AIB Fine Arts Blog

Welcome back! A new semester is under way and we'd like to know what you did this summer. Our second student interview is with AIB Fine Arts major Danielle Kelly '13.

What did you do this summer?

I spent the summer living in and biking around Boston. I was working for AIB Admissions, Residence Life, and the Cambridge Community Arts Center. At the CAC I served on staff to assistant with art camp programing for elementary and middle schoolers.

Did you get to make new work? If so, what did you work on? 

I was able to start a few new printmaking projects, but mostly I worked on sketch book drawings and watercolors.

 

Are you glad to be back at AIB? 

I am so excited to have everyone back on campus and in classes. I really missed working in the studios late at night with friends.

What are you taking this semester?

This semester I am taking Advanced Projects in Printmaking, Advanced Projects in Sculpture, and The Nude, as well as two Lesley courses: World Geography and World Music.

Finally, what would you like to accomplish this year at AIB?

Last year my classes were divided amongst all the Fine Arts studios. While I enjoyed experimenting will many mediums I feel as though I could not draw connects between my classes and projects. This year I hope to narrow in my focus as I build a more cohesive body of work in preparation for my senior year studios.

 

Welcome back! A new semester is under way and we'd like to know what you did this summer. Our first student interview is with AIB Fine Arts major Sally Lemaire '12.

 

What did you do this summer?

This summer I worked on staff at an adoptee camp called Holt Camp. The camp was for children who are internationally adopted from ages 9-16.

 

Did you get to make new work? If so, what did you work on? 

At the beginning of the summer I tried my best to squeeze in as much work as I could before I left to work. I really want to push my portrait work further so I worked on portraits of my
two brothers and myself.

 

 

Are you glad to be back at AIB? 

I am glad to be back for my senior year at AIB!

 

What are you taking this semester?

I am taking Senior Studio I, Professional Development, Women in Art, Adv. Figure Painting, and Complementary, Integrative, and Alternative Medicine.

 

Finally, what would you like to accomplish this year at AIB?

This year at AIB I would like to accomplish a strong body of work for my senior show. I hope to really push my creativity level and comfort zone in order to find my own style.

Hunter Sease '11

Last semester you were studying abroad in Florence, Italy. How would you describe your experience?

It was incredible. Everyday was a new exciting adventure! Being by your self, dumped in a new culture full of new people with so many new things to try and see, is a mind-blowing experience.

 

What did you like best about Italy?

If I had to pick just one thing it would have to be the food! But it’s really hard to choose. The art was incredible. I got to see things I never thought I would see.

 

What did you like least about Italy?

Let’s just say Florence is a lot different from Boston. I guess it would have to be the little things that you can’t get anywhere but home. 

 

How would you describe your work and/or style?

My work that I am most comfortable with would be painting the figure, but painting in almost a graphic style, with bold shapes and minimal blending.

 

Did your work change as a result of this trip?

Drawing-wise yes, I definitely feel like I improved my control and revised my overall style when it comes to setting up the page and executing. With painting, however, I was sick of going back to the figure so much. That was my comfort zone. So I started working with landscapes and trying new techniques with mediums.

 

What do you like to do when you are not making art?

Listening to music, going to both art and music shows, being outdoors.

 

If you could work with another artist on a "dream project," with whom and on what would it be?

Where I am right now I feel like I would love to paint with Edward Hopper. I really feel like I could learn a lot of information from him that I could translate into my painting.

 

What was the last book you read or film you watched?

The last book I read was The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone, and the last film was Goodfellas, a classic.

 

 

Get to know Glovebox

Glovebox was founded by AIB alums- Liz Comperchio '06 & Jodie Baehre McMenamin '06

Who we are: GLOVEBOX is a non-profit artist organization that enables artists to exhibit their work in non-traditional spaces in the Boston and New York area. GLOVEBOX was created by Liz Comperchio and Jodie Baehre in 2007 to create a community among emerging artists and to assist them in developing their careers. 

