Two New Small Works: Soft Ferocities, Pan Door

This is Pan Door, 2017, 6″ x 6″, watcolor, ink and pastel.

My children and I spent much of their earlier years in a northern Arizona forest. When we went into the woods, it was the closest thing to church we attended. There, we played, layed silently in falling aspen leaves, built forts, discussed mythology, ruminated on spirituality and continually discovered more about each other and the ecosystem of which we are small parts. Recently, my son turned thirteen. It is certainly a right of passage. We now live in a desert city, though the forest remains deep in us. We open ourselves up to new kinds of ecosystems, life stories, friends, dreams and experiences.

 

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Here is Soft Ferocities, 2017, 5″ x 5″, watercolor, ink and pastel.

I reflect often on our human emotional and physical neediness. We are prolific and impacting, to one another, to the earth on which we build lives. I feel, in a way, these rabbits are metaphorical for our fragility, as well as our innate ability to build/destroy.  Both fragility and the powerful ability to adapt our environments to ourselves have many facets, many ramifications.

Thanks for reading! Both of the above works are available. For more about them and my other works, visit http://charmagnecoe.com, Facebook or Instagram.  If you are near to historic downtown Scottsdale, AZ, my work is represented and always on view at Royse Contemporary.

Artwork by Fred Tieken (L), Charmagne Coe (center), Marily Szabo (R).

Royse Contemporary – Southwest Contemporary Today, Closing Reception – The Reaches

I’m thrilled to announce I am now represented by Royse Contemporary, a new gallery in historic downtown Scottsdale Art District. It is a great honor to work with gallery owner and Arizona arts vanguard, Nicole Royse.

Royse Contemporary celebrates it’s grand opening, Southwest Contemporary Today, this Thursday during the Scottsdale ArtWalk. I will be exhibiting new work alongside exciting artists, Angel Cabrales, Monica Aissa Martinez, Daniel Shepherd, Marilyn Szabo, and Fred Tieken.  The opening has been celebrated in Phoenix New Times, Superstition Review and several other cultural arts publications. Please join us on this wonderful debut evening for boundary-pushing art, refreshments and music. You can also RSVP at Facebook.

Southwest Contemporary Today
Thursday, September 14th
5 PM – 10 PM
Royse Contemporary
7077 E. Main Street Suite 6, Scottsdale, Arizona 85251

 

If you didn’t attend the Opening Reception, or would like to see my work again, please visit me at the Closing Reception of my Phoenix debut solo exhibition, The Reaches. It is occurring during this Third Friday Art Walk in downtown Phoenix. Many art aficionados prefer the more focused, relaxed atmosphere of Third Friday to view and discuss work with the artists. My twenty works include never-before-exhibited pieces and some are even in the raw, unframed. Also enjoy some live jazz by Alan Jones and refreshments. RSVP here. 

The Reaches
September 15th
6pm – 10pm
Chartreuse Gallery
1301 Grand Ave, Phoenix, AZ 85007

The Passage, New Drawings

I completed this painting last week, and the title seemed obvious to me. Two figures connect  and travel earthy caverns. Here is The Passage, 2017, 7 1/8″ x 10 1/4″, watercolor, ink and pastel. It is available here. 

Details:

It really is all in the details. I have a lot of fun panning out and zooming in as I work. I always feel there are many little paintings within the one.

Here are some other drawn works finished this month.

Pieces and Graces

Holding a Meaning Together

Bouquet

To Eat the Bread in Your Wild Wakes

The drawing below, made with sienna ink and pastel, is part of my biophilic series, elementals.

Lilt

Thank you again for coming by to look and read.

Thicket

Thicket is my newest abstract and surreal painting, created with watercolor, ink and pastel, 19 1/4″ x 20″.

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I began this more abstract painting, much as I do many, with only a slight perception of where the story might take me. My lines felt very much in sync with how I make contour drawings, but by using larger movements. India ink is a marvelous medium because it is so powerful, lustrous and unforgiving. Because this ink is permanent, creating with it feels like cliff-jumping. Sometimes I decide to jump really big. Why not? This work is figurative in the slightest, wildest sense. I hope to impart a kind of biophilic, nature-needing impulse.

Thicket is immediately available for purchase at my website.

Here are some recent ink drawings.

Oyster

The Praise. This is a drawing from my series, elementals. 

Above is a detail picture from one of my small paintings in progress. This bird found itself on the edges of a lavender structure. I didn’t know it was a bird till I put a drop of black India ink on the sienna oval… and voila. Tweet, tweet.

It has been a productive summer thus far in my new home/old hometown, Phoenix. It’s heating up, but I feel my body adjusting to the encroaching 110+ temps. However, I won’t mind heading up north to my other mountain home, Flagstaff, to cool off and be inspired by the lupines, primroses and wild orchids.

Below is truly an Arizona drawing called Mountains and Mesas, 2016. I made it while living in an alternate reality of dewy, humid nature in the PNW.

