Tom Ray's Art Podcast

In this episode of Tom Ray's Art Podcast, we delve into the meticulous world of Sophie Parr, an artist who has mastered the art of hand-drawn maps. Sophie's journey from urban planner to map illustrator is as fascinating as their detailed creations, capturing locations from a bird's-eye view with striking pen and ink techniques.

Sophie reveals how a simple family vacation activity evolved into a full-fledged artistic pursuit, leading to establishing a unique niche in the art world. We discuss her transition from urban planning to freelance work and how their love for maps turned into a thriving business.

Discover the behind-the-scenes of Sophie's process, from utilizing aerial views for accuracy to her decision-making on scale for optimal detail. Sophie also shares insights on the power of Instagram reels in building an engaged audience, with some of her videos reaching viral status.

As Sophie continues to navigate the art scene, they talk about the challenges and rewards of running a gallery-turned-studio, their approach to art fairs, and future aspirations, including a large-scale Chicago map project.

In this episode of the Art Podcast, we dive into the quirky and slightly macabre world of Madison-based artist Sara Christenson, of Bunny Attack Illustration. Their pen and ink illustrations of "weird rabbits" blend the adorable with the eerie. Sara's bunnies aren't your typical fluffy creatures; they're fierce, sometimes spooky, and always captivating.

Join us as we uncover the origins of Sara's unique style, starting from a serendipitous owl drawing inspired by the grain of wood on her patio. We'll explore the personal narratives and life experiences that feed into their art, like the "arrows" piece, which cleverly symbolizes past relationships with a touch of dark humor.

Sara’s creative process is as spontaneous as the bunnies they draw, often beginning with a sudden burst of inspiration that evolves into intricately detailed works. Sara shares insights into meticulous stippling technique, the challenges of balancing art with a day job, and aspirations for future projects, including an adorable line of Halloween-themed bunny merchandise.

In this episode of Tom Ray's Art Podcast, I meet Maria Amalia, a Honduras-born, Madison-based artist with a penchant for community-focused art and a rich history that spans continents and mediums. From aspirations in architecture to graphic design, and finally, to the tactile world of paper making, Maria's artistic evolution is a captivating tale of resilience, adaptability, and profound personal growth.

Dive into her story of navigating life's unexpected turns, the therapeutic power of art during times of family tragedy, and her venture into the world of fair trade and empowerment through craft. Maria's dedication to creating art with and for the community is as inspiring as her journey, with projects that invite participation and foster connections across cultures.

Maria also shares her experience as an art educator, her passion for natural dyes linked to Latin American heritage, and the intricate balance she strikes between perfection and imperfection in her work. Discover her current exhibitions, including an embroidered portrait series celebrating Latina immigrants, and her plans for interactive art tables designed to encourage communal storytelling and understanding.

In this episode of the art podcast, we delve into the multifaceted world of Sylvie Rosenthal, a woodworker, sculptor, designer, and educator based in Madison, Wisconsin. Sylvie discusses their journey from New Haven, Connecticut, through various cities, and how a residency led to setting roots in Madison for love and grad school. We explore the complexities of managing a studio, creating large-scale works, and the challenges of storing and shipping unique pieces.

GG of Green Goodies found purpose and community through art after starting their teaching career. When the pandemic hit, GG turned to TikTok, using live streams to combat loneliness. GG's videos led to a portrait project documenting unfiltered stories of life.

This is an experimental bonus episode! Since it's the holidays I wanted to wait until they were over to post the next artist interview. So I thought I would try a little experiment. I take a lot of marketing courses. And to tell you the truth they all teach the same thing. But one that I took talked about how to build an audience when you are starting out with nothing and building your own product. I thought I would just share what I learned. Let me know what you think!

Visual artist Chelsea Ramirez discusses their delicate, layered drawings and installations using pigments and found objects. After discovering their passion at the New York Studio School, Chelsea has spent the last decade developing her signature style of "radical softness" to subtly resist social constructs. We explore Chelsea's large-scale piece "The White Room," her home studio practice, and upcoming projects expanding her ethereal aesthetic.

