california roll

yellena james

there's really no time to rest on one's laurels in this business. as much as i'd like to have the time to sit and revel in the success of the lopez show, i have to give my full attention to preparations for our next show, which hangs in two weeks (ahhh!)

next at bat we have yellena james, who i've been writing about for months now.  i got an email from the artist hesitantly naming the show "stasis". i love the title so much with the work i've seen thus far i'm going to run with it. i have my graphic designer working on a flier (i know, WAY late, it was a opportunity for me to learn to keep my sight on the horizon and never get too caught up in the present, so as to forget the future). i'll get my press out soon, though unfortunately, with this short of notice it would be unfair to ask any press junket to work on a feature story with so little time, maybe we'll get some press retroactively when writers get the chance to see yellena's work and fall in love with her gentle, personable self. 

i'm very excited to see what comes for the show. yellena usually works on a precious scale, but for this show she's produced some larger works, and we're making some large scale prints of her highly detailed work. i am stoked to see how they fill the space. 

i talked with a woman the other day who referred to the gallery as "male-centric". the thought had honestly never crossed my mind, but when i thought back on the past few months i could acknowledge a slightly more masculine energy to the place. we focus on bold art, by male or female artists, but the divergence from a typical decorative presentation makes for a strong presence, which i guess this person read as male. all my co-workers are male... not sure if that really makes it a "masculine" gallery. a couple of people made comments about graffiti being a male art, which made me want to crawl out of my skin. there are plenty of talented, revered women in the graffiti art scene. its about annonymity, about making a name for yourself that transcends the person you are in the day to day. many female writers go unrecognized (as female) because they refuse to make a fuss over whether people think they're a guy or not, as long as their work is being respected. if you're interested in the feminine presence in graffiti art there's an amazing book that i first saw at the whitney museum in nyc called graffiti women: street art from five continents by nicholas ganz that is not to be missed. (i love you reminisce! you are a fucking ninja goddess). 

yellena's show is my "girly" show. not that i think that art ought to be gendered, or that the show will be inherently feminine because the artist is a woman. i call it my "girly" show because the vibe of the art lends itself well to a classy, sensual presentation that may just have a slightly female energy to it. i loved the lopez opening. i had so much fun, and i'm a tomboy who loves beats, breakdancing and whiskey en mass. but i'm relishing the opportunity to have a new kind of opening. i'm hoping to have a wine tasting, maybe some live jazz and i'm planning on bedecking this space with flowers (and possibly balloon art, check in with me next week, i know it sounds wacky but it could be really conceptual). i have a skirt that i could never wear anywhere but yellena's opening. my mom found it at an estate sale. i'm not sure where it came from, it may have dropped out of heaven. its a high waisted skirt made of PAPER (kid you not) and hand painted with taxonomical drawings of exotic butterfly species, not to mention the clumps of vintage rhinestones. it must have been a stage costume or something. with a little perfume , some stockings and pin-curls by my friend dawn, i'll have a real girl night... then i'll wake up the next morning with a rats nest on my head, a potential hangover and want my jeans and grubby hooded sweatshirt back.

october show

breeze, 6"x6", pen and ink on paper

i am getting over the moon excited about yellena james' show in october. the more i look at her art the more personal connection i find to the work. its like the style of hip, sumptuous, smart, lush drawing i'd always hoped would someday come off my pen if i kept doodling long enough (sadly, this never came to fruition, so far i've mastered bubbles though i have been told they look like pokemon). 

i've often said that my favorite kind of art is that which says something. i've argued up and down that the art that we exhibit at the gallery should go beyond merely decorative and should have a voice, it should comment in some way on the world, on the human condition. this has often caused mention of abstract work, which is hard to say has any particular story to tell, and whether or not my need for discursiveness invalidates the importance of abstract, or purely visual work. yellena's work is certainly subtle and soft-spoken, it may not defame the presidency or draw attention to the global famine crisis, but that doesn't mean it doesn't have heart. each intimate world that she creates has its own ethos, its own special ability to radiate an emotional range that most anyone can relate to. 

