Woolgathering

Ruminant, Sean W. Byrne, Copyright 2009, All Rights Reserved

I started Ruminant last spring. The original inspiration was the title of this blog. I wanted to do something using sheep as symbols for wandering thoughts, ideas, inspirations.

Sheep at the Museum of Life and Science in Durham, NC

In preparation for the painting, I made a trip to the Museum of Life and Science in Durham to check out their Gulf Coast sheep and, while in rural Harnett County for my niece’s graduation, took lots of landscape photos.

Following this initial burst of energy, the painting stalled for a few months as life got in the way.

Rural landscapes in Harnett County.

In September, with Works of Heart looming ever closer, I locked myself in my studio for two weekends in a row and completed a painting called Hydroponic Garden that I had started two years ago, but had never finished. This was a strange experience, since Hydroponic Garden is stylistically part of the “Song” series I was deeply into two years ago… and I have since moved on to the “Meditation” series, which is a very different direction creatively. I was happy with the end result of the painting, however, and it exceeded my expectations in the auction.

Hydroponic Garden, Sean W. Byrne, Copyright 2009, All Rights Reserved

After Works of Heart, I was able to turn my attention back to Ruminant. I settled on four sheep in the foreground (experimenting initially with three and five), arranged them in a grouping that felt comfortable, and balanced the strong horizontal composition with vertical elements such as a broadcast tower, extra-tall trees and two vertical fence posts.

In early October, in need of some R&R, I visited my dad for four days. While decompressing, I found myself being flooded with all kinds of random thoughts. For example, I noticed how the once-imposing, century-old barn was showing its age, and wasn’t looking quite as invulnerable as it used to. I also wondered, while watching my dad hitch up the horses, how many future generations would even know what a horse collar was. My dad and I also had a conversation about the Baltimore/D.C. urban sprawl encroaching ever closer, which made me think about vanishing rural communities in general, and the inevitable march of time.

I collected these thoughts and used them as the basis for a series of small 8″ x 8″ works I am calling Incomplete Thoughts. Some of them, such as Incomplete Thought #1, I am considering doing larger pieces of, providing that particular sheep doesn’t break from the flock and go wandering off, never to be seen again… as sometimes happens.

Incomplete Thoughts 1-4, Sean W. Byrne, Copyright 2009, All Rights Reserved

Ruminant and Incomplete Thoughts 1-4 will be on display in the Exchange Gallery at the VAE on the City Market, downtown Raleigh, Dec 4 – 24. Ruminant is Mixed Media on Panel and is 48″w x 24″h. Incomplete Thoughts 1-4 are Mixed Media on Panel and are 8″w x 8″h. They are all part of the Meditation series.

I will post more about each Incomplete Thought in the coming days/weeks. Don’t hold me to that.

SPARKcon kicks off tonight with ideaSPARK, beginning at 6:00 at Marbles Kids Museum at Exploris.

I have three pieces of art in the artSPARK Image Slam: Crossing, Cow Barn and Right Hand Turn. The artSPARK Image Slam will happen at Moore Square on Saturday, Sep 20, 10 a.m. – 1 p.m. Local area artists’ works will be projected onto a wall on Fayetteville Street all during SPARKcon weekend. The Image Slam will also be available as a digital gallery on the their website.

What is SPARKcon? From their website: “SPARKcon is a showcase of creativity, talent and ideas of “The Creative Hub of the South,” the Triangle NC.” Learn more about SPARKcon on their website located here.

Cow Barn, Sean W. Byrne, Copyright 2009, All Rights Reserved

My work Cow Barn has been juried into the VAE’s 20th Annual N.E.W. (Never Exhibited Works) Show! The show was juried by Ce Scott, Director of Residencies and Exhibitions at McColl Center for Visual Art in Charlotte, NC.

The show will run from Sept 4, 2009 through Sept 24, 2009 at the Visual Art Exchange.
The First Friday Reception will be on September 4, 2009 from 6-9pm.

It is an honor to be selected. There is a lot of wonderful work in this show; I hope everyone has an opportunity to swing by and check it out!