Pat Henzy has been creating art since he was young, covering his walls with drawings and finding inspiration in the artistic films of the 80s and 90s. While art remained a hobby for years, Pat eventually started posting illustrations on Instagram. By tagging breweries in these beer-inspired posts, Pat landed their first commission. From there, social media connections and engagement snowballed into designing beer labels, skateboard graphics, and prints. Hear the story of how Pat built this business and some tips for turning your passion into a profession.

Surrealist pop artist Lindsay Kovnat Davis talks about their evolution from animation to painting and their first major gallery show. Featuring cats and invasive lantern flies, Lindsay brought their art to life with sculptural frames made of wood and foam. After a successful debut, Lindsay plans to do more shows, collaborate on animation, and even make a full-length animated film someday.

On this podcast episode, painter Pranav Sood stops by again to talk. Pranav was born in Punjab, India, and now lives in Brooklyn, NY. He works primarily with acrylic, gouache, and watercolors both on canvas and paper. Last time we spoke we talked about the inspiration and technique of their work. But this time around we talk about trying new things and how Pranav was inspired to create a whole new series of work based on just a slight change in what they do.

On this podcast episode, I meet Jordan Baraniecki. Jordan is an artist from Saskatoon, Canada. His ink collage paintings are a mesmerizing blend of intricate detail and three-dimensional aspects, inviting viewers to experience a unique relationship with scale through the use of color, texture, and form. We talk about how Jordan discovered the style and method for the work they create and how they almost gave up on art completely before finding their voice.

On this podcast episode, I meet Kate Rusek. Kate is a sculptor from New York currently working in Montana. Kate Rusek assembles highly tactile sculptures transmuting these themes into abundant maximalism. We talk about Kate's current project they are doing in Montana, other works they've created over the years, and how they create their unique pieces. Some of which are works made out of aluminum blinds.

On this podcast episode, I meet Angela Cappetta. Angela is a photographer living in Manhattan. Angela's creative work has appeared on art blogs, in media as diverse as film, television, and thriving rights-managed collections like ImageSource. Angela's shooting philosophy offers a unique blend of poignant, candid, and sometimes humorous views of the human condition.

On this podcast episode, I meet Amra Causevic. Amra is an artist living in New York. Amra creates their work in a very unique way, the work includes mixed found objects made into materials for the pieces and also uses different things they find that have a connection or a story to them. I talked with Amra about how this all started and the process for creating these works that have been displayed in galleries and other art shows.

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On this podcast episode, I meet Debbi Kenote. Debbi is a New York-based artist who creates paintings on their own unique canvases. We talk about how Debbi got started, how they discovered the style they make, and the different opportunities they have had since showing work publicly.

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On this podcast episode, I meet Estefania Velez Rodriguez. Estefania is an American artist born in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico living in New York. Her work often uses abstracted landscapes as well as non-objective visual spaces that are somewhat open field and bright. Estefania experiments with raw pigments, spray materials, oil mediums, and acrylic polymers. Her painting language ruptures visual spaces to open the viewer's receptivity to fleeting spaces, times, and emotional presence. We talk about Estefania's work, getting the word out, and having their art used in different areas and mediums.

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Estefania Velez website https://estefaniavelezart.com

On this podcast episode, I meet Sfera Louis. Sfera is a painter living in Brooklyn New York. Sfera describes their paintings as Spherealism and works on several paintings simultaneously. With a background in working with music promotion, Sfera has a solid grassroots method of promoting creative work, which has led to making their own studio home to open mics for creatives and gallery salons!

On this podcast episode, I meet Damone Harris of Mone Media. Damone is a video creator living in Milwaukee WI. I found out about Damone on YouTube a few years back because they have a weekly video series recreating Saturday Morning cartoon broadcasts from the 1980s and earlier. And I mean the commercials, station breaks, cartoon lineup, and everything!

But Damone also has a unique way of telling stories through other types of videos and short films they create.

