Growing up, I never thought of myself as a creative or an artist. I always thought my role in life was to appreciate art and not create it. I now understand that I was drawing the box too small on understanding what an artist does and how we all create things and influence the journey for us and others. Art is both deeply personal and a shared journey; it is only half realized when it is not shared with someone else. I am so very humbled to have been invited into the worlds of so many artists and entrusted with curating this part of the journey for all of you. I hope these pieces help you push your perspectives and understanding as you move through the next year of life. Please keep creating and sharing, for this is how we move forward together. I hope that over the next year, you make a point to share something you create with others, whether it is a piece of pottery or an incredible baked good. Sharing builds community and what we need now more than anything is a shared understanding and strong sense of community.
Anna B. Jordan
Visual Arts Editor
Liberty 2018
Lisa alexander baron
Lisa Alexander Baron is the author of four poetry collections, including While She Poses (Aldrich P, 2015), prompted by photography, sculpture, and visual art. Her poems appear in Chautauqua, Confrontation, Fourth River, Potomac Review, and Philadelphia Stories. She is an MFA in Poetry graduate of Vermont College of Fine Arts and teaches advocacy in writing and speech at Lehigh County Community College and Lasalle University in Philadelphia.
Image 3
Brian Michael Barbeito
Brian Michael Barbeito is a Canadian writer and photographer. Recent work appears at Fiction International and CV2 The Canadian Journal of Poetry and Critical Writing.
Skeleton Gold
Janelle Cordero
Janelle Victoria Cordero’s expressionist portraits are distinguished by dominating contour lines and sparse watercolor highlighting. Her subjects are often disjointed and unfinished, missing a neck or a limb or a torso, which emphasizes the disconnected nature of the human condition. Her work has been featured in galleries from Washington to West Virginia, as well as published in numerous journals and anthologies. Janelle’s artistic priority is to collaborate with other creatives to push for social and political change. Stay connected with Janelle’s work at www.janellecordero.com.
Red meat theater stations of the cross pontius pilot condemns christ our mother
Alfred eaker
Red meat theater stations of the cross the gospel of contempt
Alfred eaker
Red meat theater stations of the cross the murder of christ our mother
Alfred eaker
Red meat theater stations of the cross the passion of christ our mother
Alfred eaker
Artist statement on several of the pieces from the artist's personal blog: https://alfredeaker.com/2017/10/09/red-meat-theater-the-gospel-of-christ-our-mother-featuring-cheryl-townsend-as-christ-and-donald-trump-his-admin-and-the-alt-right-as-her-murderers-opening-october-14th-2017-at-thunder-sky-gall/
After attending John Herron School of Art with a major of Fine Arts Painting, I have shown in art galleries throughout the Midwest since the 1980s the most recent being “Red Meat Theater: The Gospel Of Christ, Our Mother And Her Murderers; Donald Trump & The Alt-Right” at Thunder-Sky Inc. gallery in Cincinnati, Ohio. In 2012, I attained my Masters of Theological Studies in the Arts with my thesis subject being Thomas Merton’s Marian art. For nearly a decade, I have professionally written film criticism for the webzine 366 Weird Movies, which can be seen on site or in the printed yearbooks. My essays on silent clown Harry Langdon, along with directors Tod Browning and Guy Maddin have been quoted in published books. My artwork has been featured on the cover of Aurora Magazine. I have performed the characters BlueMahler and Brother Cobweb in various art galleries, independent films, and the Gresham, Oregon haunted house attraction, The House of Shadows. https://alfredeaker.com
on sunday
Stephanie Flood
This mixed media piece was made from vintage book pages, old magazine pages, thrift store price tags and random mementos. The pieces were were torn out, cut, and assembled into a composition that expresses myself as a Filipino-American adoptee.
Stephanie Flood was born in the Philippines in destitute poverty. Her birth name was "Desiree Maru." She was adopted when she was two years old and her named changed to Stephanie Flood. She grew up in the Midwest, in the United States. Her difficult, transracial journey in the Stats has shaped her into the recycled mixed media artist, writer and librarian that she is now. Stephanie's first poem was published in a literary magazine in high school. Now a Pushcart Prize Nominee (2015) with an MFA in Creative Writing, her local articles have been published in the Flagstaff Live, the Noise, and the Daily Sun. Fiction stories, mixed media art and essays have been featured in literary places including Helen Presents, the Sonder Review, Third Flatiron Anthologies, the Story Shack, Foliate Oak Literary Magazine, Storm Cellar, the Healing Muse, and On the Rusk. Stephanie's adoptee media has been presented at conferences like AdopTree Project: Exploring Asian Adoption Narratives (2012); her autobiographical MFA multimedia thesis was published in 2014, and most recently, an autobiographical essay was featured this October (2017) at InterCountry Adoption Voices, in efforts to raise awareness of today's growing orphaned crises, international adoption challenges and the impacts of socio-economic issues.
