The OVAC blog is featuring an ongoing interiew series with the artist from the current 24 Works on Paper show. Click here to read my thoughts on the process of creating romy.

24 Works on Paper is on display at Northern Oklahoma College in Tonkawa through October 14. The show will travel to venues around Oklahoma through August 2010. Click here for a full exhibition schedule.

The Oklahoma Visual Arts Coalition is gearing up for their 2009-2010 Artist Survival Kit Workshop season. (I’m on the workshop committee, so you can read more about them here in the coming weeks.)

First up is “Dreaming Big: Public Art,” two workshops to answer questions and help artists prepare to apply for the Public Art Mentorship. The Public Art Mentorship will offer commissions to three artists, totaling $75,000, as well as the assistance of experienced public artist, Lynn Basa. This workshop will be held in Tulsa on August 22 and in Oklahoma City on August 29.

In September there will be “Artist Proposal Writing” workshops. Each of these will focus on proposals for the next Art 365 and Momentum opportunities. This will be held in Tulsa on September 10 and in Oklahoma City on September 15.

I’ve been to several of the ASK workshops held by OVAC, and they are not to be missed. I always come away feeling well-informed and energized.

Click here for a full listing of OVAC’s upcoming workshops, plus registration links. This page will be updated regularly, so check back.

Not an OVAC member yet? Here’s why you should be.

What did it take to get to your position?

The short answer is: hard work, believing in myself, and a healthy dose of good luck. The long answer follows.

I was born in Norman, Oklahoma, in 1980. When I was still a baby, my family moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico, where we lived for the next twenty years. My parents both have backgrounds in the arts. My father, John Atlee, was a professional potter when I was born. Since then he has practiced in a number of other media. My mother, Emmy Ezzell, studied art in college and became a book designer a couple of years before I came along. She is now Production Director at the University of Oklahoma Press in Norman.

Sarah’s Mom Draws Sarah Drawing, ink on paper, circa 1984 by Emmy Ezzell. Click image to view full-size.

I am not alone in believing that all children are artists, and the lucky ones who are encouraged continue to be artists when they grow up. My parents have always understood the value of art in a person’s life, so while growing up I knew that making art was not silly or wasteful.

By the time I graduated from high school I knew that I wanted to study art in college. I didn’t yet know if I wanted to pursue fine art as a profession, because I knew that career path was a difficult one with no guarantee of success.

I attended the University of New Mexico on scholarship. I majored in Fine Art Studio with a focus in painting, and graduated in 2001. [See that gif on the Art Studio program page? The barest hint of my worktable is visible in it, behind James Pitt's paintings. Yeah, looks like they haven't updated it lately.] My education at UNM focused mostly on the conceptual side of art rather than the technical. I feel I got a very good education in how to think and talk like an artist. But while I was there, my desire to produce technically excellent drawings and paintings was met with confusion and occasionally discouragement. The practice of making pictures of things was definitely not the norm at UNM.

I understood that I didn’t really fit in at this program, but I set my sights on what I really wanted to make. You may be familiar with Juxtapoz magazine, which entirely changed the way I looked at art. (At that time, most of the students and faculty at UNM hadn’t yet heard of Juxtapoz.) I spent a lot of Friday nights in the studio, alone, trying to make paintings that were as good as just one frame of Batman: Arkham Asylum (a graphic novel by Grant Morrison and Dave McKean in the Batman lexicon). I’m still not that good, but I recognized that to get there, I had to reach very high. It wasn’t enough that I do work as good or better than my fellow students. I had to make work as good as successful professionals in the field. (Although I didn’t yet know just what field that was.)

Jaded Girl, acrylic and ink on canvas, 5 x 7 inches, 2001. Click image to see more of these.

I spent the next two years out of school, living in Bloomington, Indiana. (My Mom had moved there for a new job following my parents’ divorce.) I kept painting, and I booked a few gallery shows around town. I did some part-time work, but mainly my Mom supported me during that time. My paintings were not what I wanted them to be. I realized that I didn’t have the skills, guidance, or enough practice to be the painter I wished I was. I decided to go back to school.

In 2003, I enrolled at the Rochester Institute of Technology (Rochester, New York) as a graduate student. RIT is a technical university, but they have very good programs in the arts. I majored in painting, minored in illustration, and graduated in 2006 with a Master of Fine Arts degree. My graduate thesis was about the use of cartoons in contemporary painting.

