One of my Art Heroes - Mary Fedden

I would like to introduce you to one of my art heroes: Mary Fedden. This is an artist whose work I discovered this year, and it opened many other doors for me, spiraling out into articles, books, videos, and changing the way I think about several projects that I began, and now setting me on a new path. I am fascinated with her use of color, how she blends subjects and simplifies things, views, and space. How she works with the surface, how fresh and open her work is.

Mary Fedden was an artist who lived and worked in Britain. During World War II, Fedden worked in the Land Army and then for the Women's Voluntary Service, before being called up to serve as a driver in the NAAFI in 1944. Her artistic career spanned many decades before and after the war, and it overlapped with many very interesting artists, one of whom happened to be her husband, printmaker Julian Trevelyan (JT works means Julian Trevelyan, all the other works in this post are Mary Fedden - from the books mentioned below)

I was able to get my hands on a couple of books to look at her works - one of them, "Mary Fedden: Enigmas and Variations," is now in my collection (thank you for the great birthday present, you know who!), and is filled with many color reproductions of her works. The second book, "Mary Fedden and Julian Trevelyan - Life & Art by the River Thames," is filled with interesting works by Julian Trevelyan (see below) but, most importantly, contains quite a few pages from Mary Fedden's Travel sketchbooks!

Mary Fedden lived to be 96 (here is her obituary in the Guardian from 2012), and I see some of her works online dated 2010. That is truly one of the longest painting careers - though my other art hero, David Hockney, is definitely working on similar results!

There are different ways to learn, and one of them for me is watching people paint - seeing their brushstrokes and choices - without any commentary. Though the commentary in this video is rather interesting too: her love for gouache, working in series, and drawing in a sketchbook everywhere she goes are things that I definitely relate to.

An interesting article to read more about Mary Fedden:

Mary Fedden: the pleasures of life after privation and loss

https://artuk.org/discover/stories/mary-fedden-the-pleasures-of-life-after-privation-and-loss

Chicago Trip, Part Two: Art Institute of Chicago / Gustave Caillebotte

Chicago has an amazing (and ginormous) art museum named the Art Institute of Chicago. I've visited it before, but not for quite some time, and I forgot how big it is and how one can find something from any time for any mood and interest! We spent around 5 hours there, and apart from a quick lunch all this time was packed! 

But the highlight was the current exhibit of Gustave Caillebotte - one of my art heroes! To see so many works in one place, experience in person slight variations of color, be in the presence of expressive brushstrokes - this was a gift! I am fascinated with the way he worked with light, how he builds compositions. With conversations between bodies in his art, with integration of people into environments, and all of that with the simultaneously serious and playful feeling that comes from his works! He lived a short but very interesting life, left a large city to live in a suburb, and stopped trying to get into the Art Salon but continued painting. He was a gardener, worked on textile design, collected stamps, designed and built yachts, sailed them, and he supported other artists. What a life! 

Museum Visit: Ruth Asawa's Retrospective

There is a wonderful (and large) retrospective of Ruth Asawa's work in SF MoMA (one of my "I want to see in 2025"). This exhibit makes a fair attempt at showing works of someone who had a very prolific 60 years of making art of all sorts. It was not an easy task to put it together and it is quite possible that several separate exhibits would be a much better solution. I probably would not visit them all through. But I would love to look at room after room of sketchbooks.  Or an exhibit of only paper sculptures? I would love to have a day of visiting a garden and the house. The faces installation in the Cantor Art Museum at Stanford is always worth a visit (they were not part of this retrospective however were mentioned). But that is an interesting project - uniting many years of artist's work and life in a community. The wired sculptures that are considered the most recognized pieces created by Asawa took many rooms and could be a separate art show as well. As usual - being in their presence was different from looking at them in a book - I spent quite some time watching people dance to them, kids try and draw every coil and I tried to film some moving shadows. Then there are public art projects. And teaching, and work with kids. And then there are some wonderful prints! In short - there is a lot to embrace if you are trying to make (or look at) a retrospective of Ruth Asawa! more notes in my sketches :)

