Dr. Sketchy's Starts in OKC Sunday 01.25.2009

Flyer for first Dr Sketchy's OKC session Dr. Sketchy's has come to Oklahoma City! Marilyn Artus, co-founder of The Girlie Show, has organized a leg of the burlesque life-drawing group which will meet at AKA Gallery (Google Maps link) one Sunday a month. The first meeting will be this Sunday, January 25th, from 6 - 10 pm. You must be 21 to attend, and there is a $10 cover. Ilsa the Wolf will be our first model. And I am so there.

From the press release:

Dr. Sketchy's is a life drawing class meets cabaret experience. Started in Brooklyn by artist and burlesque girl Molly Crabapple, Dr. Sketchy’s now has 60+ branches around the globe, including Hollywood, London, Berlin, Edinburgh and NOW Oklahoma City. We will have gorgeous women, musclemen, freaks, and geeks. Bring a chair and your art supples, drink some booze. Tip your model and bartender, listen to some tunes and draw draw draw!!! We have great give-aways from local retailors like Blue 7. There will be contests made up on the spot! Visit http://www.drsketchy.com for more information.

Illustration Friday: Pale

Anonymous Niece, acrylic and colored pencil on Rives BFK, 2009 by Sarah Atlee Anonymous Niece, acrylic and colored pencil on Rives BFK, 2009. Click image to see full-size.

To learn more about Illustration Friday, click here.

Anonymous Niece was created for Seeing Other People, a show of contemporary portraiture by Oklahoma Artists. The show hangs in the OKC Underground Invited Artists Gallery from January to April 2009. There will be an opening reception this coming Thursday, January 22, from 5:30 to 7:30 pm. Please join us!

To create this fictional portrait, I worked from several photographic sources. My primary source was a picture I found in a stack of old family photos. There is no information on the photograph identifying the subject, just the name of the portrait studio: Jamiesons Studios, 3A High Street, Wrexham. (A quick search tells me that Wrexham is in northeast Wales, the country my family came from two generations ago. So it is likely the girl in the photograph is a distant relative.)

Following is a list of movies I listened to (on headphones, from my portable dvd player) while I worked on Anonymous Niece.

A Room With a View

Ballets Russes

Warming By the Devil's Fire

Charlie Wilson's War

Chicago

Pride and Prejudice (episode 1)

Hinton Geary Accepted to Society of Illustrators

Normal, OK: Hinton Geary, ink and collage on found fabric, 2007 by Sarah Atlee
Normal, OK: Hinton Geary, ink and collage on found fabric.

I'm pleased to announce that Hinton Geary from the Normal, OK series has been accepted to the Society of Illustrators 51st Annual book and exhibition. Ever since I learned about the S of I, I've wanted to be a part of it. My painting Let's Make Some Undies was in the student show in 2005. This will be my first time showing at the Society (or anyplace in NYC) as a professional.

Hinton will be in the Book Illustration category, representing Normal, OK: The Book (which you can order by clicking here).

The exhibition opens at the Society of Illustrators in NYC on January 28th 2009. The awards ceremony for the Book and Editorial categories will be on February 6th. God willing and the creek don't rise, I'll be there.

Normal, OK Characters Appear In Nimrod

Two characters from my series Normal, OK appear in the Fall 2008 issue of the Nimrod International Journal of Prose and Poetry. To purchase a copy, follow this link. Normal, OK: Peoria Jenks, mixed media, 2007 by Sarah Atlee

Normal, OK: Peoria Jenks. Mixed media, 2007.

Peoria Jenks, 72, carries on the family tradition of bootlegging. (Opteemah County is dry.) She does not sell to "drunkards." One day, while having her hair set, she overheard a call on the salon's police scanner noting suspicious activity at the Slim Pickens Mo-tel. On a hunch, she went over. Onlookers say she got a shotgun from the trunk of her Dart and walked purposefully past Sherrif Ardmore into room 112. No shots were fired. Ms. Jenks reportedly walked out shaking her head and saying, “Not in my town. Not in my town.” The headline in that week’s Porcupine read “Meth Lab Seized With Help From Locals.”

You can learn more about the people of Normal by reading the book.

My series of works titled Normal, OK was part of the Art 365 exhibition sponsored by the Oklahoma Visual Arts Coalition. Art 365 travels to Legion Arts in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to open on October 15.