Award-winning blogazine, primarily about painting
Monday, September 25, 2023
On March 31, 2022 Two Coats of Paint contributor Julia Kunin spoke with artist-reporters Violetta Oliinyk and Taras Polataiko to see how they were doing, and then she followed up on May 7. Due to unexpected technical issues at Two Coats of Paint, we have been unable to publish these interviews until today.
Contributed by Julia Kunin / On March 1, 2022, I reconnected with my friend the Hungarian artist Anita Kroo after reading that she and her family had taken in a refugee family from Ukraine. She told me about the experience. Anita Kroo: I remember when war broke out on Thursday, February […]
Contributed by Julia Kunin / On March 19, I had the opportunity to interview the Ukrainian artist Violetta Oliinyk. She has been working with her partner, artist Taras Polataiko, in Chernivtsi, Ukraine, sending medical supplies and protective gear to the civilian soldiers of Kyiv.
Contributed by Julia Kunin / Like most Americans, I have been distressed by the news coming out of Ukraine. I spoke with Ukrainian Canadian artist Taras Polataiko over a week ago, and as the war escalated, I wanted to check back and see how things were going. Taras and his girlfriend Violetta Oliinyk have gone to Ukraine to take care of family, raise funds for, and organize the delivery of medicine and protective gear to Kyiv’s citizen soldiers. I learned that Violetta�s father and two brothers are now fighting, too. This interview took place on March 14, which was the nineteenth day of the war. If you would like to make a donation to their effort, please message Taras on Facebook.
Contributed by Julia Kunin / Like many Americans, I have been watching onliine and reading about the war in Ukraine with shock and sadness. Finding Ukrainian Canadian artist Taras Polataiko speaking out on social media made it more real. Taras, whom I met in 2008 at Art Omi, is back in Ukraine to help his family and raise funds for Kyiv’s civilian defense soldiers. I reached out last week to see how he is doing. �A lot of people don�t realize that we actually have been at war for the last 8 years,” Taras told me. “The word ‘war’ was not used because the Russians presented their hybrid war as ‘a civil internal conflict.'” He told me they are slowly getting used to the situation. I’ll have an update in a few days.
Two Coats Obituaries
Two Coats of Paint is celebrating National Daughter’s Day by honoring Lena, who some of you may recall was the mastermind behind our Social Media Services Project a few years ago. She has since opened her own business @honeyhomeofbeauty in #OldMysticCT. Love you @lena.alohalani ❤️🏆❤️ Daughter, visionary, and muse.
Image: @meadowflowerphotography #honeyhomeofbeauty @mystic_disc #burningman mysticct
Latest post, link in profile / Elisa D’Arrigo: Between the beautiful and the grotesque / Contributed by Kay Whitney / There is a fundamental paradox at work in Elisa D’Arrigo’s ceramic objects – while they are unmistakably beautiful, they break every standard for what is considered “beautiful.” They are small, shambolic, eccentric objects lacking symmetry; they are not overtly colorful and don’t attempt to please. They are humble, not loudly announcing nor applauding their own appearance; understated and private, the viewer must come to them. Rather than exhibiting the mechanical surfaces of a wheel-thrown or machine-made object, her forms bear the imprint of her hands and in that way reveal the processes of their making. If there is any other artist with whom her work could be compared only George Ohr, the “mad potter of Biloxi,” comes to mind. His small “puzzle mugs” demonstrate the same sensibility — simultaneously humorous and serious, their extraordinary eccentric surfaces and coloration are reminiscent of D’Arrigo’s, exposing a shared aesthetic. Link in profile
@elisadarrigo1 @elizabethharrisgallery @k.whtny #ceramics #chelseagalleries
Image: Elisa D’Arrigo, Making a Move 6, 2023 7 x 6.5 x 4 inches, courtesy of the artist & Elizabeth Harris Gallery
“Something darkly set itself at our senses’ five thresholds without stepping over them,” a cinematic two-person show @bonnierskonsthall with Tulsa Lovell and Sara-Vide Ericson, is a haunting mediation on the past, the future, and the inexorable force of nature. In terms of craft and content, unlike anything I’ve seen in NYC. Or is it? Images are tagged.
@tildalovell @saravidee #swedishartists #konsthall #theatricalinstallation #manvsnature #bonnierskonsthall
Snapshot: Overlooking the Central Baltic Sea from @fotografiska.stockholm. We saw the @shirin__neshat and @therealpeterlindbergh shows — strange combo, but both moving in their own way. The place is dark and loud — more like a nightclub than a gallery. The bar on the top floor is beautiful.
Latest post, link in profile / Inside: Arthouse art house / Contributed by Jonathan Stevenson / The set-up of Vasilis Katsoupis’ slickly but somewhat facilely resonant feature debut Inside is deceptively simple. A high-end art thief is helicoptered onto the roof of a luxury Manhattan high-rise and, with the aid of a techie accomplice, hacks into the security system of an absurdly opulent penthouse, owned by a high-end art collector who is evidently away for a season or two. The thief is targeting several of Egon Schiele’s signature vampy drawings and a singularly valuable self-portrait. Link in profile
@insidethefilm #insidethefilm #jonathanstevenson #twocoatsofpaint #filmreview #wilemdafoe #VasilisKatsoupis
Surprise: #PatriciaTreib solo on view in Stockholm @galerie_nordenhake 💥 beautiful paintings, elegantly installed ❤️
Swedish-born and UK-based, artist, activist, writer and eco-feminist Monica Sjöö (31 December 1938 - 8 August 2005) fought for freedom from oppression, but especially for women’s rights. “THE GREAT COSMIC MOTHER” @modernamuseet is her first retrospective. Swipe for the image that was considered blasphemous and obscene in the 1970s.
Rejecting abstract art as a Western male privilege, she asked: “How does one communicate women’s strength, struggle, rising up from oppression, blood, childbirth, sexuality – in stripes and triangles?”
#MonicaSjöö #cosmicmother #modernamuseet #stockholm
In the studio of Prince Eugen Napoleon Nicolaus of Sweden and Norway, Duke of Närke (1 August 1865 – 17 August 1947) was a Swedish painter, art collector, and patron of artists. Swipe through for a wide angle of his attic studio. Yes, it has a water view :) #stockholmartist #Waldemarsudde #Djurgården #princeeugen #landscapepainting