[I'd like to interject here and say that going to graduate school was frighteningly expensive. Most art students enter grad school intending to become professors. This never interested me; I was in it to become a better painter. I did that. It was worth it. But I also racked up student loans that are too big to talk about here. So if you are an art student considering grad school, please don't feel like you need to rush into that. It is not your only option.]

While at grad school, I learned from one of my professors that being a professional illustrator was a viable career choice. Thousands of illustrators are employed every day by magazines, book publishers, companies who need images to sell their products, etc. Turns out, illustration is everywhere once you start looking for it. Every time you see a picture, remember that *someone was paid to make that picture.* And it’s not all made on computers, either.



Birthe Flexner’s Coffee Cups, ink sketch, 2008. Click image to view source.

Upon getting my master’s degree I hoped to become a professional illustrator. In 2005, my Mom had returned to Norman, Oklahoma, for a new job. I followed her there, eager to reconnect with my Okie roots. What I found when I got here surprised me. Oklahoma has a growing, thriving contemporary art community, made up of people of all ages and backgrounds. As an artist, I was welcomed with open arms.

Of course, there were a couple of proactive steps I took to help myself along. I joined the Oklahoma Visual Arts Coalition and sent them a portfolio to put up on their website. I cannot emphasize enough how important a resource this is for Oklahoma artists. (JOIN.) Julia Kirt, the Director of OVAC, looked at my portfolio and offered me a slot in an upcoming group show. Ashley Griffith, a photographer and gallery owner in OKC, went to that show, and offered me a show at her gallery. Meanwhile, I also submitted my portfolio to Mainsite Gallery in Norman. They offered to put my work in their annual Emergent show. That was in late 2006, and things have just snowballed from there. In art, as in any other industry, word of mouth is the best advertising.

I believe that talent exists, but by no means is it the deciding factor in a person’s success. I do believe that luck favors the prepared. I have been blessed with many opportunities. Certain professional skills have helped me take advantage of those opportunities: having a website where people can see my work, having a quality portfolio (on the web, on cd, and in book form), having business cards, returning people’s calls, sending thank-you notes, shaking hands, being willing to ask for advice and learn from other people. These kinds of things apply to every business, not just art, and they matter just as much as the paintings I produce.

My current job title is gallery artist, or working artist. I never thought it would happen, but I’ve become an artist who shows work in galleries (and even sells some). I don’t hesitate to say that living in Oklahoma has helped to bring this about.




Submerge, acrylic on canvas, 2009. Click image to view source.

What do you like about your job?

I love that I get to follow my calling. I make art, and nobody gets to tell me what that art should look like. I have complete creative control over my product. I have a fantastic network of support and mutual creativity in the Oklahoma art community. I feel very lucky.

What do you dislike about your job?

It can be very challenging to make time to make art. Remember those things I mentioned, like shaking hands and returning phone calls? Administrative tasks like that can take up a lot of my time. Not to mention things like grocery shopping and walking the dog. But I’ve learned to manage my time well, stay organized, and summon the energy to complete the necessary tasks that stand between me and my paintings.

What is a typical day in your profession like for you?

I have a part-time job as a lifeguard for the YMCA. [Note: I left this job in April 2009.] I work the early weekday shift, which means I get up at 4:00 am, leave the house at 5:00, and open the pool at 5:30. (Getting up early is something I seem to be good at.) My shifts are four to six hours long, so I leave work before noon and have the rest of the day at my disposal. I come home, and spend an hour or two changing clothes, eating, and reading my email. I resist the urge to spend the rest of the day reading blogs on the internet. I keep project notes and to-do lists on index cards, so I go over those and see what my tasks are for the day. (Check out David Allen’s book Getting Things Done for more advice on this subject.) I like to get quick things out of the way first, to feel like I’ve accomplished something. I try to save errands and run them all in one day.

Some days I don’t make art. But usually I have a project going that has a deadline, such as an upcoming gallery show. I like to work on art during the afternoon and evening, for at least two hours at a stretch. I have a portable DVD player on my desk, so I play movies or listen to music while I’m working. Wearing headphones allows me to shut out the outside world and focus on my work. Listening to some kind of media helps me park my verbal brain elsewhere, and lets my subconscious mind come out and play. This way, I’m better able to make aesthetic decisions without over-analyzing and second-guessing myself.