On this podcast episode, I meet Melanie Sartori. Melanie is an artist living here in Madison WI. Melanie is a multidisciplinary, experimental self-taught artist creating abstract and surreal scenes with acrylic, oil and plaster. Melanie started selling artwork publicly in 2018 and one thing that worked was posting it on Facebook Marketplace!

On this podcast episode, I meet Peter Schenck. Peter is an artist living in Brooklyn, New York. Their artwork is abstract, with what Peter calls a cartoonish language of his own world of symbols. We talk about how Peter got started and how their paintings have found their way into galleries and more!

On this podcast episode, I meet Drew Sternitzky. Drew is an artist living in Wisconsin who draws a comic called Mr. Hugh’s History. It's a weekly comic strip about events big and small that have shaped our collective history. And it's also available now in a new book!

On this podcast episode, I meet Stephen Gilpin. Stephen Gilpin has been working professionally as an illustrator since 2001. He’s illustrated numerous picture books, chapter books, graphic novels and illustrations for a host of clients including Disney/Hyperion, Simon and Schuster, Harper, MacMillan, Scholastic and others. Since 2016 he's done a regular comic strip page for Scout Life (Boys' Life) Magazine.

We talk about how Stephen is currently trying to break out with his own comic ideas these days and trying to set their own path.

On this podcast episode, I meet Joseph Iorio. Joseph is an artist living in New Jersey. Joseph had pursued art in the past but somehow it got away from him. Then a few years ago he found inspiration again and started painting again and working on getting his pieces out there and even showing them in galleries. We find out how he has been going through the steps to restart his art career.

On this podcast episode, I meet Ryan Haugland. Ryan is an artist I know from Instagram who I knew as a musician. But recently Ryan has started painting and I was very interested in the paintings they were posting. So we got together to talk about how this new painting pursuit started and the answer kind of surprised me!

On this podcast episode, I meet writer Liora Paniz. Liora tells me about how a combination of dancing and Mediation led to being a writer. And how a vacation trip inspired Liora with the idea to start making children's books.

On this podcast episode, I talk with artist Rob Parkinson. Rob is a graphic designer who has worked as an artist for different companies and eventually went into business for himself as a full-time freelance designer. Rob also started an online t-shirt company of his own called Relik Ragwear where he recreates logos of Wisconsin places from the past that have gone out of business.

Rob and I used to work together when I was in high school at a store called Artwave where we hand-painted custom t-shirts.

On this podcast episode, I meet AI artist billy Z duke. billy lives in California and has been a musician for years. But recently billy started making fantasy paintings using AI. These aren't just prompted that billy is doing to make the artwork. The work is created section by section in the program creating fantasy portraits. We talk about how it started and the process of making them.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet painter, Araceli Zuniga. Araceli who used to live here in Madison is a painter that creates amazing work using a unique mixture of colors and forms. We talk about Araceli's inspiration, and what they've learned since showing their work publicly in 2019.

On this episode of the podcast, I talk about some of the things I've learned over the years about shipping items I sell. Things like setting up shipping costs, the difference between priority mail and first-class mail, creating labels to mail them, packaging, and more.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet Sara Harvey Patrick. Sara is a comics artist living in Rochester, New York. Sara tells me about starting out as a newspaper reporter, then writing comedy with improv groups, and eventually started making comics. Sara is also in the progress of starting a webcomic series.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet artist and musician Christian Bernal. Christian lives in Illinois and is a tattoo artist. That work is also expressed in the digital collage art Christian makes. We talk about Christian being a tattoo artist, starting their website, and selling work on Etsy. Christian is also a musician who releases music on Bandcamp in the metal genre.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet pop artist and musician Amanda Wirig. Amanda creates acrylic paintings, mixed media pieces, and screen prints that incorporate pops of vivid color that leap off the surface and a dark nostalgia for decades past. Amanda also has recently started a new virtual online gallery to showcase their own art and the works of others.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet painter Krista Allenstein. Krista is an artist here in Wisconsin who paints reimagined old roadsigns on maps they collect. The signs painted sometimes have different messages than the original. We talk about how Krista started out as a costume designer and how they started making paintings and putting their work out into the world.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet painter Pranav Sood. Pranav is an artist living in New York. I had originally seen the paintings Pranav did while they were going to college here in Madison. Pranav works primarily with acrylic, gouache, and watercolors on canvas and paper. What stood out to me were the characters in the painting and the detailed patterns of each piece. We talk about getting gallery showings and promoting works and more!