Take care.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another Day Opens, and New Drawings

This is a new small painting. It is a hope-filled expression which feels fitting for the spring season.

Another Day Opens, 2017, watercolor, ink and pastel. It is also available to view and purchase at my website.

New drawings:

Anemone, 2017, ink and watercolor drawing.

Organelle, 2017, ink drawing.

Ribbon Running, 2017, ink and watercolor drawing

The above painting and drawings are available, so please feel free to inquire! You can do so here or my website contact form.

I had a wonderful time at the group exhibition Put the Art in pARTy at Icehouse Gallery, curated and hosted by Joe Holdren. The setting is always a spacious and intriguing place to explore, as is the art.

I’m looking forward to yet another upcoming group exhibition at Icehouse on May 5: Figure So Surreal, curated by Travis Fields. I’ll be one on 36 other artists showing contemporary surrealistic work. More on that in the next post.

Here is a detail pic of something that sprang onto paper yesterday afternoon. We’ll see where it takes me. Perhaps this is where it stops.

Every day, I try to either run or hike in the Sonoran landscape. I make a practice to stop and smell the roses… and orange blossoms and creosote. There is so much visible beauty to not only enjoy, but to remind my spirit of how importantly interconnected we all truly are wherever we go, be it a quiet forest in the mountains or a sprawling metropolis. Here is a small dried barrel cactus fruit which must have been a nice meal for a bird or a javelina. It caught my eye, I passed it, then turned around to pick it up.

I am quite fond of listening to ambient music while I paint, or any time really. My favorites are bands like Pausal and The Dead Texan, who allow for a lot of open spaces between the changing chords and patiently allow the narrative to grow. Like clouds slowly overlapping, merging and dissipating. This musical piece is by an incredible group called A Winged Victory For The Sullen. It was put out on the Erased Tapes Records label, album titled, Requiem For The Static King Part Two.

I’ve just finished another small painting. I will be photographing it in the next day or so, and blog it soon.

Happy Easter. Happy newness.

Art Detour 29 Weekend in Phoenix

Upcoming events this week…

Joe Holdren, the talent behind the historic Icehouse art gallery in downtown phoenix, has invited several Arizona artists to participate in Put the Art in pARTy and I’m pleased to be included. This is a group exhibition happening during Art Detour 29 in Downtown Phoenix to meet and greet many artists that live and work around Phoenix area. This will be concurrent to the wonderful show, Songs Untitled, by artists, Dan Pederson, Joe Holdren, Carol O’Hara Sherwood and Onna Voellmer. Below are pictures of their work. The Art Party is Saturday 10am -2am through Sunday 10am – 5pm, March 18th – 19th, 429 W. Jackson St.! Come on by, enjoy the art, speak with the artists, hear live music and have some refreshments.

I took the following pictures (the first one below is by Joe) when I dropped off my artwork last week. You can see that the crew at Icehouse is busy putting up new lighting in preparation for a fantastic time!

With my two work, Awake and Diviners.

I also have these four artworks, two drawings and two paintings, at The Artery, during Art Detour 29. These will be included in the group show with Ladies Who Paint. Also be sure to walk upstairs and view the studios of artists such as  Ann Morriss Osgood and Laura Cohen-Hogan.

Third Friday, March 17th, 6 – 10 pm
Saturday, March 18th, 11 am – 5 pm
Sunday, March 19th, 11 am – 5 pm

It was a pleasure to be interviewed by Nicole Royse for YabYum online music and art magazine for Phoenix, AZ. You can read it here! 

It’s been full speed ahead the past couple of weeks! I have completed the painting, Calamus, and started several more. Below are detail pictures of one I’m working on.

If you have any questions regarding any of the artworks you’ve seen in this or past blog posts, please contact me!

Calamus

A departure, a change, a derivation, a rabbit hole…  I like where this little work took me. I abraded the surface with so much moisture, it curled back. I scrubbed pastel into the cotton fibers till they frayed and my knuckles were raw. Here is little Calamus, 2017, watercolor, ink and pastel, 9 3/8 x 7″.

And details. Some of them from the side, so you can view the textures.

This work is available to view and purchase at my website’s shop.

“Prelude” – Solo Exhibition of Recent Paintings by Charmagne Coe

Hello! I am pleased to share this upcoming show!

“Prelude”
   a solo exhibition of recent paintings by Charmagne Coe
Friday, February 7th
Opening Reception 7pm – 9pm
Renaissance Hotel in Downtown Phoenix
50 East Adams Street, Phoenix, Arizona 85004

This is an inaugural partnership event of Shade Projects (of monOrchid Gallery) and Renaissance Phoenix Downtown Hotel . This celebrates the opening of the West Wing Gallery to host Arizona artists and other talents. Don’t forget to stop by the bar to enjoy some fantastic cocktails! I hope to see you there. This exhibition runs through the end of February 2014.