Currently, my studio is a room at the back of our house. (I now live in OKC with my boyfriend.) It’s awesome having a dedicated space for my work. I also like working near a kitchen, a bathroom, the mailbox, etc. Working at home is a good situation for me. [Note: I have just moved into a studio/office at the OKCCoCo, which is also near a kitchen, a bathroom, and a mailbox. It's swell.]

I have never been a night person. I like to go to bed early.

(If you are interested in how other creative people organize their day, have a look at the Daily Routines blog.)

Whats your favorite color?

Gray. One of my college professors described the color gray as mysterious. It turns any other color into something that’s much more difficult to describe. Gray is ambiguity.

When I give this answer, there’s usually a voice that pipes up and declares that gray is not a color. From a certain technical standpoint, smartypants is right. But when I go to the art supply store, I can pick up a tube of paint that says “gray,” and bring it home and put it down on a canvas. So that guy can suck it.




Crazy Aunt Millie (Was Burned at the Stake), oil on canvas, 2005. Click image to view source.

Do you have a favorite artist?

I have many. Here are some of my favorite artists of the moment:
Joe Sorren (painter)
Maira Kalman (painter, illustrator)
Mike Disfarmer (photographer)
August Sander (photographer)
David Hughes (illustrator)
James Jean (painter, illustrator)
Ruth Ann Borum (painter, Norman, OK)

Where do you get your inspiration?

Inspiration comes from absolutely everywhere. Books, movies, music, magazines, internet. Right now I’m really excited by old signs for businesses around Oklahoma City. I especially love hand-painted signs. I’m often inspired by other artists: when I see a picture that I really like, I think to myself, “I want to do that, too!” So I may paint my own interpretation of that picture, in my own style.

As I mentioned, luck favors the prepared. I try and keep an open mind, and recognize that ideas can come from anywhere without warning.

Edmond “Mundy” Tulsa was born to a man who was hoping for a boy. Everyone calls her Mundy. She is a prodigious baker, and wins many bake-offs and Opteemah County Fair ribbons.



Young Mundy Tulsa, first underpainting.

The Tulsa family’s money went down with Penn Square Bank when the bottom dropped out. But Grampa Dewright Tulsa had placed gold and silver coins inside sections of pipe and buried them in the backyard. One day Mundy undertakes to dig a vegetable garden and discovers the coins. This becomes the startup capital for Miz Mundy Cookies, and later Mundy Buns.



Young Mundy Tulsa, second underpainting.

Mundy Buns grows so successful that Mundy gets a buyout offer from Nabisco. She declines on account of her personal integrity. Soon after, she strikes a deal with Dobbin Wynn to be the exclusive concessions distributor for the Dobbin & Dixie Family Film Fest.



Young Mundy Tulsa, third underpainting.

The Mundy Buns plant remains the economic heart of Normal. Mundy hires Katie Hennepin to help her branch out into organic baked goods.




Normal, OK: Young Mundy Tulsa, graphite and acrylic on paper, 2009

Mundy is seen here at the Opteemah County Fair in 1944, with the blue ribbon she won for her Sweet ‘n’ Spicy Blackberry Pie.

Back To Normal: Normal, OK Revisited is on display at the Gaylord-Pickens Museum in Oklahoma City through September 19th.

I would like to thank everyone who attended my talk at the show last Saturday, I had a wonderful time. Please join us for the closing reception on Thursday, September 10th, 2009 at 5 pm.

I keep my complete inventory in a stack of 3×5″ index cards. When it comes time for a show, I make inventories for the gallery in spreadsheet form, and also in a document with thumbnail images.

Paper and pen are my preferred medium for most applications, but if you’d rather create a digital database of your work, try the GYST company.

Too many index cards cluttering up your desk drawer? Try putting them together into a Hipster.

End matter or back matter is a book publishing term that describes all the written elements of a book to be dealt with after the author has finished writing the manuscript. These may include indexes, appendices, glossaries, the table of contents, notes, bibliographies, and so on.

As a gallery artist, I have learned to do a lot more legwork besides making the paintings. I have come to think of certain tasks as the end matter — what remains to be done after the art is finished. The more of this work I do myself, and do well, before delivering my work to a gallery, the better my professional standing.

Following is some end matter I’m faced with before a gallery show.

Sign and date the work. Sometimes, as with the Normal series, I include a story on the back of the piece. Information like this can increase a painting’s value and provenance.

