Featured image: Works by Ashley Mary

I discovered the artist studios of the Northrup King Building last spring through “Art-a-Whirl” and fell in love with the environment—with the creative energy pulsing through all four floors of the hundred-year-old warehouse. It was a thrill to return for “Art Attack,” another special weekend when the artists open their studios to the public.

I’d like to shake the hand of anyone who has managed to see everything on display and for sale in that building. I managed to get to two floors and maybe a couple dozen studios of the 200 tenants. It comes as no surprise that I was especially drawn to the color-rich, abstract/impressionist works by the following local artists:

• Megan Bell – I was first taken in by her choice of colors, which she says are inspired by the “colorful big skies, lakes, woods and prairie lands of my home state of Minnesota.” Her compositions, though completely controlled by her hand, remind me of the effects of pour painting.
• Anna Dvorak – As an abstract landscape artist, Dvorak uses gorgeous hues of turquoise and green and gray to achieve striking impressions of horizons. I love the experimental spirit of her work, embracing how the paints “interact and intersect.”
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  My favorites by Anna Lowenthal Walsh

  Ashley Mary – Whimsical shapes. Vibrant colors. There’s a happy and playful, yet very complex, feel to her work. I’m not surprised that her aim is to “put the goodness back into the world” through her art. It shows.

• Anna Lowenthal Walsh – I’m especially in love with Lowenthal Walsh’s bold geometric designs: stacked blocks and a pattern reminiscent of a log-cabin quilt block. I used to knit the latter; now I’m eager to try the design again on paper or canvas.
• Katrin Schroeder – From a distance, Schroeder’s work may look like very clean and traditional still lifes. However, upon closer study, one notices that she throws some interesting drips into her portrayals of tidy flowers and applies the palette knife quite wildly to her landscapes.

It’s so fun to explore the work of others as I chart a course to my own destination as an artist. My list of “influences” only continues to grow.