Keith Thomas, Young Liar, 2009. Oil on prepared cardboard.
Most artists I know make work inspired by their personal lives — even if the end product looks so abstract or conceptual that you’d be hard pressed to find evidence of human experience in it. Keith Thomas, perhaps, just takes a more direct route than some from [...]

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Sheree Rensel. Twingo. Copper and mixed media on wood. 11-3/4″ x 11-3/4″ x 3″. Artist’s statement: “Twingo” is the unique and original tweet language of Twitter Tweople. Bio: BFA, MFA, Detroit artist born, NOW living and loving my art life in the real and virtual Universe.
If you’re following St. Petersburg artist Sheree Rensel on [...]

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Tes One’s spray-paint-on-wood painting measures 10-ft. by 11-ft.
You know what they say: when the going gets tough, the tough get…bigger?
Despite the ongoing economic malaise—which seems to find Florida in a particularly compromising position—St. Petersburg artist and art party impresario John Vitale isn’t giving up. Though the muralist and owner of Vitale Studio recently downsized [...]

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Bruce Marsh, Riverwall (detail). Photo by Megan Voeller.
Downtown Tampa’s Riverwalk gained a public art cornerstone recently with the installation of Bruce Marsh’s Riverwall– a 40-foot long mural composed of photographic images of the Hillsborough River. Fired into porcelain enamel on steel plates, the images show the river– a 54-mile long waterway integral to the region’s [...]

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Rumors of a Sarah Jessica Parker-produced reality TV show – think Project Runway for visual artists – have finally been confirmed, and a round of regional casting calls held over the next two weeks will determine the series’ first round of participants. Aspiring Tampa-based contenders can head to Miami for next Tuesday’s try-outs at Fredric [...]

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Image courtesy Polk Museum of Art
This weekend, the Polk Museum of Art celebrates the debut of its recently acquired Art-O-Mat with an interactive talk by Art-O-Mat founder and creator Clark Whittington.
Whittington, a conceptual artist based in Winston-Salem, NC, first hatched the Art-O-Mat idea for an exhibition in 1997, when he transformed a dilapidated cigarette machine [...]

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Andy Warhol. Flowers (1970), screenprint. ©The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts/ARS, NY. On Loan from Bank of America’s Art in Our Communities Program.
At the outset of writing anything about Andy Warhol, it seems like a sure bet that nothing new can be said. Nothing, anyway, that hasn’t already been better articulated by scholars, [...]

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Neverne Covington’s drawing, Portrait of Bob Devin Jones (detail), 2005. (Pictured below left: Covington’s Portrait of Dave Ellis. Pictured below right: the complete portrait of Jones, which measures 45″ x 88″.)
Since April, St. Petersburg’s Studio@620 has been unfurling a series of events designed to celebrate the multidisciplinary arts venue’s fifth birthday. Following a gospel [...]

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Wallpaper design (detail) by Anthony Zollo. Image courtesy of the artist.
For a couple of years now, Florida Craftsmen has been organizing a series of exhibitions that explore a single theme: living with art and fine craft. Despite their conceptual commonality, the exhibits couldn’t be more diverse. At Home With Crafts, the inaugural effort in 2007, [...]

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Ruud Van Empel. World #1. 2005, cibachrome/dibond/plexiglass. Copyright Ruud Van Empel, courtesy George Eastman House.
Given the breezy brightness of this spring’s weather, you could be forgiven for imagining that west central Florida constitutes a little slice of paradise — especially in the manicured gardens outside the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in [...]

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Roger Chamieh. Eventually You Will Say Something of Interest (detail). PVC tubing, paper, and Plexiglass.
[This review of Chamieh’s solo exhibition at Three04 in West Tampa is by guest contributor Kurt Piazza. - MV]
Roger Chamieh: New Work
Closing reception Fri., May 22, 7-9 p.m.
Three04
1906 N. Armenia Ave., #211, Tampa
813-260-0130
Roger Chamieh’s sculptures defy the laws of gravity, [...]

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Image courtesy Isabel Czerwenka-Wenkstetten and Leslie Fry
Tuesday evening marks the public debut of a collaborative project between St. Petersburg-based artist Leslie Fry and Austrian artist Isabel Czerwenka-Wenkstetten at the Studio@620. The pair met via email and Skype earlier this year then teamed up for an intense, ten-day collaboration in St. Petersburg. During Tuesday’s opening reception [...]

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