i can't wait to transform the gallery into her world. 

flare, 11x16", pen and ink on paper

the lovely yellena

Yellena James, "Vessel", print of drawing done with pens, ink and markers on paper, 6"x6" (print available on her etsy shop)

i've been gushing for quite some time about yellena james. she's a talented aritst and designer who lives on the oregon coast (currently... she misses the city, i can empathize). orignially from sarajevo, yellena has traveled the world honing her beautiful, dreamlike style of illustration and racked up a laundry list of fans. i've got pages and pages worth of praise for her art, but as I mentioned earlier, the heat has turned my brain into mush. for today i'll let the interview and the images speak for themselves. she's agreed to a show at fenario in october, so i'll have plenty more to say in the coming weeks. yellena sat down and answered some of my questions after a recent trip to hang a show at giant robot in san francisco. 

CG: tell me a little about yourself, and how you got started making art. 

YJ: i've done art as long as i can remember. i hear this from a lot of artists in interviews, but it's true. i always loved to draw and i have always been fascinated with pens and markers. my sister is also an artist and we used to make things together growing up. during the civil war in sarajevo, i enrolled in an art high school against my parents wishes. where i am from, as most places i'm sure, artists tend to starve. but we all at some point make the decision that doing what you love is most important. 

CG: where do you draw your inspiration from? what gets your imagination running?

YJ: oh, this is always the hardest question for me because it is very hard to pinpoint inspiration. i think artists just have that in them. if you love what you're doing you are always inspired to do it no matter what. you get inspired by all things. many of my recent works were inspired by small elements or ideas found in my previous works which begged to be explored furthur. it's a nice feeling to finish a piece and step away with the direction in mind for a new piece. 

CG: you have a very distinct, recognizable style of design and illustration. how has your aesthetic developed over time?

YJ: thanks for saying that. a lot of work and time have gone into creating and developing my style. i still feel like there is so much more room to grow. i've had a lot of traditional training, and many great teachers along the way. i had one teacher in sarajevo who made us do line drawings for months until we perfected them. i was so happy when we finally started doing some shading in our studies. i think i started doing my best work when i stopped trying to impress other artists, teachers, critics, etc. and started making art that i enjoy. 

yellena james, "bliss" pen and ink on paper, 6"x7.5"

CG: do you doodle when you talk on the phone?

YJ: no, i usually pace around the room when i talk on the phone. when i'm drawing, i'm completely focused on what i'm doing. i almost always have music playing. i'm completely addicted to pandora.com.

CG: do you have a favorite medium?

YJ: pens and markers are still my favorite, although i do love paint. i have literally hundreds of pens in my studio and i am very particular about paper too.

CG: it seems that a lot of your pieces are on a small scale. what draws you to working on small pieces? do you ever work on a larger scale?

YJ: i work in a small scale because my work is so detailed and it takes me forever to finish little pieces. i also like the intimacy of smaller pieces. they invite viewers for a closer inspection, a second look. 

CG: you recently moved to the oregon coast. as a native oregonian, i must say, you've picked a truly beautiful, scenic part of the world to call home. how has your change of scenery inspired you? do you have good tide-pooling near your home?

YJ: it's true, oregon is very beautiful. the tide-pooling is top-notch i'm sure. the coast is a great place to work in peace, though i'm definitely missing the city energy these days. we'll probably be living in portland by the end of the summer. there are a lot of creative people there and always something fresh going on. we live next to the ocean right now and i guess that has had some influence on my work. recently, my artwork has been described as resembling precambrian ocean life. i liked this, because during the precambrian era, the seas were just these big pools of potential, and life was just forming - seemingly at random but also by design. all these little elements were taking form and coming alive on their own. this is similar to how many of my art pieces come together. lots of little bits and lines, forming curves, then shapes... sort of randomly, but also by design. 

