Anita Collins, Eclectix Interview 14

The lovely Anita

“When I sculpted a girl, she was so cute I couldn’t bring myself to slaughter her. Later – on a new piece, I went for it. The right element popped in when the time was right.” 

Kush by Anita Collins

Anita (also known as Sleetwealth) creates indescribably realistic, fantastically impossible and hauntingly beautiful sculptures. The flesh of her beings have sumptuous, luminous and sweaty skin textures, making them human and vulnerable. Some have the remains of a white powder, hinting of forgotten stage makeup or shroud residue. Her coloring is subtle yet punchy, strong where it needs to be and fading to realism elsewhere, emotions flow – lips wetted and eyes tearing up. The elegant arrangement and added touches of decor, tattered fabrics and jewelry are artfully and tastefully edited. These are poetic works, tactile souls that ache – with a dash of art nouveau and well loved ghosts. Anita is a master at what she does and it shows-   she’s at the top of her class and a huge favorite of mine. You may remember some of her works from Eclectix’s  “All Dolled Up” exhibit. We are proud to have this chance to share some Anita with you…

Eternal Dreamer - Anita Collins

Can you tell us where you were born and a little history about your childhood?  I was born in Maryland,but my earliest memories are of the attic space of a Chinese embassy we rented in DC. What did you do up there? I usually was stringing necklaces out of colorful resistors, playing with a rubber sloth toy or watching the street from a tiny window at the top of the house.

Anita Collins

Where do you live now? And how do you feel your environment affects your art? I live in a tiny mountain community outside of Bakersfield, CA. Famous for a woman’s prison and windmills. It’s beautiful in a desolate way. I suppose you can see it in my art – the feral, sparse and apocalyptic overtones of this land.

Flame & Ash by Anita Collins

Is there an event or experience that helped form who you are today? Loneliness , isolation, closeness with nature. And a hunger for reading about things outside my own reality. I made my friends and I have a vivid imaginary world.

Leadwings - Anita Collins

What was first piece of art that you remember creating? The media? It started so early I don’t remember my first but, at age 10, I made a doll of wire, cloth and string. I called him “Mr Broken” – he had bandages round his head and a cast on his arm. Do you have a pic of him? I no longer have him nor did I get any pictures. My mom kept some of my odd fruit and vegetable people. Made from snips of cloth and stuffed with toilet paper.

Alice by Anita Collins

What generally inspires you to create a piece? The human body- its strengths and base weaknesses. Its crude decaying matter and its spirit, will and light. Worn materials of any kind spark me.

Ron Mueck's art

If there was an artist, dead or alive, that you could spend 24 hours with; who would it be and what would you do? Just one?!!! OMG hard!! Like asking which food would I like to eat the rest of my life! It would be great to meet a figurative sculptor like Ron Mueck. (above) Watch him work, pick his brain, etc. And I’ve always wanted to visit the crazy studio of someone that’s just crammed with good stuff !

Flying Yeti by Anita Collins

What materials, specific brand of paint/glue/pencil do you prefer to use? A favorite? And why?  Genesis heat set oils. because I love oil paint and it allows me to paint spontaneous layers with a heat gun.

Colorless World by Anita Collins

Is there a technique, procedure or tip that you have discovered, you could pass onto other artists?  I think it’s helpful to be open to all mediums and crafts. The knowledge inspires improvisation.

Lambsy Divey by Anita Collins

What is your favorite word? “Peace” because the word itself is relaxing and makes me visualize. Any favorite songs or musicians that you listen to while you work? I sometimes listen to the Silent Hill Homecoming, Coleen, Antenne, some ambient-like stuff, but I most often like to work in the wee hours with silence.

Rene Lalique's dragonfly pin

If you could pick one piece of art to own, out of the world’s museums, personal collections and galleries, what would it be? Rene Lalique’s dragonfly pin (above) or any jewelry designed by Lalique.

Scarlet and Matilda by Anita Collins

Of all the exhibits and shows you have been in, are there a few that stand out in your mind as far as the overall quality of work? Abnormals Gallery in Berlin. New nude photography. No boundaries! (Link to gallery)

Unigirl Song by Anita Collins

Of all your works, what is your own personal favorite? What was the thought or vision behind the work and why is it your favorite? Unigirl Song (above).  I had this vision of a girl with her head split open and all the ornate designs inside. When I sculpted a girl she was so cute I couldn’t bring myself to slaughter her. Later- on a new piece, I went for it. The right element popped in when the time was right. A unicorn horn forcing its way out of the fissure.

Arctic Mermaid by Anita Collins

What is your biggest dream or fantasy?  My biggest dream would be to find the portal that goes to the other side, create an anchor so I can go back and forth between places, but I’d probably end up staying there most of the time.

Lolirott by Anita Collins

Last words?  Bloom where you are planted, go through doors that open…

For more Anita…

Her Blog: Sleetwealth  –  On DeviantArt: Sleetwealth -  On FaceBook

LINK to the current Eclectix website – art news & exhibit listings

(This entry was  originally posted on 11/28/10 and transferred here –  as we are discontinuing our other blog site)

El Cerrito Art, 34th Annual Show and Sale

Floral Mandala by Barbara Rockhold

Previewed the local El Cerrito Art Association’s 34th Show before the opening reception tonight. A large show full of all different media, styles and eclectic emotions. Lots of traditional realist imagery, some very masterful, a sprinkling of satisfying non-traditional with a few Eclectix artists in the mix as well. Definitely worth a long walk thru and some are worthy of extended ponders. Favorite picks from the exhibit preview are below, just a few, there were so many. With the photography and the watercolors, getting pictures was mostly impossible due to the framed glass reflections, hence my picks are unfortunately edited… 

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

If you live locally try to make it out, the exhibit is only 3 days long, ending October 3rd. Help support your local artists, most the art is for sale at really great  prices.