On this episode of the podcast, I meet writer Julie Navickas who lives in Illinois. Julie writes contemporary romance books and is the executive director of The Writing Champions Project, a global writing community. Julie is also the academic advisor in the School of Communication at Illinois State University. We talk about how Julie goes about writing books and getting the word out when finishing a project.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet Michael Filippello. Michael is a painter living in Hendersonville Tennessee. Michael paints landscapes and tells me about doing painted illustrations for children's books. Michael also talks about how going through a major surgery has driven him to really move forward with his art career.

On this episode of the podcast, I talk with Jake Jensen. Jake is a painter that I met in the first season of the podcast. He lived here in Madison and since we last spoke he had moved out of town to Beaver Dam and found some great artistic opportunities there. We catch up and talk about what Jake's been doing, getting involved in art walk pop-ups, and getting a new studio.   

On this episode of the podcast, I meet illustrator Casey Hulbott. Casey lives here in Madison WI. I've run into Casey around town many times over the years. Casey creates drawings and prints in pencil and ink. We talk about how Casey started a website and recently began showing artwork they make to the public. We also discussed when Casey started doing pop-up markets and how they got involved.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet writer and publisher Rod Garcia. Rod lives in Arizona and is a writer and their most recent series of books is called "indGame" in the YA genre. Rod also runs a publishing company for authors called Epiphanymill Publishing. We talk about writing books, promoting them, and what it takes to run your own publishing company.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet webcomic artist Ryan Roberts. Ryan lives in Dallas, Texas, and has a comic series called Bonebag Comics. He created Bonebag Comics back in early 2012. He has spent much of his time honing his skills as a graphic artist and as an Illustrator.

We talk about making comics and promoting your own stuff and I even have a small rant during the conversation about the never-ending hashtag bots on Instagram.

On this episode of the podcast, I talk with Eylul Dogruel an artist from Istanbul, Turkey. I went to Prague to talk at the Ubuntu Summit to talk about being an open-source musician and Eylul was also there to do a talk about creating art. We spoke a few times but we never really had any time to really sit down and talk for an extended period of time. So I asked Eylul to come on the podcast and talk!

Eylul's work focuses on the interaction between materials and their style elements and uses a wide variety of materials including code, photography, video, animation, pen and paper, and acrylic and canvas.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet Hilary Falk a creator here in Madison. Hilary runs Fovea Works and makes natural science bone jewelry. So of course I needed to know how does someone get started working with bones to make things and I find that it all started from an unlikely origin... Cosplay costumes.

On this episode of the podcast, I meet Susan Hensel. Susan is a textile artist in Minnesota who blends commercial embroidery processes with sculpture. We talk about Susan's process, the interesting storefront gallery Susan has, and how seeing a particular blue color of thread sparked the beginning of an artistic journey!

On this episode of the podcast, I meet Marla and Val of Pumpkin Hollow Art Center. They tell me about how Marla started running the Momentum Art Tech on Madison's east side and how that eventually was moved to an old schoolhouse just north of Madison past the Dane county airport.

In this podcast episode, I wanted to talk about a Facebook ad I use all the time. It's called a Facebook lead ad.

It's a way to collect emails to connect with people interested in what I do and add them to my email list.

And the best part? I don't have to create a landing page! It all happens in the Facebook ad itself.

In this podcast, I talk about the different types of posts I tried on my website to get free traffic from Google by finding the questions people are searching for. I also talk about how I found a way to make money from these posts just by talking about what I do.

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