Art exhibits that I want to see in 2025

(this drawing from my sketchbook is here because I think every post needs an image)

I posted my art exhibits that I want to see around the world before and it seems like this year I have a fresh list! Some I will visit, some I will only hear about and to some I might make it ;) Probably the list will grow later in the year but so far here it is:

1. David Hockney Is Taking Over the Entire Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris. David Hockney is one of my all-time art heroes and his ability to work at put together such a huge exposition at 87 is definitely one of the reasons for that. There are several great articles about the show:

in Vogue: https://www.vogue.com/article/david-hockney-fondation-louis-vuitton

in New York Times (this article is unlocked via Austin Kleon's Newsletter which I recommend to people on a weekly basis!) 

2. Ruth Asawa: Retrospective - in San Francisco MOMA. In 2023 I wrote about Ruth Asawa exhibit in Whitney Museum of American "Through Line" and then read all I could find about her. Since then I slowly track down and visit all of her art (there is much to go still) - but this retrospective will move me a lot on my quest!

3. The Met has "Sargent and Paris" From April 27 till August 3 of this tear. Sargent is one of the painters whose works I love to see in person. There is so much in the dance of the brush, so much color and light in layers and so much in seemingly empty parts of the paintings!

4. Palazzo Barberini (check out their logo!!) in Rome has Caravaggio 2025 - which is an extensive collection of works, including some "recently authenticated" - but to see such a collection on one place? That is a gift!

5. Wayne Thiebaud: Art Comes from Art is in Legion of Honor in San Francisco! Did you know that Wayne Thiebaud played tennis even after turning 100? And painted too! And he was an artist who was thinking with both his art and words - as a teacher for many years.  Did you hear about a Cake Event in San Francisco - in honor of this exhibition? Here is a great article about it by Wendy MacNaughton (whose substack I also recommend). https://club.drawtogether.studio/p/let-us-eat-cake

Here is a video that accompanies the exhibit: https://www.famsf.org/stories/wayne-thiebaud-film

ANd an article: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2025/apr/16/wayne-thiebaud-san-francisco-exhibition

That's it for now. 

What exhibitions are you looking forward to? 

Mary Cassatt as printmaking inspiration (and more!)

San Francisco Legion of Honor hosted a wonderful retrospective of Mary Cassatt "Mary Cassatt at Work" and it was a fantastic experience. I wanted to see in-person works that I knew from books and they as usual elevated my relationship with the art piece because of the level of details that one can see in person and by the experience of looking at an artwork on the wall, in space and imagining the process of making it. I specifically enjoyed looking at the brushstrokes and colors on the edges - away from the well-defined features. 

I did not know what to expect from an announced section of prints but was excited to learn more about printmaking recently and had a companion who was willing to explain and discuss all the intricate nuances of what is innovative in her work, how she did this or that and what we can deduct from these prints and what is still a mystery. Legion of Honor put together a comprehensive article about it with lots of visuals: How-To with the Conservators: Mary Cassatt’s Color Prints by By Christina Taylor, paper conservator at the Philadelphia Museum of Art

And a great video about the process:  Demonstrating Mary Cassatt's Color Printmaking Techniques

It would be unfair not to mention some wonderfully colorful and free pastels. And a lot of information about Mary Cassatt: a woman impressionist, the only american in their circle, human, artist, feminist. 

It was so good that we did two takes!

Here are some of my notes from the show.

Reading Notes: Beatrice Alemagna

Beatrice Alemagna is one of the childrens books illustrators and authors whose work relatively recently discovered and whose work I keep coming back to. She is on my list of "whatever book comes out I must see" :) I recently realized that I have quite a few names on this list and finally decided to put them into writing and I think I will add these names/dates of the next books coming out to my calendar next year - might add a layer of excitement to a barrage of appointments and meetings that usually populate my calendar.  Do you have a list of things you are waiting for?

So this holiday season I got all the books by Alemagna that were available in my library system and here they are with some notes:

These are some spreads too (please tell me you have a theory of why one of the neon orange jackets is not colored in?)