It’s been over a month since I’ve posted anything. Summertime is supposed to be lazy and languid but, at least for me, that never seems to be the case. The past month or so has included my niece’s high school graduation (congratulations, Haleigh!), my nephew’s visit from Charlotte, my beagle’s operation, July 4th activities, and of course work work work.

Sadly, there has not been much time for art. I am hoping the coming months will allow for more time. And finding time, of course, is still only half the challenge. You still have to hope and pray that once you finally get in front of the easle, the ever-elusive Mighty Engine will be present ensuring everything falls into place.

With that in mind, here is Neil Halstead performing “Oh! Mighty Engine” off of his latest CD:

Neil Halstead “Oh! Mighty Engine” from MySpace Transmi

Click the link for the lyrics: Continue reading →

When I was in school at East Carolina in the early 90s, I remember one of my Art History professors mentioning that oil painting, though in widespread usage by the northern European painters of the 15th century (Jan van Eyck in particular), didn’t really catch on in Italy until the 16th century. In Italy, tempera was the preferred medium, and oils were initially considered to be some new-fangled thing. I found this interesting, and my mind went wandering off on its own… making connections to similar instances throughout history.

Photography, for example. The first permanent photograph was produced by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce in the early 1800s. Throughout the 19th century, and well into the 20th century, many artists argued that photography was not authentically art—that it was too “mechanical”… it was “science” not “art”. Even today, two hundred years later, there are those that continue this debate, even though photography has been accepted by the art world for some time now.

I think it’s pretty easy to see where I am going with this. Today, in the 21st century, there is debate going on about whether or not the computer is a legitimate art medium. And interestingly enough, the debate often seems the most heated amongst artists themselves (much like photography was a hundred years ago). Continue reading →

We had a great time at Scope: the NC Landscape last night at the Visual Art Exchange, followed by dinner at Caffe Luna. Crossing placed Second in the cash awards—a surprise and an honor! Thank you to the Visual Art Exchange and everyone involved in putting together this show!

If you didn’t have a chance to attend the reception last night, remember Scope will be on display from June 5-25, 2009. There are a lot of really wonderful pieces in this show to see!

Some happy snaps from last night:

Pati Crowe Schetzina, Artist Grace Li Wang and me

Click the link for more photos and the full list of Award winners! Continue reading →

Right Hand Turn, Sean W. Byrne, Copyright 2009, All Rights Reserved

For those of you who may not know, my father is an organic farmer in Seven Valleys, PA. (I did a series of paintings of the farm a number of years ago that are in the Celtic Springs Farm gallery on my website.) Right Hand Turn was inspired by two photos taken on a trip to the farm in 2007: Continue reading →

I am very excited to announce that I have been selected as one of the Visual Art Exchange’s exhibiting artists for the month of December 2009. I will be showing work in the VAE Exchange Gallery along with fellow artists Alia E. El-Bermani, Kathy Brancato, Janet Harrell, and Mary Ann Scherr.

The reception for this show will be Friday, December 4, 2009 from 6 – 9 pm.

You may read more about the The Exchange Gallery here.

Visual Art Exchange 325 Blake St. Raleigh, North Carolina 27601

Thank you to the everyone at the VAE!

Crossing, Sean W. Byrne, Copyright 2009, All Rights Reserved

Crossing has been juried into the Visual Art Exchange’s upcoming show Scope: the NC Landscape. The show was juried by David Steel, Curator of the European Collection, North Carolina Museum of Art and will run from June 5-25, 2009.

The reception will be Friday, June 5, 2009 from 6-9 pm at the Visual Art Exchange on the City Market in downtown Raleigh. Come one, come all!

More information about Scope is available here on the Visual Art Exchange website. My previous posting about Crossing is located here.

Field #1, Sean W. Byrne, Copyright 2009, All Rights Reserved

A typical flat field you would see in eastern NC, punctuated by a flock of blackbirds.

“At the sight of blackbirds
Flying in a green light,
Even the bawds of euphony
Would cry out sharply.”

— Wallace Stevens, Thirteen Ways Of Looking At A Blackbird

Field #1 is part of the Meditation series and is 32″w x 16″h, mixed media on hardboard tiles.