What we offer artists: GLOVEBOX provides a community for artists to show work in non-conventional spaces. Emerging artists can discover how to exhibit their work while established artists can take risks by showing work outside a typical gallery. GLOVEBOX artists help build the community by volunteering – many help by promoting events, curating shows or doing an internship. 

In addition to the hundreds of artists associated with Glovebox events, more than 50 AIB and Lesley students or alumni have participated in GLOVEBOX events as artists, volunteers or interns. Many more have supported and attended GLOVEBOX events in the past 3 and a half years.     

Community Involvement:  GLOVEBOX works with local businesses and organizations to plan art events, most of whom donate venue space. The local businesses that support GLOVEBOX get a chance to be part of our grassroots artist organization and often get exposure through our press. Many of our shows are collaborative efforts, continually focusing on building community. We also work with other non-profit organizations and charities through fundraisers and art auctions. 

What we have done in the past: Since 2007, GLOVEBOX has hosted over 20 shows ranging from the group and solo exhibitions to art auctions and fundraisers. 

GLOVEBOX teamed up with One Home Many Hopes, a charity that houses orphaned girls in Kenya, hosting an art auction. The event raised over $5,000. 

In the works & the Future:  GLOVEBOX is currently working with the Art Institute of Boston to plan an art show for the senior Illustration students.  We are also planning for our next artist show with action artist, and AIB alumni, Matt Cheney. In addition, Liz is starting the Glovebox NYC chapter with several AIB alumni who live in the New York metropolitan area including Nicole Burnor (BFA Design/Illustration). Ferris Caldwell (BFA Design) and Katie Dratz (BFA Fine Arts).  

About the Glovebox creators: 

Liz Comperchio:  After graduating the Art Institute of Boston in 2006, Liz freelanced for design and branding firms in Boston for 3 years. Having moved 6 months ago to Brooklyn, NY, she is currently working at Meredith Corporation—a media and marketing company. Graphic designer by day, artist by night, Liz is trying hard to make the word sketchbook a verb. You can find her sketch booking with friends or collaborating on some installation-light-sculpture. She recently discovered a new passion—teaching! She taught a pre-collage class at the Art Institute of Boston this past summer. 

Jodie Baehre McMenamin: After graduating the Art Institute of Boston in 2006 and starting GLOVEBOX, Jodie found her calling—to run a non-profit. She is now a graduate student at Boston University studying Non-Profit Art Administration.  She also works at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in Watertown, MA in the programs and exhibitions department. Jodie has interned with Maser Printmaker, James Stroud and recently completed an internship with the Massachusetts Cultural Council in the artist fellowship department, under the direction of Dan Blask and Kelly Bennett. Her aspiration is to create a harmonious dialogue between artists and the public and to create art that satisfies the soul. She stays busy in her own artist studio working on large-scale paintings.

Visit: www.gloveboxboston.com

Steve Kim ‘08

"Erin and Rose"

Artist Statement: My interest has been in working with polar opposites: Dark and Light, Beauty and Ugliness, Chaos and Order, Construction and Destruction, Good and Evil, Life and Death, etc. In some ways life is a battle between these opposites. We’re always trying to balance and contain these opposites. Humans are a very complex species and are always dealing with these opposites on a daily basis.


My works are almost like a puzzle pieces. I hide clues for the viewer to find. I abstract images to give hints of what painting is about but I leave the rest of it up to the viewer. I want people who look at my paintings to come up to their own meanings for the painting and imagine the picture and, in a way, finish it in their head. In some way, I’m just mimicking life itself, so different viewers will look at it in different ways because we all have our different ways of seeing life.

"Jill"

Medium: All Works Oil on Canvas
Brief description of current projects: I've been focusing more on forms, movement and the rhythm of the painting.