And here are things that I enjoy tracking down in every book:
A. Polkadot patterns (there are many patterns but I think there is a special place for polka dots in every book.

B. View angles! And absolutely unstoppable movement!

C. What parts of these illustrations are drawn and what are glued in/ sometimes collaged with photos?

D. Faces that look both inside and outside:

Beatrice Alemagna has a new book coming out soon and I am very much looking forward to it! "Pepper and me" will be available in January 2024.

For more of the awesome colors, lines, textures and overall wild and riveting illustrations - see Beatrice Alemagna in Instagram. 

Reading Notes: Books about Ruth Asawa

After I wrote about the art exhibits that I want to see this fall I went down the rabbit hole of learning more about Ruth Asawa and checked out from the library all the books that I could find. The latest catalog - from the ongoing exhibit in Whitney Museum was not available (hopefully soon) but I got 6 others and spent an amazing time going through all of them - while listening to a new (for me) Jazz Pianist Mary Lou Williams which worked just perfectly with the visuals that I was drinking in! Below are some of my notes and some photos from the books - I picked ones where you can see Ruth Asawa working - by herself or with other people - there you can see the environment and concentration of her work. 

Art exhibits that I want to see (fall 2023): Monet/Degas, Maria Primachenko, Ruth Asawa.

I posted about my dream art exhibits at the beginning of 2023 and recently realized that I've been saving information about more art events that I would love to visit, remember, and share.

First - there is the "Manet/Degas" at the Met.

Each of these giants of color, brushwork, composition and subject matter would bring me to a museum many times over. But to have both in the same space - is amazing! And the whole idea of juxtaposing these works of art, the idea of trying to parse their many years of artistic argument, rivalry, and dialogue is something that takes the work of the museums to a different level. And this is the first trip of Olympia to this side of the Atlantic! 

Whether you could make it to the museum or not - there is a wonderful video put up by the Met that will give you a very interesting tour of the exhibit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep_OgMsLcQA

The second exhibit is in the Ukrainian Museum in New York: Maria Primachenko: Glory to Ukraine.

Maria Primachenko is one of my art heroes. I've seen her work since I was a kid - in my parent's home in Kharkiv we have several catalogs of her work, filled with clippings from newspapers and magazines - my parents collected all the reproductions that they could find. She was a self-taught artist with a brilliant imagination and the ability to bring joy of color and whimsy with every piece of work she created. She had a long and very hard life yet it was filled with art-making to the end. 

This is the first exhibition of Maria Primachenko's works outside of Europe and has over 100 pieces including some 3D pieces. You can read more on the Ukrainian Museum's FaceBook page or Ukrainian Museum Instagram Page. 

The third exhibit is in the Whitney Museum of American Art: Ruth Asawa: Through Line.

Ruth Asawa was an American sculptor best known for her hanging wire sculptures. I've borrowed Ruth Asawa's biography from the library so many times that I lost count - yet I could not finish reading it because every reproduction of her work sends me away to work on something or to look at the shadows of something and draw them. I recently saw her "The Faces" installation at the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University and it blew me away with the infinite personal feeling that I got from looking at all the faces. 

The exhibit the Whitney Museum of American Art is showing Ruth Asawa's line works. Here is a quote from the description of the exhibit: "For Ruth Asawa (1926–2013), drawing served as a center of gravity—the activity she described as her "greatest pleasure and the most difficult." Although now widely recognized for her wire sculptures, Asawa drew daily. Her exploratory approach to materials, line, surface, and space yielded an impressive range of drawings that speaks to her playful curiosity and technical dexterity as well as her interest in the aesthetic possibilities of the every day."

I also recommend reading an excerpt from the essay by Kim Conaty, Steven and Ann Ames Curator of Drawings and Prints - “Your Hand Is Already Flowing”: Ruth Asawa’s Daily Practice of Drawing". There are amazing examples of work there too.