For more infoclick here.

LINK to the current Eclectix website – art news & exhibit listings

(This entry was  originally posted on 10/1/10 and transferred here –  as we are discontinuing our other blog site)

A Step-by-Step Art Shack From Laurie Hassold, “Bone Hut” Progress Shots

The completed "Bone Hut" sculpture

Laurie Hassold fashions unbelievable assemblage sculptures of organically inspired creatures. She is a wonderfully rare original artist, full of energy and an art professor to boot. To view some previous works exhibited at Eclectix in the AllGurlz show, click here.

Artist Hassold at work on a piece, Credit:The OC Art Blog

Below is a peek at her new work  the “Bone Hut” ( formerly “Fossil Grotto”) and a slideshow of detailed step-by-step shots of it’s evolution. It will be on exhibit in the upcoming Art Shack show in Laguna Beach. Laurie graciously consented to a  little interview with Eclectix.

What materials did you use to create this piece? Bones, steel, resin and clay …

What is your personal vision, the thoughts behind Bone Hut?  There are implications of global warming, post consumerism, and the predatory nature of evolution which resonate as one’s eye meanders through this dwelling. Constructed of remains and human detritus of post-human extinction, the cave seems to be turning into some sort of altar, which may contain an item preserved from the former culture that hints at the appearance of the new occupants. This piece also explores dualities of Dead/Alive, Order/Chaos, Mind/Body. I’ve also started looking at it as an elaborate container for nothingness–obsessive ornamentation as an insecure, compulsive activity to validate one’s own existence. Ironically, all the neurotic layering in my work often ends up feeling incomplete to me–and ultimately the frenetic activity feels more like suffocation and death. This piece has given me new awareness into my process and the underlying motivation for my work, in that I feel the contrast between the empty interior and the overwrought exterior has become the message. It’s like an abandoned husk that once nourished some sort of life, but now stands dormant in a state of mute erosion. Of course, as a “husk” it has potential to become a dwelling for some new life form. In a way, it’s like a painter confronting the void of the white canvas–that limitless potential is as much about creativity and life, as it is about emptiness and death.

The hollow deadness of the thing gives me the same feeling I get when I go to the desert. My favorite spot is a dry lake bed in Anza-Borrego surrounded by the mountains… At full moon the dry cracked mud turns silvery gray and the black silhouettes of the surrounding mountains give you the feeling you’re being watched by some hulking timeless beings while standing in a bowl of moonlit sugar! There is no sound but the wind and if you lay on your back and stare up into the night sky riddled with stars, you start to feel like you are actually leaving your body and dissolving into the environment. For some reason I’ve always dug that feeling–of being insignificant in the face of nature. It transports me and literally incinerates my petty human problems.

Any fun/interesting/frustrating/mishaps/tidbits that occurred while making the piece? I started receiving gifts of little dead things…a dead rat from my cat Ninkie, a dead bird from a student at Orange Coast College, a dead mouse from a student at Santa Ana College, and many beef and pig rib bones from an IVC student who worked at Lucille’s BBQ!  Also–an amazing artist and now friend, Sarah Perry, whose exquisite bone sculptures have been a huge inspiration to me, invited me out to her 5 acre property in the Antelope Valley. When she beguilingly suggested I bring a huge “tub”, I knew I was in for a very interesting day. She had me fill my tub with all sorts of bones from all of the dead animals strewn about her property in various states of decay! While cutting apart and drilling through these bovine leg bones that were to become the “legs” for my piece, I discovered that the decomposition process was not quite complete– which was pretty stinky!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

More on the “Bone Hut”: The installation includes simulated “glow worm drips” like the ones found in Waitomo Cave in New Zealand.  You’ve probably heard about these fascinating critters, but if not, they secrete these gorgeous glowing strands of saliva which suspend from the ceiling of the cave and attract moths.  The moths fly into the strands and get stuck and then are reeled back up to the worms who eat them alive–yummie!  Also…I’ve placed a sort of relic inside the cave which has filigree spider-like legs and sports an adorned human brain.  If the cave was built with fossils from post-human extinction species, it is possible the bones of those species were much larger than human, so the preserved human brain in the center references scale.

The Art Shack exhibit runs June 13th-Oct. 3rd, 2010 at the Laguna Art Museum

Related Links:

The OC Art Blog: Sneak Peak at new artwork- artist Laurie Hassold

EclectixArt: A Look a Laurie Hassold’s Art

A Flicker Set on Art Shacks -

YouTube video of the artists and art at Art Shack.

(This entry was  originally posted on 5/20/10 and transferred here –  as we are discontinuing our other blog site)

San Francisco Art Institute’s Spring Show 2009

 

Took the chance to see some fledgling, fresh talent at local art school’s spring exhibits. Some of it didn’t translate well into the blog format, the installations and pieces where sound were a key factor. Nonetheless, there were a slew of creative works and it was hard to choose which ones to feature here. Didn’t have time to list artist’s names and titles, but wanted to share the eye candy with you all… Shown here are some wonderful selections from the SFAI Spring Show, May 21-28th 2009, Herbst Pavilion, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco.

(This entry was  originally posted on 5/27/09 and transferred here-  as we are discontinuing our other blog site)