Linnie Brown is an adroit artist and teacher. Born in Portland, Oregon she graduated from BYU with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Art and she earned an MFA degree at the University of Utah. Brown lives in Utah and teaches drawing at the University of Utah.

Tell us about your evolution as an artist. I studied painting as an undergraduate at BYU, and whether it was my instructors or my own personal aesthetic, I feel like I was always drawn towards abstraction. When I look back on my classwork, even still-life or figure drawings, I was cropping or simplifying elements so it was usually more about design and arranging shapes, values, and colors. In one class, we created and used stencils in our paintings. I was really attracted to the idea of being able to rapidly repeat and build up layers. I worked at a copy center at the time (with a great discount), and starting creating stencils from photocopies. After that, I transitioned into using photocopies and found paper directly as collage elements. Collage appealed to me, just like the stenciling had, as a way to quickly layer visual information.

For a decade or so after college, my work dealt primarily with the idea of achieving visual balance. Meanwhile, I got married, taught high school art for a couple of years, had two kids, and made art part-time. Collage became even more important in my work.   I think a lot of that has to do with its physicality—it’s not an illusion of something, but it’s actually there, with distinct edges and depth. It can completely obscure what’s underneath or be sanded back by degrees to partially reveal previous layers. Each piece of paper also brings its own history with it, creating the potential for even more layering of ideas. I switched from oils to acrylic so I could incorporate collage at any point in the creating process. I went to graduate school at the University of Utah from 2013-2015 and that was a challenging (but good) experience for me. I questioned and re-established the ideas behind my art-making and had the chance to explore additional media.

You once wrote, ‘My artwork is based on the idea of achieving a visual balance between conflicting ideas and imagery.’ I would purposely start an artwork with imagery of two things that in my mind seemed at odds with each other: decorative patterns vs. tools, fossils vs. appliances, maps vs. plants, etc. Then I would rework, abstract, and layer those images until they fit together with some sort of resolution. The end image wouldn’t look like one thing or the other but would have morphed into something unique that was a little bit of both. The challenge of finding that balance and resolution was interesting to me, and I think also alludes to the idea of living lives that are full of this type of tension and negotiation. At what point do you change yourself to fit into circumstances, relationships, expectations, and at what point do they need to change?

A lot of my previous work was directed at achieving this balance, particularly between natural and man-made imagery. Some of the recent, rapid growth in my community though, started to make me realize that my environment is not like this–it’s awkward, one-sided, fragmented, and unresolved. So that’s something I’m starting to explore more of-creating a sense of layers of human activity with less emphasis on the harmonious design.

Your work is so original. How do you get started on a new piece? My recent work deals with layers and patterns of development and how we move through developed spaces. I try to continually make/collect images dealing with those ideas so I have a library of sorts to use. I take photos of roads and construction sites in my area, look at Google Earth views, find maps of all kinds, and create elaborate on-going sketchbook doodles. When I’m starting an actual piece, I will usually quickly draw or collage one of those images I’ve found or created and then respond to it. My work is very process-oriented and intuitive, so from that point I’ll add collage or paint layers, scrape a few things back, paint or draw more, and so on—all depending on what I feel like the piece needs as I go. I may have a loose idea, like “all the back-and-forth driving this neighborhood does” or “how do I show layers of time in this space?”, but I never really have a pre-conceived idea of the finished piece.

What’s next for you? I’m working on a collagraph project up at Saltgrass Printmakers in Salt Lake. The idea is that I will make a plate and print it. Then I will re-work and re-print the plate, repeating this process over and over again. Fragments of earlier states may remain visible or inform later choices, but there’s no going back once the plate has been changed. Each print will represent a fugitive moment in time, documenting the changing condition of the plate. Because collagraph plates can be constructed from so many materials, I kind of feel like I’m making a painting and documenting it as I go. Collagraphs are new for me so there’s a certain amount of trial and error involved. A second, side project will be a large-format folded sketchbook composed of all the “mis-prints”.

Visit Linnie Brown’s website.

Like Linnie Brown on Facebook.

Images courtesy Linnie Brown and Artists of Utah.

Salvador Alvarez received a burst of notoriety during the most recent LDS General Conference when one of his paintings played a prominent role in an address. He writes of his new series, “I am driven to make visible on canvas the history and the heritage of hope of a mighty and industrious people and I can see how each chapter of my life has given me the tools I needed to master the line, color, and form for the Joy in the Journey collection.” Alvarez lives in Utah.