Art and War in Ukraine. Part 7. Photographer Alexandra Bolotina

Alexandra Bolotina is a portrait photographer from Kharkiv Ukraine. I think her work as a family photographer is her superpower - the way she makes people interact with each other and the camera, and how she organizes space around them. In her photos, Alexandra creates a whole little world that belongs for just a little bit of time and space only to these people. 

Alexandra's photos were bringing her international awards and recognition and her clients were spread around the world way before the war entered our lives. Now these people are even more dispersed - but are still in touch with Alexandra's projects. 

When the war began Alexandra was in Kharkiv and for some time photography was substituted with organizing help for people and animals. Food, medicine, and support in evacuation. Then she was organizing people who wanted to help as well. Then there were projects helping soldiers in the front, people recovering in the hospitals, and orphans. Projects that Alexandra curated were built around concrete things that were needed by real people. And she documents it in her photos: what was done, and how, who received this help - we see these people in action. 

There is an ongoing production of adaptive clothing for people injured in the war. 

Food and medicine to a village that was just liberated and is standing in ruins with people living in rubble. Wheelchair and medicine for a child with a devastating disability. The list goes on and on. And parallel to all of that photography returned to Alexandra's life - and how! 

Portraits of her fellow volunteers, animals, and families. Wonderful portraits of the city of Kharkiv - I love seeing it through her eyes - with scars but with so much beauty. 

Photo projects - from a series created with AI on a theme of Ukraine to documenting the damage done by russian strikes to projects-posters. She writes little stories that come with the photos, they are translated by Facebook quite well. That is the best way to see her latest work. Or on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alexandra.bolotina 

To support her projects here is PayPal info: bolteni@gmail.com Please put "Support Ukraine" in the message field  or specify if there is a particular project that you want to donate to.    

Alexandra's art is filled with beauty. Her life and work were completely broken by this war yet she creates art every day and it is filled with the unstoppable will to overcome the evil. 

Art and War in Ukraine. Part 6. Illustrators Telling Stories

I've been thinking about how to share the war-time works of illustrators and comic book artists from Ukraine for some time. The issue of course is that of language - many things would be lost without the text. Then two comics appeared in the New Yorker and New York Times - both by Zhenya Oliinyk and I decided to start there and just gather some of the comics that stayed with me the most and share them as is - in hopes that pictures will help with the missing language bits.

So here you are - Six Ukrainian illustrators that are creating art about the war and whose work I wanted to share. 

Zhenya Oliinyk

For me, the weirdness of the shapes, deceptive simplicity, and lack of facial parts that would be expressing emotions make the subjects of these drawings only more real and close. 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CqkHdl3oVJB/

https://www.instagram.com/p/Cqm7V_LIJ0I/

Anna Ivanenko

I noticed the range of textures overlapping colors first. Then I noticed the faces and hands and it just hit me. I think about those faces and hands often. 

https://www.instagram.com/p/Co6uEt0ts56/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CfoHfWkNuNj/

Jenya Polosina

Jenya Polosina and Anna Ivanenko run Studio Seri/Graph.

Jenya's works speak to my sense of being simultaneously connected and disconnected to the horror and truth of what is happening in Ukraine. For me, grainy textures and distorted views make it possible to continue looking at images so filled with pain.

https://www.instagram.com/p/CpCcA3pMmr_/

https://www.instagram.com/p/CilM-vTsm0b/

Julia Tveritina

For me, these illustrations feel very personal. Julia lives far away from Ukraine now but her pain is very visible even when from a great distance. I love unwrapping her detailed, layered, and very colorful illustrations made based on photos and accounts of her family and friends in Ukraine. 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CpAWfVFSPKG/

Mari Kinovych

Illustrations are made with straightforward colors, dynamic lines, and interesting points of view. For me, they are bursting with feelings. 

https://www.instagram.com/p/CliW48jKwtL/

Potapenko Iryna

A series of colorful and sincere drawings about actual everyday life during the war. Done with lots of humor, kindness, amazing optimism, and unstoppable conviction that Ukraine will prevail against evil. The series of "Stories from the Basement" became a book:
https://www.instagram.com/p/Cp9zVWdgUzL/