CG: what fellow artists and designers do you admire? who do you have your eye on?

YJ: oh, let's see. i'm a big fan of julie mehretu and matthew ritchie... i also really like apak, sam weber, jeff soto, takashi murakami. there are so many more... i think now is a really exciting time in art. one thing about being close to portland, and also selling on etsy and the giant robot, is that i've been introduced to so many amazing DIY-minded artists. there are just a lot of people right now who are doing things on their own. 

CG: what albums do you take with you when you go on a road trip? 

YJ: for road trips, i like to bring compilations: interpol, black keys, beck, okkervil river, b.r.m.c., my morning jacket, muse, ours, the shins... that kind of stuff.

CG: if i loaned you my private jet where would you go?

YJ: i have been wanting to visit sarajevo and the adriatic coast lately. it would be nice to see my family there, and show my husband where i was born. then i would probably ask you to loan me your jet again for a trip to japan. then italy, then france, australia, ireland, brazil.... your jet will probably need an oil change when i'm done. 

yellena james, "magic" print of drawing done in pen and ink, 8.5"x11" (prints available on her etsy shop)

Long time, No see

So sorry for the delay folks. Apparently my interview with Kevin went so well I was like a man after earth shattering sex: I just had to roll over and go to sleep for awhile. Things at the gallery are still smooth sailing. I met with Sara Ciampa, our artist for July, this week and we hit it off immediately (her portfolio had come in and her show was booked before I started working here full time). Turns out we took this great Pre-Raphaelite class together at the University of Oregon! It was refreshing to talk to someone I already had the ease to talk to on a pretty cerebral, academic level without fear of coming across as the world largest goober (or, even more dreadful, the worlds biggest know-it-all). Sara and I have a great report, and I'm really excited for her show "Omens and Accidents" that will be opening on the 4th of July. I'll be posting an interview we did later today. Hopefully, it won't send me into a writing coma, like Kevin's did.  

I've had the great fortune of meeting and talking to two other really talented artists this week as well. On Tuesday, a recent MFA graduate from the University of Oregon, Robert Dewitt Adams, was gracious enough to invite me to his studio here in downtown Eugene. A few weeks back, I had become instantly enamored with his portfolio of large scale graphic-design inspired acrylic canvases. Rob's work includes found objects, and interesting elements like sand and pebbles. Rob focuses on powerful symbols, like signs, letters, numbers and corporate logos. My first gut instinct was to lump this work in with Pop art. I suppose "lump" sounds perjorative, I really do appreciate pop art, I just find that its a hard style to reinvent in a truly fresh, unique way. Luckily I was able to see the originals, and talk to Rob about his process, thus being able to really broaden my understanding of what Rob is trying to achieve with his bold, thoughtful works. Though much of Rob's art focuses on images borrowed from popular culture his work doesn't seek to glorify consumer products or mass produced images. Instead, he seems to be taking a closer look at how these processes affect our interactions, our attention spans, and how these artificially created, digestible chunks of metal real estate get bought and sold. And he does all this with a great sense of humor and a keen aesthetic eye. I think he work is exceptional, and I hope to be able to get him a show soon.

I was also lucky enough to get a visit from the very lovely Yellena James, whose work I first fell in love with while cruising the Nucleus Gallery's La Femme exhibit catalogue. I was very happy to discover that she lives here in my native Oregon, and she was kind enough to pay the gallery a visit on her way down to San Francisco for a show she's having at Giant Robot.  I was so floored by the originals that she showed me. Her small scale drawing and painting have such character! I had seen her prints on her site, and on her Etsy portfolio and had been really curious as to her technique. They are even more impressive close up! Every tiny line and shape has its own presence and voice. They are the ultimate visual eye candy. Luckily for me she liked the space, and we're trying to plan a show as soon as possible.  

                                   

  Yellena James, Allusion, pen and ink on paper, 8x10