Rebecca Crowell
Co-Host of The Messy Studio with Rebecca Crowell
Rebecca Crowell has been a professional artist for thirty years, and is widely known for her innovative painting techniques involving cold wax medium and oils. She has taught these methods both in the US and internationally, and has recently published (with co-author Jerry McLaughlin) a comprehensive guide, Cold Wax Medium: Techniques, Concepts & Conversations (Squeegee press, Dec. 2016)
Rebecca Crowell is represented by fine art galleries in numerous US cities, including Chicago, Atlanta, Telluride, Colorado and Benicia, California) as well as in Dublin, Ireland. Her paintings are included in hundreds of private, public and corporate collections. She has been awarded ten artist residencies since 2001, in the US, Spain, Sweden and Ireland, and was recently commissioned by the MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas,for five large paintings. In 2014 she was recognized by John Seed of the Huffington Post in his article, Ten Memorable Paintings of 2014. She holds an MFA in Painting (Arizona State University, 1985.) Rebecca and her husband divide their time between rural Wisconsin and northern New Mexico; she maintains (messy) studios in both locations. Please visit her website to view her work.
Rebecca Crowell has hosted 81 Episodes.
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Episode 81: Another (Freewheeling) Conversation With Dan Addington
July 20th, 2019 | 32 mins 24 secs
art, galleries, rebecca crowell, shows
Rebecca speaks with Dan Addington, owner of Addington Gallery in Chicago, Illinois about his perspective as both gallery owner and artist. Dan weighs in on when and how to approach a gallery, how we as artists can best work with our galleries, and his number one pet peeve when hanging an exhibit.
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Episode 80: The Inside Story - Conversation with Dan Addington of Addington Gallery
July 12th, 2019 | 33 mins 55 secs
art, business, galleries, rebecca crowell
Rebecca talks with gallerist Dan Addington, who offers insider tips and anecdotes from his years of experience as both a working artist in the medium of encaustic and as the owner of Addington Gallery in Chicago, Illinois. This is part one of a two-part conversation.
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Episode 79: Deep or Wide - What's Your Focus?
July 7th, 2019 | 34 mins 24 secs
art, branding, experimentation, focus, play, rebecca crowell, voice
Intro
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Episode 78: Chilling In The Comfort Zone
June 29th, 2019 | 27 mins 55 secs
art, cold wax, comfort zone, rebecca crowell, self improvement
Boundaries, parameters, comfort zones—there are lots of names for the limits we set for our personal creative explorations. These limitations play both positive and negative roles in our art practice and business and it can be tricky to know the difference. When is a comfort zone serving us well? Would risk-taking instead be more beneficial? Is a narrow focus better than pursuing new ideas? Today we’ll toss around some of these questions --
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Episode 77: Surgical Abstraction, Interview with Steve Immerman
June 22nd, 2019 | 26 mins 40 secs
abstraction, art, glass, rebecca crowell, steve immerman
In this week's episode, Rebecca and Ross join Steve Immerman, a Wisconsin artist working in fused glass. Steve discusses his beautifully designed intricate glasswork, how he developed his art practice, his creative process and the relationship between his art and his day job as a general surgeon.
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Episode 76: Meeting Deadlines Head On - Part Two
June 16th, 2019 | 25 mins 15 secs
art, business, deadlines, rebecca crowell, self improvement
The need to produce our creative work under pressure from deadlines and other expectations is a common situation for artists. This basic idea can seem so wrong—shouldn’t our art be created in our own time, free from outside influence? There are many challenges and pitfalls involved, and we may resent the entire situation. Yet for anyone pursuing art as a serious endeavor, avoiding pressure is simply unrealistic. Today we'll talk about some practical solutions to coping with deadlines and expectations.
