Sally; Representational

Full portfolio at my website: sallyfamacochrane.com

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A sketch of some dried flowers from this winter.

16″ x 16″, oil on panel

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Still Life with Bread, Cheese, Olives, and Prosciutto. 

6″x18″, oil on panel.

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A little landscape sketch from this winter.

Snow Fences on the Lakefront. 8″x8″.

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Cardinals. 12″x24″. Oil on panel.

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Portrait of my sister, Lydia. Animator, Aviphile. 24″ x 48″, oil on panel, 2016. (With details because this was impossible to photograph).

Inspired by Lydia’s animated short, Midge the Pidge. Her incredible work can be seen at her website: http://www.lydiafama.com/

Lyd is not only brilliant and talented, but passionate about her art and an admirably diligent worker. She might be nine years my junior but she’s my role model. I hope I get another chance to paint her portrait--I don’t think I did her justice! (She’s way cuter than this). The dress here was made by my great grandmother for my great aunt’s engagement party... so this represents all kinds of Fama female work.

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“Memory,” 18″24″, oil on panel, 2016.

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I’m getting around to posting some photos of old paintings...

This little still life (18″ x 6″) was part of my cancer series last year. The etymology for “cancer” is the same as the Greek word for “crab.”The two curling ribbons are meant to be visually analogous to the two-sided strands of DNA--with cancer “sitting in” the gene. The label on the bottle reads “BRCA,” and the black liquid spilling out of it is meant to be reminiscent of “black bile,” historically hypothesized to be responsible for the growth of cancer.

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Eleventh Street Arts is an exhibition space for contemporary visual art in Long Island City, New York.

I will have some new paintings in this exhibition at Eleventh Street Arts, opening this Friday! There will also be an artist’s talk night on April 20th and a panel on May 4th. If you’re in New York and want to see the work of the Resident Artists at the Grand Central Atelier, and hear us talk about our work, please come by! 

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Cancer, Written in our Genes Oil on canvas, 25"x39" 2016 The potential for cancer is inherent in our genome. Though external factors may turn genes on or off inappropriately, "causing" cancer, the possibility for the disease is written in our own genetic code, in genes that when functioning properly govern cell growth, maintenance, and death. In this way, cancer is strongly tied to aging, because each cellular division increases the chance of mutation. This painting is meant to visually describe this personal tie we all have to cancer and aging. The crab -- the etymological root of cancer -- is hidden under the rock, like hidden oncogenes. The forlorn look on the model's face evokes the worry (but ultimate helplessness) we have to prevent aging and disease. Her body is wrapped up in a billowing cloth, on which is written (in red, echoed in the blood dripping from one finger) sections of bases from genetic code.

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Death and the Maiden oil on canvas, 22"x34" 2016 "Death and the Maiden" is a motif that extends back at least to Hans Baldung's painting on the subject in 1517. The juxtaposition of a young, healthy woman and a looming skeleton emphasizes the unpredictability and suddenness of death -- that such a dramatic transformation can occur in a short amount of time (or in the painting, a small visual space). In my take on the subject, I have included references to the effort to ward off death: the alchemical circle in the background was an effort to prolong and restore life by balancing the humors, while the boiling flask represents modern medicine's chemical experiments. The vapors from the boiling flask form the snake from the rod of asclepius, which is the symbol associated with medicine.

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BRCA diptych oil on two panels, 18"x36" each 2015-2016 I finally finished the second panel to go with the painting in my last post! Since there were detail shots of the right panel in that last post, here are detail shots of the left panel. 

This diptych was inspired by the two most common types of female cancers caused by the BRCA mutations -- breast and ovarian cancer. A visual description of these cancers is embedded in a narrative of a bakery scene, while both figures look around a corner into the dark unknown: on the right, the bread held at chest-level is "dissected" to look like mammograms, and the jam spread to evoke the trauma of mastectomy; while on the left the figure wipes flour from her hands in a pattern like an ultrasound image, used to detect ovarian abnormalities. Both figures wear headscarves with patterns meant to be reminiscent of cells with spiraling outward patterns like metastases. The pattern is repeated on the cloth ties around their ankles, demonstrating the spread throughout the body, while gold arm bracelets have the symbol of cancer on them. On the ground on the left skulls modeled on the Mayan wall of skulls documenting their victims (called tzompantli) crumbles by her feet, while on the ground on the right the spilled flour and broken egg echo a similar kind of destruction of life and resources. 

