“starting in the background”

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Well, you asked and I listened… and then I called Polish-born, US based artist/illustrator Marta Spendowska! I’ve written about Marta several times over the years, the last time being only a few weeks ago. I received so many comments asking me to have her on the podcast, and luckily she said YES! We’re talking about psychics, art happening in the background, and paths that were meant to be! Listen right up there under that stunning floral/abstract, or you can subscribe on iTunes.

Ok, I am completely in love with Marta’s floral work from a couple of years ago, so I’m going to start there:

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Right!? Sigh. Near the beginning of our conversation she mentioned doing portraits… I had no idea she did portraits, but look what I found in the illustration section on her site:

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Whoa. Gorgeous! I did, however, know about the lovely perfume bottles that were also in that same illustration portfolio. They were actually the first bit of Marta’s work that I ever wrote about:

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Ahhhh, I can almost smell their powdery, perfumy goodness.

Guess, what… more flowers! We were talking about them as part of her evolution from illustrator to fine artist {and it’s just a good excuse for me to show more of them}:

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Yes, I love them. Now, I’ve said this many times before… I always admire artists who continue to push themselves to evolve. Marta is definitely one of those people! These are floral-ish, but heading into abstract… and they’re absolutely stunning:

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These are the pieces I wrote about a few weeks ago… petals? Butterfly wings? Both? Love.

So from floral-ish abstract, to truly abstract:

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Don’t those make you want to play with ink and watercolor all day long?

And finally, a few personal photos from Marta’s Instagram feed. Anyone who loves coffee as much as this, clearly needs to be my friend:

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Mmmm, art and coffee. Perfect combination… add a pierogi or two and we’d be all set! Thank you so much to Marta for talking to me and sharing her very inspiring story; thanks to Saatchi Art for supporting this episode; thanks to audible.com for making my new book into an audio book – it will be out on October 25th! To preorder a copy for FREE{or to pick up any other book you might want} just use my link: audibletrial.com/JealousCurator. And as always, thank YOU so much for listening… there will be more art for your ear next weekend.

Other links:

  1. Walker Art Center 
  2. Marta’s Online Shop





comments (4)

  1. Marc Cardwell /// 10.22.2016 /// 8:16am

    i love this work, simply stunning. and it’s interesting to hear her immigration story also.

  2. Jay /// 10.24.2016 /// 5:04pm

    Those perfume bottles are gorgeous! Just the right amount of detail, too. Lovely work all around!

  3. Oliwia Barczyk /// 10.24.2016 /// 11:45pm

    I am so impressed & you’re right I just took watercolour set to start painting 🙂

  4. Elissa S Nesheim /// 10.25.2016 /// 2:07pm

    what a fabulous, inspiring artist! It was lovely to hear about Marta. Thank you both!