Prepare the painting for hanging in the gallery, either by wiring or framing. I highly recommend Downtown Art & Frame in Norman, OK.

Attach a business card or other identifying information to the back of the piece. This is especially important for group shows where your work might be misidentified.

Photograph the piece. That is, take a good photo, not one with uneven lighting, or glare, or out of focus, etc. The digital formats I use most often are:
300 dpi, 1,000 pixels on a side (for print)
300 dpi, 4 x 6 inches or thereabouts (for print or application to juried shows)
72 dpi, 500-800 pixels on a side (for the web)
72 dpi, 150 pixels on a side (for thumbnails)

Make a backup of the photos, on cd, on the home server, etc.

Upload the image to my website, Flickr, Facebook, etc.

Add the piece to my portfolio, if it’s among my best works.

Add the piece to my inventory. I’ll post more on this later.

Register the work with the copyright office. I keep a text file with an ongoing list of all the works I complete, called “Works By Date.” When I finish a piece (or scan a batch of sketchbook pages), I add it to the list. I also keep a folder of small images at 72 dpi, which I will submit as a batch with my copyright registration. When I’m on top of things, I register my work four times a year.

Create an inventory for the gallery. This is so underrated. I make the inventory in two formats:

A spreadsheet containing the title and dates of the show, then the title, medium, dimensions, year, and price for each piece. At the bottom of the spreadsheet I list the show drop-off and pick-up dates, with space for my initials and the curator’s. I print two copies: one for me, one for them.

A visual inventory with thumbnail images of each work in the show, followed by titles and prices. (Again, I print two or more copies, and file one for my own reference.) This helps whomever hangs and labels the show, and can also facilitate sales. When a potential buyer calls the gallery asking for the price of a piece, they may only remember it as “That yellow one, with the guy, and that thing in the corner.” Having a visual inventory on hand can help avoid all sorts of confusion.

I’ve learned to leave myself a few days before my deadline to tie up these loose ends. When it’s time to ship or deliver my work, I feel much better having all these ducks are in a row.

This post is part of NaBloPoMo for July 2009.

via Right Some Good.

The Hi Fructose blog is featuring an exclusing interview with contemporary pop baroque painter Carrie Ann Baade. Reading Baade’s description of her working process, I found that she uses collage as a sketching method, just like I do! Quote:

The spark of the muse that could be called intuition is present when I make the collage for my work. I begin this process by covering the first floor of my house in photos and ripped out pages from books. After the floor is covered I walk around looking for images that fell on top of each other in an interesting manner…this is similar to reading tealeaves. Often I will have a question in mind while diving into the piles of picture images, such as, “What can I say about the horrors of dating in Tallahassee.” This process reminds me of reading tarot cards and getting an answer through the cards that can sometimes be uncannily accurate. Looking for the divine spark to speak to me through these images, I collect and adhere together with cellophane tape to paint later. I know something is really working if I involuntarily laugh aloud at the juxtaposition.

I feel the same intuitive connectivity when I’m making collage sketches. Sometimes the best compositions happen by accident, because I left two scraps in the same pile. I look over and realize, with a little rush of adrenaline, “Of course those go together!”

Ostrich, collage sketch, 2007 by Sarah Atlee. Click image to view source.

I like how Baade allows the collage aesthetic to show through in her finished paintings, without her images appearing slapped-together. She does an excellent job of creating integrated compostitions from a variety of sources. The world is a vast grab-bag of information, and our job as artists is to interpret, reinterpret, and dis-cover meaning through our medium. Although Baade has been told that “paint was an inadequate media to display the complexity of [her] ideas,” her intricate creations overflow with narrative and emotion. You can explore more of Carrie Ann Baade’s work here.

As I was reading this interview on the Hi Fructose blog, I felt an eerie similarity between Baade’s collage process and my own. This feeling was redoubled when I saw the previous blog post about the release of Isabel Samaras’ new monograph by Chronicle books. The gent on the cover bears an uncanny resemblance to this guy here. The similarity is a coincidence.

This post is part of NaBloPoMo for July 2009.

Oh, pens, how I love each and every one of you. Below are some of my favorites.

The Old Standby: Sharpie Ultra-Fine Point.
Pros: Long-lasting as long as they stay capped between uses. Writes on a variety of porous and non-porous surfaces. Inexpensive and easy to find in bulk. Very durable tip, will stand up to quite a bit of abuse. Decent color selection.
Cons: Smelly. Bleeds on paper. They will write on top of acrylic paint, but as the ink is solvent-based, the acrylic will dissolve and clog the pen tip. This solvent will also make paper turn yellow after a few weeks, sooner if the drawing is exposed to air and sun.