Tell us about your evolution as an artist. Like most kids I started with crayons. In first grade I started drawing portraits of my classmates and never stopped. By fourth grade a teacher introduced me to Gray’s Anatomy and I started taking off on the human figure. I was a pretty intense kid and my mother always used to say that at age four I was already an old man. I had loving parents but they were not knowledgeable in the arts and never took me to an art gallery or museum. A door-to-door salesman had sold them a set of Encyclopedia Britannica and that became my window to the world of art. By the age of fifteen I started crashing life drawing classes at the local junior college, and yet ironically one of the only times I stopped art completely was the last couple of years of high school. I hated the art programs in my school and started taking drafting instead, which gave me a great foundation in perspective. I never grew up really thinking I would become an artist. I was just driven to make art. After high school I realized that art had been my one constant love and I realized I needed to get serious. I sought out Masters to apprentice under. I was fortunate to study under Stanihous Sowinski in watercolor and Sebastian Capella in oils and drawing. I traveled to Europe to stand before great canvases in person.

At the age of 24 I had what I can only describe as a ‘waking dream’. I was looking at a canvas and saw through it into a place where I was shown what I had to do. The dream was about the pursuit of excellence. Everything was laid out for me in a way that seemed so simple at the time. I was told that I had very little knowledge, but great enthusiasm so I had to go as fast as I could because later I would have great knowledge but not as much enthusiasm. I was also told that it would be late in life when I would come into my own. A few years after that dream I was awarded a full scholarship to the Masters Program at the New York Academy of Art. That was a time of great awakening. After I completed my studies in New York I headed to Paradise (North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii) to raise my family and concentrated on painting the ocean, the colors of the Islands and did hundreds of portraits. Family circumstances brought me back to Utah where I started working on the “Joy in the Journey” collection.

Your artwork was a central feature of one of Dieter Uchtdorf’s recent General Conference addresses. Last year I had an opportunity to debut the collection, which celebrates the joy, hope and faith of the pioneers who journeyed west. These are paintings that are meant to put a smile on your face. President Uchtdorf and his wife Harriet came by and fell in love with them. When they saw the collection they smiled from ear to ear, then just a few weeks before this past General Conference I received an email asking if President Uchtdorf could use the signature painting Joy in the Journey (top) in a conference talk. Of course I said Yes, but I had no idea if or how it would be used. When he used it for the Great Aunt Rose Parable I pretty much went into shock. The response was immediate, and although there was no attribution, thousands of people started asking whom the artist was and where they could get a copy. Word is getting out. Our plan had always been to put the collection into print, but this accelerated things in a miraculous way. We now have a website up and prints in production. The collection consists of eleven now, but I am adding pieces constantly.

What’s next for you? After sixty years of hard work behind me I am now an overnight success. I can see that dream from years ago coming true. I hope this will give me more freedom to create wherever my heart leads me. The pioneer collection will continue because I enjoy each one I do. I may pursue formal portraits and then there is that epic collection that has been in my brain for years…The Colossus Collection.

Visit Salvador Alvarez’s website.

Follow Salvador Alvarez on Instagram.

Walter Rane is a prolific painter and illustrator. He received a BFA from the Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles and embarked on a career of a freelance book and magazine illustration. He expanded into religious works and gained prominence for his LDS-related pieces. His work has appeared in the LDS International Art Competition seven times. Rane and his wife live in New York City.

Tell us about your art career since you moved back to New York. I currently live in New York City. My wife Linda and I moved here about two and a half years ago. This is our third time living in the city, we actually met and started our family here and the city continues to pull us back. One of the reasons we are here now is to seek new opportunities to show my work and make new connections as I continue to grow (I hope). This may be working; I am involved in a couple of shows that I hope will lead to more. Other reasons for living here include the museums, galleries and over all creative energy that is here. We moved to Oregon, from Connecticut, about 20 years ago as my illustration career was fading. We also wanted to be near my wife’s family while our children were growing up. While in Oregon I started painting for galleries and did some teaching. Then the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints called to see if i was interested in doing work that could be used in visitor’s centers, temples, and other church buildings. I was, and I have done many. The Church owns about 90 of my paintings. They are often used in church publications as well being displayed in buildings. I continue to do work for the Church but am also looking for new venues.