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Episode 75: Meeting Deadlines Head On - Part One
June 8th, 2019 | 25 mins 47 secs
art, business, deadlines, rebecca crowell, self improvement
INTRO: Meeting deadlines and other expectations are part of an artist’s career at almost any level, and they're important when you are aiming to make the most of your opportunities. Working under pressure can make you feel nervous, compulsive or perfectionistic, but on the positive side can also cause you to create at the top of your game. This is a two-episode topic--today we’re going to examine various situations that involve creating under pressure.
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Episode 74: Art on a Greek Island: Skopelos Foundation for the Arts
June 1st, 2019 | 24 mins 26 secs
art, greece, rebecca crowell, skopelos, travel, workshops
Rebecca discusses the founding and growth of the beautiful Skopelos Foundation of the Arts on Skopelos island, Greece with Gloria Carr and Jill Somer. They are the forces behind its creation and diverse programming, from artist residencies and workshops to a thriving youth film festival.
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Episode 73: Abstraction In Words And Paint
May 25th, 2019 | 28 mins 54 secs
abstraction, art, greece, poetry, rebecca crowell, travel
Rebecca and Jerry McLaughlin discuss commonalities in poetry and abstract painting as well as how to approach poetry as inspiration in your own work.
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Episode 72: Excellence Vs. Perfection
May 18th, 2019 | 31 mins 25 secs
art, greece, perfectionism, rebecca crowell, travel
Rebecca and her partner at Squeegee Press Jerry McLaughlin, discuss both the pursuit of excellence in the studio and the pitfalls of perfectionsim in this episode (recorded on the Greek island of Skopelos).
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Episode 71: Movement and Creativity
May 11th, 2019 | 24 mins 17 secs
art, exercise, movement, rebecca crowell
In this episode, we consider the physical activities mentioned in episode #59 about what people enjoy doing in addition to their studio work. What is the importance of physical activity in a creative life? Lots of forms of art require physical movement to carry out, such as wedging clay, hauling paint panels around, grinding litho stones, carrying supplies for plein air painting into the field... even sedentary art practices may require periods of stretching and moving to avoid becoming stiff and sore. But the importance of movement goes beyond just being physically fit for work. Today we're going to talk about the importance of movement in our art practices, including exercise but also movement intended to enhance creativity.
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Episode 70: The Importance Of Drawing
May 4th, 2019 | 28 mins 2 secs
abstraction, art, drawing, rebecca crowell
Drawing is something a lot of artists do regularly, but for others -- especially abstract artists-- it has been pushed back to a musty corner with art-school exercises or early work in realism. But drawing, including abstract drawing, is an excellent way to keep your work vital and personal. What is the role of drawing in your work, and is it something that you would like to develop?
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Episode 69: Interview with Keith Wilson: Seeing What's Around You
April 25th, 2019 | 31 mins 1 sec
art, ireland, keith wilson, rebecca crowell, travel
Rebecca talks to Keith Wilson, an artist from Northern Ireland, about his working process and his way of finding importance in his immediate surroundings.
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Episode 68: Intuition
April 18th, 2019 | 29 mins 46 secs
abstraction, art, intuition, ireland, rebecca crowell, travel
Rebecca discusses the role of intuition in abstract work with Nuala Clarke and Joanna Kidney at Ballinglen Arts Foundation in Ireland.
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Episode 67: Responding To Poetry
April 13th, 2019 | 30 mins 30 secs
In this episode, Rebecca speaks with us again from the Ballinglen Arts Foundation in County Mayo, Ireland where she is on a 3-week painting residency. Today she’s going to talk a little about the residency in general and specifically about a project she is working on there, a series of paintings based on a poem by the Irish poet Seamus Heaney.
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Episode 66: Contrast and Personal Voice
April 6th, 2019 | 30 mins 47 secs
art, contrast, ireland, personal voice, rebecca crowell, travel, workshops
This week Rebecca is speaking with you from Ballinglen Arts Foundation in County Mayo,
Ireland, a place she returns to every year for teaching for her own time to paint. She shares some of the ideas that were the focus of her advanced cold wax workshop there, and we discuss how they relate to personal voice in your own work.