"Limbo"


"Modern Aph"

Last gallery show that made an impression on you: Cecily Brown show at Gagosian Gallery, and Francis Bacon show at the MET this past June. It was very impressive, just to see the works by artists who have done the things that I've been trying to do. It was quite amazing. 

 

"Reaching"

Artists you are interested in or would recommend others to check out: Lately I've been really digging Steve Huston, Maggi Hambling, Susanna Coffey, Malcolm Liepke, Alex Kanevsky and Hollis Heichemer.
  

"Rembrandt"

All work © 2010 Steve Kim

Elisa Finos ‘10

Mass Four by Elisa Finos

Artist Statement: My art has biological references, though it is abstracted in both form and material. My ideas evolve greatly from original sketch to final product, since exploration of the behaviors of the chosen materials guides the direction of the work. My forms are organic, but loosely structured - a sort of 'soft geometry' - and are created using various fabrics, wire, stuffing, gel and latex media. I am fascinated with how texture can be either inviting or repulsive, and I enjoy playing with such dualities.

Mass One by Elisa Finos

Current projects: I am creating an installation piece for my BFA thesis exhibition in the spring, which will consist of hanging fabric/latex sculptures juxtaposed against seated sculptures made with nylon, foam, and wire.

Skins (detail) latex, paper, acrylic on canvas


Scale (detail) latex, aluminum, acrylic on canvas

Last gallery show that made impression on me: Kristen Hassenfeld created a magical installation with huge illuminated paper sculptures show at the David Winton Bell Gallery in Providence (now closed).

Artists I am interested in: Eva Hesse, Louise Bourgeois, Joseph Beuys, Yayoi Kusama, Annette Messager

Mass Two by Elisa Finos

**All sculptures: nylon, foam, and wire. © 2010 Elisa Finos

AIB's Markus Haala

Markus Haala is attending AIB this semester as a foreign exchange student. He is originally from Germany and is currently a senior at the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam, The Netherlands.  

Interviewed by AIB Student, Kaitlin Butler 
 

1. How would you describe your work and/or style?
   I like to call it my own “New Expressionism.” It is a merging of art history and contemporary interests.
   
   
2. What is your favorite medium?
   Painting and Printmaking.




3. What are your main influences in your work?
   Contemporary German painting.
   
   
4. Favorite artists?
   Daniel Richter (painter), Damien Hirst and the Young British Artists.
   
   
5. What is your opinion of art schools as a whole?
   I think that schools should focus on classical training because it is essential to making art; it would be like writing a book without knowing how to write.






6. What do you like to do when you are not working?
   I like going to the theatre, and to the movies, but not mainstream movies. I also enjoy the opera.
   
   
7. What was your first impression of Boston upon your arrival? Was it what you expected?
   Surprisingly, I don’t get homesick her., I feel like I am at home. The city is very relaxed and the people are kind. As far as expectations, I didn’t really have any.





8. What are some of the differences and similarities between working here at AIB and back at home?
   When I am here I am surrounded by painters, which I find to be very inspiring. When I was home I was just doing a lot of research and producing work only for the sake of producing work.
   
   
9. What is your favorite color?
   My favorite color is always changing with my mood. Currently, I would say it is blue.
   
   
10. What are some of your favorite foods?
    I love seafood and vegetarian food although I am not a vegetarian. 




11. Last book that you read?
    I am currently reading The Perennial Philosophy by Aldous Huxley. The last book I read was The Flies by Sartre.
    
    
12. Why did you decide to go to art school?
    It wasn’t really a decision, it was part of my life.
    
    
13. If you could work with any other artist on a “Dream Project,” with whom and on what would it be?
    Jonathan Meese on stage design.






14. If you weren’t going to pursue a career in the arts, what would you see yourself doing?
    Probably something with biology…maybe Marine Biology.
    
    
15. Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
    I would love to have my own studio where I could create freely and not worry about financial problems. As far as location, I am open to anything. 
    

More of Markus’ work can be seen on his website: www.mhaala.eu