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Agatha (Allegory of Breast Cancer) oil on panel, 18" x 36" 2015

Saint Agatha is the patron saint of breast cancer because she had her breasts cut off during her martyrdom. In art history she has often been portrayed holding her breasts on a tray. Here, the connection with mastectomy and cancer is made through symbolism: the bread is "dissected" to look like mammograms; the crabs in the cornices on the doorway and the crab symbol in her armband refer to "cancer" (etymologically); the pattern in the headscarf is meant to be reminiscent of cells with spiraling outward patterns like metastases, and is repeated on the cloth tie around the ankle, showing it spreading throughout the body. The figure is looking into the dark unknown, while skulls -- from the Mayan wall of skulls called tzompantli -- crumble by her feet. 

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Personal: why I'm not into my birthday

It's always a pleasure to hear from people, and I appreciate messages from friends and family. But honestly I would ALWAYS like little notes from people I love, because I love them. I don't, however, like my birthday. Why? Because I don't really understand what it means and it sends me into a little existential crisis. What THING is turning 27? Not the assemblage of matter that is my body: nearly all the cells have died and been replaced many times. Not a stream of consciousness: I didn't start forming memories until I was 4, they're spotty for a decade after that, and the brain doesn't fully "wire" itself for complete self-awareness and control until the late 20's. "My" body has been constantly exchanging molecules, and "my" memories are often fallible and fabricated. So what IS consistent about this thing "me"? Just the genetic code that directs formation of new cells from new molecules? That's not something I can be proud of, or even know. So in the end, my body, my consciousness, just feels like the incidental by-product of the self-promoting work of a stranger--the deoxyribonucleic acid in each cell--making sure its code exists. I'd much rather celebrate accomplishments and events than birthdays. And I'd much rather tell the people around me I love them frequently and whenever I feel like it than on arbitrary days of the year. Because then I don't have to panic about my unexistence.

[art-is-art-is-art]

Air, Guiseppe Arcimboldo

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Lydiallama, bird alert.

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Sweaty, sunburnt, and scarred: Summer Selfie Sketch, 2015. (Plus progress pictures).

I had two weeks between finishing my last big painting and moving, so I decided to entertain myself while I packed by doing a little self portrait on a scrap piece of canvas. These are the progress pictures. I experimented with a light source behind me as well as a source in front.

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Discovering the Microbiome Oil on gessobord, 30" x 40" 2014-2015

The "microbiome" is the collection of microorganisms (and their genetic material) that are present in the human body. In this painting, inspired by Nature Unveiling Herself Before Science by Louis-Ernst Barrias (1899), the harmonious growth of bacteria in and on our bodies is metaphorically echoed by the moss on the back wall, the fungi-encrusted trees, and the wildflowers on the ground. The transparent veil is pattered with circles and lines meant to evoke bacteria under the microscope, and is tied in a sash in the shape of a colon -- one of the organs whose health is most affected by the colonies of bacteria that live symbiotically with us. (And note the thread in the place of the appendix). The pendent on the dress is a petri dish growing a culture of bacteria.

(I started this painting last fall and didn’t finish or post it until now. There is a lot I don’t like about it, and I had given up on it. But in an effort to be honest and transparent... and to force myself to finish projects... I threw on some wildflowers and here it is).

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The Organic Body 2015 Oil on panel, 12"x36"

As someone with a chronic illness, I often feel betrayed by my body. It's a temporary conglomeration of organic materials. This painting, inspired by Hans Holbein the Younger's The Body of the Dead Christ in the Tomb (1520-1522), explores the paradoxical permanence and impermanence of our selves and our bodies.

The cutaway of the ground with burrowing animals and the tuberous root system of the lily shows how the process of decomposition returns nutrients to the cycle of life. Mushrooms, shown at the head and feet, help in recycling organic materials. While white lilies are associated with death, here tiger lilies are meant to give death a more chromatic -- and energetic -- characterization, and are shown in multiple stages of life: pre-bloom, full-bloom, and withering. The slab of fossils behind the body (all based on studies from the Field Museum in Chicago!), shows how bodies can be accidentally and beautifully preserved, despite their brief life. And the clouds above are meant to give the feeling of how the meteorological "life" of the planet will continue observed or unobserved, over millennia.

To me fossils show how small, brief and unimportant our lives are in the bigger picture, but also act like metaphors for how we can leave a lasting, beautiful impression hidden in the world -- maybe with our works rather than our bones.

(This painting is scavenged from Chicago: I picked the mushrooms from Hyde Park lawns during our wet spring, and personally caught the grapevine beetles shown here in my backyard, where I also dug up the tubers from the tiger lilies. The fossils are all from studies I did at the Field Museum. I may have gone overboard on the clouds, but they were so epic in Chicago this stormy summer I could barely control myself).