Seeing Bates’ home studio is like opening a brand new pack of colored pencils: everything is satisfyingly uniform and perfectly laid out by color, and his drafting table seems too meticulously organized to be in actual use. But Bates in person is as precise as his paintings, and he keeps his studio organized to an extent that, like the photo shoot of a sparsely furnished modernist home, elicits a twinge of envy for a level of immaculate attention to detail that most of us will never be able to sustain.

Bates works in graphite and gouache to segment the planes of the face and figure into a series of nestled curves, creating portraits that read almost as topographic maps. He reduces the arcs of the human form into shapes that draw the eye into a constant sense of movement, and the meticulous detail of his linework is so thoroughly exacted that it gives the deceptive impression of being effortless.

His first pieces concentrated almost entirely on faces, and by honing his focus in on the minutia of his models’ features, he shifted the emphasis away from his subjects as individuals and instead created psychological studies of specific expressions. Bates originally began observing the human face because of an interest in capturing variations in non-verbal communication, and his compositions are meditations on the myriad small parts that comprise the whole. His interest in expression arose from observing the ways that people communicate. “There’s something universal in expressions,” Bates tells me, “but there’s something very much not universal in how we read them, in the way we empathize and connect with each other.”

(L) Jillian, in collaboration with Shaun Kardinal; Helga, in collaboration with Amanda Fiebing

See all posts related to Gallery Hijinks

(TOP) The Moguls (Stalker) Diptych 24″x40″; (BOTTOM) The Moguls (Stalker) Detail – Watercolor, graphite

View entire Stalker Series On Jacob Van Loon’s Website

Mount Eerie – To The Ground 7″

Our European friends Atelier Ciseaux are releasing a limited edition copy of To The Ground, a 7″ featuring the tracks “To The Ground” and “The Mouth Of Sky” (MIDI Strings). As with all Atelier Ciseaux mixes, this one does not disappoint, and they’re proving it to you by offering the whole thing for stream, below. The artwork is designed by Phil Elverum himself, and the release is limited to 300 copies.

Order To The Ground 7″ On Atelier Ciseaux

July 12th, 2012 Update
After the records were distirbuted, Atelier Ciseaux asked fans to take photographs of where their copy of To The Ground ended up. Scroll over the image above to see some examples, or see the rest on Armour & Discipline.

Upon first glance, Bohac’s works are complex and psychedelic in nature, full of unnatural colors and shapes. But despite how obscured, manipulated and tweaked they might be, their very cores are centered around landscapes — one interest that is deeply-rooted and enduring in Bohac’s life. After all, it is landscapes which drew Bohac from the Midwest, where he had lived his entire life, to the West Coast.

“I came out here to visit a friend who had moved out here… [and] I just was like, ‘Whoa, there’s a lot of stuff out here happening that I’ve never seen before,’” he recalls. “I’d seen mountains and I’d seen oceans, but I think everything just coalesced together in this area, and it makes these really interesting landscapes.”

To pay homage to his new surroundings, Bohac began with painstakingly rendered tempera paintings based off of photographs he had taken of the ocean. Ultimately, though, it was attending art school and taking in critiques from others that refined Bohac’s style from mere imitation to reimaginings of everyday scenery.

Seattle’s Flatcolor Gallery is taking a hiatus for the summer! But before then, they will be moving out of their long-standing Pioneer Square location (528 1st Ave. S, Seattle), and are inviting you to join them for a folkloric show of Stacey Rozich‘s new works.

The opening is tomorrow, April 5th, from 5:00pm to 9:00pm. Select pieces are displayed below, and more can be see here.

See our interview with Stacey Rozich, Patterns Of Renewal

Bumblebee

The appearance of materials such as stencils, spraypaint, and unconventional installation materials makes sense when one considers the curator of the show is none other than Los Angeles street artist Bumblebee — an individual that really runs with his moniker to create miniature beehives and models that he attaches to abandoned phone booths. In this group show, he pulls his work off the street and into a gallery setting. What is perhaps most impressive about the curation of this show is that beneath its sophisticated facade, each and every artist knows how to get down to the nitty-gritty and how to take his or her works to the street.

Perhaps this quote can serve as a fitting summary for this show:

“There are many artists in the urban / street art movement. For this show, each artist was selected based on his or her unique voice and ability to push the boundaries of the genre, while remaining true to its origins.” - Bumblebee

Hyuro

Valencia by way of Buenos Aires artist Hyuro makes drawings which blur the lines of where individuals begin and end. A heavy aspect of this all-in-oneness lays focus on hair, which she textures delicately and with great dimensional purpose. Expect a post soon about her street art brilliance.