You once wrote, ‘Art is communication. That’s what art is. If I’m trying to express something that is important to me I’ll do whatever I want’. I certainly believe that art is personal expression of my feelings and convictions. That is why commissions can sometimes be a difficult since you are being asked to express the ideas of someone else. I may have been referring to the fact that I think the finished artwork is what is important not the process by which it is made. Although I primarily use painting as my mode of expression (and at this point I rarely use anything but oil paint), I don’t feel bound by the medium or any particular technique. My purpose for painting is to do something that the viewer will find engaging, something that will open a door in their mind and there will be an exchange, a connection that maybe cannot be verbalized or had in any other way.

Visit Walter Rane’s website.

View Walter Rane’s prints.

Gregory Mortenson is an incredible painter who will be opening a new show with a reception tonight at the Arcadia Contemporary Gallery in New York City. The show will run from November 5-15 and includes 17 original paintings from his Haiti series that was previously profiled at The Krakens. (One of the new paintings is shown below.) According to American Artist Mortenson, “Embraced the rigors of training in the atelier tradition. This prowess is most evident in his portraiture, where the precision of description and delicate paint handling give a quite breathtaking sense of presence to the subject.” He  lives and works in New York City.

Explain the atelier tradition. The 17th, 18th, and 19th century artists were tremendous draftsmen that continue to inspire today’s artists. They were all trained in the atelier system which involved a master artist that trained apprentices. It involved a lot of drawing and painting the figure from life, as well as drawing and painting casts from Greek and Roman statues. These systems eventually evolved to the prestigious 19th century French Academies. The method of training faded away in the twentieth century as representational art fell out of fashion. I studied at a four-year-school modeled after this method.

Visit Gregory Mortenson’s website.

Follow Gregory Mortenson on Instagram.

Donate to Zion’s Children of Haiti.

Justin Wheatley is a deep-thinking painter and teacher. His piece Prodigal Son (above) was selected for the LDS International Art Competition. He holds a BFA from Utah State University and a Masters in Education from National University. His website explains, “His work is influenced by his love for nature and architecture.” Wheatley lives in Utah.

Tell us a little about where you grew up and how your career got started. I grew up a half hour north of Salt Lake City in Clinton, Utah. I have wanted to be an art teacher and artist ever since junior high, so I did everything to make that happen. I now teach high school art and have been participating in the Salt Lake art scene for just under ten years.

You once said, ‘No matter what we make, construct, or destroy, we are still surrounded by the presence of what has existed since long before our time.’ During college I studied abroad in Germany and a considerable amount of our coursework was based around drawing and painting architecture. I quickly became fascinated at the amount of thought and work that goes into constructing the buildings we work and dwell in and their relatively short lifespan. Buildings come and go. Cities come and go. From there I began thinking of the relationship that architecture has with its surroundings, and it’s pretty clear that nature always has the upper hand.

You also once said, ‘Suburbia is loaded with kitsch, we’re all living in this kitschy world where we try to make things look nice or beautiful or wonderful, but in reality, a lot of the times, its fake. It’s not always fake, but a lot of the times it’s just a facade.’ How does social media fit into your view of Suburbia? I have long considered the houses I paint to be representations of people. In that sense, many of my paintings could be a critique on social media as well as suburbia. The paintings are relatively simple, but they address complicated issues. I hope that even though there is a dark side to some of my work, it can be viewed in a humorous way. I think it would be nice to give all the people on social media who paint the impression of a perfect life a big hug, and say “I know you’re not as cool as your profile makes you look, but I still love you.”

What’s next for you? I’m not through with suburbia yet, but I’m taking a break and returning to a series on the Great Salt Lake that I started about ten years ago. It’s been enlightening to explore my relationship with the lake. It has been a source of comfort and awe for as long as I can remember. As far as shows go, right now I’ve got a piece in the LDS Church’s International Art Competition which just opened. I’ll be part of a couple of shows next year at the Springville Art Museum that open in January and July. Both shows have work by artists I have looked up to for a long time and I’m thrilled to be a part. I’ll also be doing Art and Soup in February and a September show at 15th Street Gallery.

Visit Justin Wheatley’s website.

Follow Justin Wheatley on Instagram.