stilllife

Christina Hale is a still life illustrator and painter who's inspired by live musicians. She studied film, painting, and cartooning before seriously beginning to draw. Hear how to create what matters to you, stay motivated, and use social media to your advantage. Check out Christina’s art at ArtDimensionsOnline.com

"We are a performance based society. We measure things in likes, salary, time, duration, looks, followers - we judge everything, we measure everything. What I like to remind people is that meditation is not a performance based activity." - Rebecca Pacheco

Rebecca is the author of the brand new book out today Still Life: The Myths and Magic of Mindful Living.

She is also the author of Do Your Om Thing, which was named one of the “top ten yoga and meditation books every yogi needs” by Yoga Journal.

Previously, she founded and wrote the popular blog Om Gal. She’s the creator of the Runner’s World Yoga Center as well as videos for Women’s Health. She frequently contributes to the Boston Globe.

In today's episode, we talk about her brand new book Still Life.

Plus, 

- what meditation does for your life
- how to stop judging your thoughts and how to observe them instead
- how you won't lose your edge with a meditation practice
- and so much more

CONNECT WITH REBECCA:

Buy Still Life: The Myths and Magic of Mindful Living

Instagram

Facebook

Website

Anna and Amanda discuss the Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction won by Hilary Mantel for The Mirror and the Light and the longlist for the Gordon Burn Prize. 

Our book of the week is Still Life by Sarah Winman.  Winman's previous novel Tin Man was a sensation and her fans will love Still Life, her latest release. Set in Florence and London from the 1940s to the 1970s, we follow Ulysses and his group of friends who become family. Infused with art and paying homage to A Room With A View, this is a comforting read for our times.

Coming up: At Night All Blood is Black by David Diop translated by Anna Moschovakis.

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Credits

Artwork: Sascha Wilkosz

Eye-catching and grotesque are words not often placed together, but those descriptors are part of the charm and beauty in the still life and food photography of Emma Ressel. Ressel joins us on this episode of the B&H Photography Podcast to discuss her practice, which takes inspiration from, among other things, Dutch Master paintings and her own upbringing in Maine. We talk with Ressel about the evolution of her style and its attempt to balance the two related genres. In her fine art photography, food is a way to address the topics of death, time, and decay and her commercial photography of food, wine, and still life has been commissioned by New York Magazine, Refinery29, and other publications and clients.

Ressel works with both a 4 x 5" Toya medium format film camera and with a Nikon DSLR, and we find out why she chooses which system for each project. We also talk about her varied lighting choices and how she came to food photography not knowing much about professional workflows and food stylists and how that may have helped define her look. She is very hands-on with her work, and we discuss sourcing items as diverse as coral snakes and pig’s heads. We also consider issues of waste and overconsumption and how her work deals with those ideas within a commercial context that uses food for purposes not directly related to human sustenance. Ressel also tells us about an inspiring artists residency in which she tackled the subject of decaying whale carcasses.

This is a well-rounded conversation, at ease with the technical issues of using a view camera, literary inspiration, and walking the fine line between commercial food photography and pushing the genre to uncomfortable new places. Join us for a listen and have a look at Ressel’s Artfare page to see her larger prints.

Guest: Emma Ressel

Photograph © Emma Ressel

Eye-catching and grotesque are words not often placed together, but those descriptors are part of the charm and beauty in the still life and food photography of Emma Ressel. Ressel joins us on this episode of the B&H Photography Podcast to discuss her practice, which takes inspiration from, among other things, Dutch Master paintings and her own upbringing in Maine. We talk with Ressel about the evolution of her style and its attempt to balance the two related genres. In her fine art photography, food is a way to address the topics of death, time, and decay and her commercial photography of food, wine, and still life has been commissioned by New York Magazine, Refinery29, and other publications and clients.

Ressel works with both a 4 x 5" Toya medium format film camera and with a Nikon DSLR, and we find out why she chooses which system for each project. We also talk about her varied lighting choices and how she came to food photography not knowing much about professional workflows and food stylists and how that may have helped define her look. She is very hands-on with her work, and we discuss sourcing items as diverse as coral snakes and pig’s heads. We also consider issues of waste and overconsumption and how her work deals with those ideas within a commercial context that uses food for purposes not directly related to human sustenance. Ressel also tells us about an inspiring artists residency in which she tackled the subject of decaying whale carcasses.

This is a well-rounded conversation, at ease with the technical issues of using a view camera, literary inspiration, and walking the fine line between commercial food photography and pushing the genre to uncomfortable new places. Join us for a listen and have a look at Ressel’s Artfare page to see her larger prints.

Guest: Emma Ressel

Photograph © Emma Ressel

On this episode, Kat and Anna share a few drinks and dive into Anna's incredible journey as a painter. We chat about how her experiences in archeology and anthropology influenced her current work. Anna talks about her love of processes and rituals and explains the inspiration behind her beautiful paintings.

Born in 1985 in Sacramento, California, Anna Valdez’s interest in cultural formation and collective consciousness began in her hometown. Exposed from a young age to a uniquely Californian cultural milieu, her proclivity for collecting and crafting a poignant and meaningful visual vocabulary took root during time spent sharing in the traditions and environments of people within her community. Her fascination with the ways in which cultural identities intersect lead her to pursue a career in sociocultural anthropology.

It was on an archeological dig in Ireland that Valdez first discovered her skill for art making. Valdez was encouraged to keep a sketchbook of the site, creating scale drawings and maps. Visually reinterpreting these “abandoned sites” allowed Valdez to explore the connection between anthropological and artistic methods of cataloguing and record-keeping.

Today, working across painting, drawing, printmaking, collage, and digital media, Valdez examines the relationship between material and cultural identity. Valdez incorporates articles found in domestic spaces such as plants, textiles, vessels and keepsakes into her work as a method of storytelling.  Her colorful work invites the viewer to consider objects as emblematic of personal and collective experience, shifting between still life and portraiture. 

Anna Valdez received her MFA in painting from Boston University in 2013. Her work has been exhibited in museums and galleries across the United States. Valdez’s work has been featured in Juxtapoz Magazine, New American Paintings, Booooooom.com, and Daily Serving. Her work has recently been exhibited at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Masur Museum of Art, the Danforth Museum, Boston University Art Galleries, Hashimoto Contemporary in San Francisco, and Parts Gallery in Toronto Canada.

Anna's Work:
http://annavaldez.com/

Recent Museum Exhibition at Crystal Bridges:
https://crystalbridges.org/exhibitions/georgia-okeeffe/