Chris Ballantyne’s work focuses on vernacular architecture and observation of the American landscape.  Banal features of suburban and industrial zones are sources for paintings that highlight the quirky and absurd.  Ballantyne states that, “Growing up in a military family and moving to different parts of the country, there was a certain familiarity to the kinds of houses and neighborhoods. They were a series of suburban developments built in separate regions of the country, always on the outskirts of larger cities, at the exit ramps of interstate highways, and all very similar in age and design.  My own notions of space developed out of this cultural landscape which was striving for an indidvidual sense of personal space,  consciously economic, and somewhere between urban and rural.” Dysfunctional structures are flawless in their strangeness, made beautiful through symmetry, simplified lines and flat, subdued colors. Ballantyne eliminates detail to emphasize the subtleties of the way we experience space and our attempts at containment. He extends these concepts further by expanding the imagery of his paintings beyond the picture plane and onto the surrounding walls. “Most of my works involve combinations of various places, drawn from memory. As well, my own interests in skateboarding and surfing altered how I saw  the use of these structures ranging from empty pools, sidewalk curbs, to ocean jetties in a way that tied in to my sense of this larger push and pull between culture and nature.” With shrewd restraint, Ballantyne accentuates the antisocial effects of our built environment with a hint of humor and plenty of ambiguity. A curious emptiness permeates the work of Chris Ballantyne. Graphically rendered buildings, pools, parking lots, and fences take on new meanings and amplified significance, isolated on flat fields of color.

Linda Bujoli lives and works in Paris Photographer and visual artist, Linda Bujoli studies light and its many variations. Through photography, she captures light’s broad range of effects to visually sculpt a body, a face or an object. She endeavors to construct aesthetic domains in which disciplines are combined to form a single, collective dimension. Driven by the desire to touch all five senses, Linda Bujoli conceived of and produced LAND ME, a multi-sensory work incorporating music, image and sculpture, in collaboration with the musical group AIR. This prior project, exhibited at Espace ArtStudioK, the Parcours Saint-Germain and Palais des Beaux-Arts in Lille, now finds its natural extension in the artist’s current work. Playing with the technical processes of the photographic apparatus, Linda Bujoli delivers pictorial intention that manifests itself through chromatic variations, visible vibrations, luminescent traces and evanescent impressions – resulting in a veritable “writing of light”. Having been invited by the National Audiovisual Institute (INA) to create a livre-objet commemorating Michel Drucker’s 50 years of television, Linda Bujoli now presents to you CALL TO LIGHT, an artistic display that showcases the very essence of photography.

I am an observer. Through digital and analogue photography, still and moving images, I explore the potential ground that exists between fine art and documentary photography. Drawing inspiration from various conditions of the reality around me, from the great interest in the modern, dynamic art scene but also from my personal experiences, I believe in the power of images to convey the emotions, truths and challenges of modern reality. Having spent the majority of my life away from my motherland, I often return to the theme of homesickness and belonging in my artwork. My approach to picture making is to present ordinary, non-idealised, never staged reality. Such practice is the formulation of an interest in things as they are. By using only one lens which is the most similar to a human field of view, I am capturing the moments and non-moments that drag my attention. I am a sentimental and nostalgic artist and the camera is the best tool to anchor oneself to memories and emotions that are constantly fleeting. My work starts with a strong interest in the moment, light or a situation. The process of looking begins before taking a photograph and continues afterwards. Selecting pictures, printing, making connections, framing or setting up an exhibition space, all of it seems connected to the way of seeing. I immerse myself in the medium fully and utterly.

Andrea Sullivan is a Sydney based artist. She has lived in Fontainebleau, London, Toronto and New York. Her vibrant works are assembled testaments to her travels and their time laboured intensity and beauty are a myriad of these experiences. Her work is held in private collections the world over and has shown in NYC and Sydney.

mother * artist * author * shop owner www.shop-generalstore.com