my home. I don't even care about Bridget Bardot, but I like the image. Little did I know that he was STILL making kick ass pop art images, even of today's celebrity train wrecks...

do yourself a favor and grab one if you can.

Steve from "Artwork by Steve" also does pop art style oil paintings; girls with colored sunglasses and always with food, or bubbles, or both...

You can also buy prints from his site.

My parents started collecting the work of David Miretsky in the 70s. In fact he did a huge painting they bought to celebrate the birth of moi. He does a lot of social and family scenes that reflect the Brighton Beach circles of Russians and Ukrainians, but also nudes and political satire paintings. His work is either soft and pretty, or very surreal and bizarre. The men in his work are always in fact, very ugly. Though I guess the women can come off like cheap whores or well-to-do depending how you look at it. I grew up with both types of his work hung around the house, and I'm sure it made an impression on me on top of all the other eastern European artists my parents collected. In fact, many visitors to the house always asked how my family could live with so many large, bizarre, and somewhat disturbing images. I thought they were awesome, and thought it was normal. But here is one of his more subdued works...

I am not really a fan of vector art or digital painting, mostly because it looks digital and has the potential to appear very dated in the long run. But, I do like Tom Bagshaw, aka www.mostlywanted.com.

His work has a painterly figurative, anime, and comic book-like quality that for some reason I really dig. You can see some of his process on his blog: http://tombagshaw.blogspot.com/

I don't remember when I first became aware of Louie Metz. Maybe it was the old Onyx Cafe, maybe it was through artist Stacy Lande or maybe some other L.A. gallery like Circle Elephant (now Bert Green Fine Art). Either way, we started showing together at Cannibal Flower around 2002, and I've loved his stuff ever since. He captures sordid situations and the L.A. vibe so well. I found him again through Flickr, and I'm happy he has a website now.

Little Robot is a gal living in Scotland that does such great drawings; I'm normally not a fan of this kind of work, but her stuff I like enough that it has inspired some tattoo designs for myself...

Amy Abshier-Reyes does wonderful little portraits, the bulk of which sort of look like gals from Edwardian era up to the 1930s. She's selling original tiny paintings for cheap too...

Gregg Griffin makes pictures of bunny-like creatures doing very naughty things. I don't know why, but I like it. They get compared to the "Donny Darko" rabbit a lot.

It also doesn't hurt that he has an adorable bulldog that digs his work too...

I've loved Holly Lane's work for a long time. Flemish paintings with awesome little altar pieces as the framework. Some look modern, other gothic, but any of them I'd love to have in my dining room!

You can find more about her thru Forum Gallery.

I've started a series of low priced paintings, here is the first of it...

"Winter Wind, 11x14" price: $150.00 Sold.
Basically, I ordered a bunch of art board from a website and it was not what I was expecting. Not only does it turn oil paint into acrylic on contact, it is just difficult to use overall. Rather than waste a bunch of art board, I decided to do a series of quick paintings I could get done in a few days with no planning and just, you know, off the cuff so to speak.

Please email me if you are interested in owning this pretty gal.

Artists I'm digging, including ones that make me want to just give up....

Julian de Narvaez

David M Bowers

Julie Heffernan

Khuan Caveman Co.

Rey Misterio

Cordeleia of Kronin (1440 - 1504)
A carnival performer since childhood, she was raised in a nomadic tribe known as Brothers of the Serpent -- infamous for gambling, grave robbing, and juggling. It was during her acrobatic horse riding at a festival that she caught the eye of a wealthy architect and was sold to him by her uncles. She had a small career as a courtesan to wealthy, but politically unimportant men. While drunk on ginger ale at a ball, she began to strip her clothes, and perform her acrobatic routine for the guests. She was an overnight success; invited to perform in most affluent homes of the day. She was no longer dependant on wealthy partners, but became trapped into supporting relatives who squandered her fortune. When her youth faded, she went back to her horse routine performing for carnivals.

Cordelieia

1 comment

11x14" oil on canvas. She'll be for sale at Anxiety Gallery in Madison, WI for the "Tattoo Show" with a book signing by Mitch O'Connell.

So much visual overload this weekend:

If you are in the D.C. area tonight, I'll be showing 5 portraits along with some other kickass artists in Alexandria @ Art Whino Gallery. In Cleveland tonight, there's a Derek Hess holiday sale and exhibit @ Kelly-Randall Gallery in Tremont. Also at Grey's Auctioneers is an exhibit by Scott Miller

Other than that, I am finally settling into my new book about Titian, got myself a copy of L.A. based Artillery, a totally overpriced Italian fashion magazine of runway photos, a zine called Nostalgia Digest that has Danny Kaye on the cover (so of course I had to buy it), the new issue of Hi Fructose that has a little advertisement of yours truly...

and of course anytime I order something from Last Gasp Books they send fun stickers and awesome catalogs full of yet more books I want. Not to mention, my stuff arrives super fast and packaged all fancy-like. I don't know how it has happened but between all this stuff, the music, cooking and sports magazines, my coffee table and my bathroom have been taken over.  Hard to think that not long ago a $3.50 magazine at the grocery check-out was like a big splurge to me.

Art blogs I've been digging on lately:

www.CreepMachine.com put together by Josh of the SF Weekly, I like that he alerts people not just about shows, but new prints and stuff available on Ebay by much of the lowbrow/pop surrealism crowd.

www.LinesandColors.com this goes back and forth on featuring very "painterly" painters, to commercial illustrators, comic artists and animation layout designers. Very awesome.

www.OurArtSite.com a little bit of everything.

www.ArtBoobs.blogspot.com  Boobies!

www.OnMyDesk.com showcases designers and illustrators workspaces that they submit. I'm glad I'm not the only one cramped into a dinning room or small space to work. And people ask me, "why don't you have a big loft with skylights? Isn't that where artists work?" sheesh.

www.Coagula.com I used to read it regularly when I lived in L.A, but have only recently started up again after the wonderful and entertaining video smackdown Mat Gleason gives Shepard Fairey. Brian Teasley of Chunklet Magazine used to be my internet cranky-pants crush, but sorry Brian, Mat has re-claimed my heart. His review of the Murakami exhibit ends with things like,

"After you have visited the Takashi Murakami show, this bombastic, empty plastic palace of sterile child abuse, caucasian humiliation and Hyper-capitalism making even Beijing envious, well you can say you saw it.

And you can forever look MOCA director Jeremy Strick right in the eyes and call him a WHORE.

You can look MOCA curator Paul Schimmel in the eyes and call him a WHORE.

You can look at anyone associated with the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art with the same tittilation and disgust that you would aim toward Heidi Fleiss were she to walk in the room."

Thank you Mat, may I swoon now?