My water-based friends: Pilot Razor Point and the Papermate Flair black felt tip pens.

Pros: Very durable. Both deliver black lines with reliably uniform thickness. Easy to find at office supply stores. Good for ink wash drawings (this one was made with the aid of a Niji Waterbrush). I also use them to write down loud thoughts.
Cons: They only write on porous surfaces, not good for mixed-media work. Limited range of colors available.

Not So Much: the Faber-Castell Pitt Artist Pen and Staedtler Pigment Liner.
I tried these while in search of alternatives to the Pigma Micron (why, I can’t remember).
Pros: Archival ink. Durable tips. Waterproof, writes on a variety of surfaces. The Faber-Castell pens come in Sepia, which is not bad, but the ink is almost indistinguishable from black.
Cons: Both pens are fairly expensive for felt tips. I find the tips, for all their durability, are not flexible enough to produce satisfying lines, especially with the larger sizes.

The Champs: Pigma Micron 01 and Bic Round Stic Grip Fine.

Micron pros: Microns have a flexible tip that will produce strong lines and fine detail if treated gently. They come in many sizes, though I stick to the 005, 01, and sometimes the 02. Multiple colors available. Will write on porous and non-porous surfaces. Waterproof when dry. The ink does not bleed on most papers. Microns have a strong fan base: check out this Flickr group, for instance.
Micron cons: Expensive if you buy them one at a time. I buy them in boxes of twelve from Dick Blick. The tips wear out fairly quickly, and can be ruined easily by dropping the pen or leaving the cap off. The ink takes a few minutes to dry, and when wet, will smear on surfaces like acrylic.

Bic Stic pros: Oh my goodness, I love drawing with this pen. Incredible tonal range. Stands up to plenty of abuse, including leaving the cap off indefinitely, storing them in my hot or cold car, dropping them, shoving them through my ponytail for safe-keeping, etc. Long-lasting. The ink is gel-based but not entirely waterproof.
Bic Stic cons: Very non-archival. I get around this problem by turning my drawings into acrylic gel transfers. The Medium-point Bic Stic is prone to clumping and smearing (arg!), and unfortunately, the Fine-point is not easy to find in office-supply stores. I order them by the dozen.

For more pen reviews, browse the links below. Happy drawing.

The Pen Addict
The Tools Artists Use
Doodlers Anonymous Flickr group
Doodlers Anonymous website
Karo: The Quest for the Perfect Pen

This post is part of NaBloPoMo for July 2009.

Namaste, photo by Kim Pierro. Click image to see this photo’s Flickr page.

I recently contributed to the BookMooch Journal Thin Places. My entry was the word Namaste.

Namaste has a lot of different translations. My favorite is “The light within me salutes the light within you.” This particular translation was used by the Reverend Tom Honey in this talk for the 2005 TED Conference. His speech, titled “How could God have allowed the Tsunami?”, calls into question our Western idea of theodicy, the notion that God is in charge and everything happens according to a divine plan. He counters this view with the suggestion that every creature contains divine light as part and parcel of their existence. (Do yourself a favor, take twenty minutes, and listen to his talk. His warm, soothing voice alone is worth the time.)



Live Oak Friends Meeting House, designed by James Turrell.

Artist James Turrell has also drawn influence from this idea of internal light. Turrell’s upbringing included education in Quaker spirituality. The Quaker belief system cherishes inner light as the receptacle and source for divine understanding. (How interesting that the disparate Quaker and Hindu faiths should include this same idea at their core.) On his early experience with the Quaker society, Turrell says,

My grandmother used to tell me that as you sat in Quaker silence you were to go inside to greet the light. That expression stuck with me. …Telling a child to go inside “to greet the light” is about as much as was ever told to me. But there is an idea, first of all, of vision fully formed with the eyes closed. Of course the vision we have in a lucid dream often has greater lucidity and clarity than vision with the eyes open. The fact that we have this vision with the eyes closed is very interesting. And the idea that it’s possible to actually work in a way, on the outside, to remind one of how we see on the inside, is something that became more interesting to me as an artist.

You can go here and view clips about Turrell and his work from the PBS’ excellent Art:21 series.