Eclectix Volume 4, "H2O" -The Water Art Issue

Take A Dip!
Features Include (posts added weekly):


• H2O, A Water Inspired Online Exhibit: Artworks relating to water; ocean art, octopus art, underwater art, mermaid art, surf art, fish, sea creatures, etc. The biggest and best online collection of water art anywhere!
• Water Drops: factoids of Interest
• Artist Interviews: Latest include Michelle Waters, Judith Schaechter, Mark Bryan and Isabel Samaras
• Art book links
• Related art news posts: Jacques Dequeker's underwater photography, jellyfish, body art, crocodile cove, sand castle art
• Eight Days A Week: Selected current art events and exhibits
• Chandeliers by Adam Wallacavage
• Video Fix: Amy Winehouse by Phil Hansen
• Surfboard art
• Shop Around: Indie and artsy wares for sale
• Jason Freeny's Nemo sculpt


Eclectix has new posts every week, related to the current issue's theme. 
Plus a gallery of original art for sale. 


Online now here: 


Fabulous artists included in H2O: Lois Van Baarle, Jason Jacenko, Chris Buzelli, Judith Schaechter, Michael Brown, Eric Fortune, Christine Benjamin, Nicoletta Ceccoli, Annie Leibovitz, Dan Quintana, Zoe Lacchei, Chris Ryniak, Diane Ozdamar, Jacqueline Gallagher, Amy Sol, Vladimir Kush, Dan May, Mizz Draconia, Sarah Joncas, Lauren K.Cannon, Howard David Johnson, Kaspen, Ryan Firchau, Ray Caesar, Jasmine Becket-Griffith, Kelly Louise Judd, Patrushka, Colette Calascione, Camille Rose Garcia, Mark Bryan, Lilla Martin, Sheila Wolk, Robert S. Connett, Boris Koodrin, Jennifer Wildermuth, Kassandra, Jennybird Alcantara, Natalie Shau, Sergey Urlapov, Imaginism, Vivek Ram, Scott Radke, Zena Holloway, Niklas Rhose, Bobby Chiu, Boris Vallejo, Joel Nakamura, Joshua Oshua, Nouar, Jeff Soto, KMNDZ, Bill Carman, Steve Jung, Annie Owens, Asia Eng, Eric Ryan, Annie Leibovitz ...

El Cerrito Art Association Show, This Weekend...

Posted some preview pix of the show opening tonite.
Check it out, a wonderful mix of eclectic art,
styles and mediums.

Above is one of the selections:
"Feed Your Children" by Ben Witzke

Click here for the preview.

Pinocchio Tattoos: Funny, Gross and Sexy?

While doing a Pinocchio search, found these tattoo images and just had to share. Not sure I would like to see him staring at me but it's a riot. And the nose surely grows...

New Tea Party Art by Mark Bryan

No caption needed, the image says it all. Awesome!

For an Eclectix interview with Mark click here.

"Everyday" Exhibit Worth Seeing In Every Way...

This exhibit  at 111 Minna in San Francisco, ends on October 2nd so get your butt in there quick! Wonderful works by the likes of Mike Davis, Mike Giant, Ryan Scott Shaffer, Juan Puente, Regino Gonzales, Daniel Albrigo, Shawn Barber, Henry Lewis, Don Edward Hardy and Edu Cerro.


I have been to Minna many times but never in the daytime as it is also a bar. It was nice to see the space opened up and uncrowded, with the works well lit. With their larger group shows they put up temporary walls to hang the art on and the lighting isn't the best at night. This show is just big enough, big with talented artists and kick-ass art! Have posted just a few pix of some of my faves here...


For all the works at Minna go here.

Lee Bontecou at Moma, New York

Visited MOMA this summer and loved so much there that I got a little behind. Just saw too much art this summer, poor pitiful me! 
Lee's show - "All Freedom In Every Sense" was well worth my sore feet staying earthbound. At first I was hesitant, not being keen on a lot of abstract art, but the elements of figurative surrealism and construction in her works won me over. She is definitely one of those artists whose works you HAVE to see in person, the textures and dimensions just don't cut it in a picture. 
The works were really a mixed media, just about every medium was represented. While her choices were eclectic in materials, they all came together under her eye and vision. Fantastic sculptures, lithos, paintings, light projections, drawings, industrial constructions - some reminding me strongly of Max Ernst and Kandinsky. Some pieces had a wonderfully dark science fiction feel to them and some an organic lightness. Even the shadows cast off from the art were fantastic.  

Shadows from one of her works

If you get a chance to see her work, do it!

Johnny Depp Poem and Art by Tim Burton

Johnny Depp AND Tim Burton...

what else need be said?

Saying GoodBye to Paul Conrad, He Made His Mark

I was very saddened to hear of Paul's death on September 4th - happily his art will live on in our hearts and political minds. Paul was a master cartoonist as well as a deft quick sketch artist, something that many artists today lack. He was a grumpy old gruff, ornery and cantankerous, friendly and engaging, the champion of the little guy, an opinionated loudmouth, a quick thinking editorialist and a genuine sweetheart. He was all of this, a liberal artist, respected and loved. His strength was the gestation of a single image that would say it all. Watching him at work was always fun - the precision pencil roughing out the gesture of a victim, with angular and tentative jagged graphite; then the sometime frustration when it didn't meet his vision, the cuss words as he cast it in the trash to begin another. Finally, after getting his painstaking sketch down, the pen applied with masterful ink strokes, thick and thin, was a wonder to behold. In a world full of oatmeal personalities (those without the cojones to take a stance, any stance) Conrad was a refreshing and dedicated strong thinker, his wonderful pen pulled no uncertain punches.

"I'VE NEVER WORN MAKEUP"

From the Los Angeles Times-
(Conrad's long time home) -

With an unyielding liberal stance rendered in savage black and white, Conrad both thrilled and infuriated readers for more than 50 years. He won three Pulitzer Prizes, a feat matched by only two other cartoonists in the post- World War II era. Mayors, governors and presidents cringed at the prospect of being on the business end of Conrad's searing pen, while many Southern Californians made him their first stop as they sifted through The Times, the newspaper that was his principal home for nearly 30 years. Just before his death in 2007, the onetime editor of The Times' editorial pages, Anthony Day, worried that the skittish and contracting newspaper industry would no longer support a "genius" like Conrad. "It's easier to not make trouble," Day said, "than to make trouble."

From Tim Rutten-

He was always and everywhere on the side of decency and ordinary men and women. His targets were the self-satisfied powerful, those indifferent to or antagonistic to our common good, and they included presidents -- as in these cartoons -- as well as governors, mayors, popes and corporate executives. 

From Patt Morrison-

What impressed me, too, was that someone as impassioned as Conrad, a devoted Catholic, came to change his mind about abortion rights issues; he was persuaded – no, he persuaded himself, he once said – that he had "forgot[ten] about the women in this thing." 

My favorite all-time Conrad, one of the best images on this subject. Pretty much says it all...
 Thanks, Paul!

Paul at work, Los Angeles Times