squaw creek pelicans
Sandra Fry
Sandy Fry is a writer, photographer, traveler, retired computer analyst, and lifetime art student. Past publications include Minerva Rising, Number One, a "My Turn" essay in the AARP Bulletin, the regional SCBWI newsletter Borderlines, and photographs in Minerva Rising and The Longleaf Pine. Her blog, HoarderComesClean.wordpress.com, tracks adventures in art, travel, and downsizing.
acyriggs falls
michael hower
For me, the artwork is not just the photograph. The process starts before the photograph and continues after it is made. I begin with historical research and end with the telling of forgotten stories. I photograph history. I look for places of deep significance like a waterless canal lock lost in the woods or an abandoned World War II POW camp hidden in the mountains of Pennsylvania. I capture abandoned human objects and places with story lines written into the landscape. My art is about man’s impact on nature in a landscape now devoid of human activity. The pictures in this set are "Acyrigg's Falls," "Armer's View," "Flow," and "Flow II."
My name is Michael Hower. I am a 38 year old photographer from Central Pennsylvania where I reside with my wife and my two boys. My experience with digital photography began five years ago. Over that time, I have amassed a resume of nearly a hundred exhibitions and publications. My work has been featured in shows at the Biggs Museum of Art, DE; Marshall University, WV; Masur Museum of Art, LA; the Fitton Center for Creative Arts, OH and the Grand Opera House, Wilmington, DE.
Ode to Artemesia Gentileschi's Judith Beheading Holofernes
Jeannie Hua
I thought it was a topical subject in light of the #metoo movement. As a victim of abuse, I'm fascinated with how powerful women are viewed throughout the ages. After twenty five years of criminal defense practice, I developed such severe suicidal ideation that I had to close my law firm even though I still kicked ass in court and looked fabulous while doing so. After recovering, I've been writing and working on my art.
Joseph John Bertand Belanger Asking for the Kiss to Tell how Ages of Love Lives
stephen mead
Montage, 8 x 10 inch from series-in-progress, "From Nostalgia, Through Now & Beyond", work paying homage to the international LGBT Civil Rights Movement predominantly pre-Stonewall. At over 300 pieces at this point the artist hopes to one day create an online museum of sorts.
A resident of NY, Stephen Mead is an Outsider multi-media artist and writer. Since the 1990s he's been grateful to many editors for publishing his work in print zines and eventually online. He is also grateful to have managed to keep various day jobs for the Health Insurance. In 2014 he began a webpage to gather links of his poetry being published in such zines as Great Works, Unlikely Stories, Quill & Parchment, etc., in one place: Poetry on the Line, Stephen Mead For links to his other media (and even merchandise if you are interested) please feel free to Google Stephen Mead Art.
Portraits erotic faces ink on paper 2017 Mauricio Paz Viola DSC 9565
mauricio paz viola
I would define my artwork as a manifestation of self, an extension of my spirit or sub-consciousness, which is still beyond my grasp and lies at the deepest sphere of pure self. In particular, I try to minimize intellectual inclinations when I create to prevent the ego, the fictitious self from intervening, and hence my works are the most loyal reflections of who I am (dreamer, fantasy-prone, sensitive, sexual and a bit dark and gloomy sometimes). I paint, therefore I am. My works feature images of imaginary landscapes, empty or inhabited by unknown beings – landscapes that externalize a constant inner struggle of being human, that visualizes conflict between good and evil, between light and darkness… hence, the best way to describe my work is – landscapes inhabited by my own self, where a step forward is eternal light and a step backwards is total darkness. In a nutshell, a constant theme of my work is life itself as it is manifested in nature, the universe (or universes) and the infinite worlds and dimensions about which we know nothing, towards which biology, science, art try to grapple… in a word, LIFE.
Self-taught artist Mauricio Paz Viola (b 1985; Carmelo, Colonia, Uruguay) embarked on his artistic journey early in life. Dabbling in plastic art since 7, he has participated in various art competitions in his native Uruguay and abroad. At 14, Paz Viola began to participate in group shows and individual shows nationally and internationally in galleries and museums.
garden in the rain II
bette ridgeway
Over four decades Bette Ridgeway has exhibited globally with 80+ prestigious venues, including: Palais Royale, Paris and Embassy of Madagascar. Awards include Top 60 Contemporary Masters and Leonardo DaVinci Prize. Mayo Clinic and Federal Reserve Bank top Ridgeway’s permanent collections. Books include: International Contemporary Masters and 100 Famous Contemporary Artists.
butte
erin schalk
I am a hybrid poet and visual artist. I recently graduated from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago with an MFA in Studio (Visual Art and Writing). I have exhibited my visual art throughout the United States and Japan. My writing and photography have been featured in a number of publications, including Parentheses Journal and West Texas Literary Review.
repair
christine stoddard
Christine Stoddard has presented her artwork at the New York Transit Museum, the Queens Museum, the Poe Museum, the Ground Zero Hurricane Katrina Museum, Annmarie Sculpture Garden, and beyond. She is the author of Water for the Cactus Woman (Spuyten Duyvil Publishing) and the founder of Quail Bell Magazine.
2
alex stolis
Snowmelt 2
A.M. Thompson
A.M. Thompson‘s poetry is published in Europe (Acumen, here/there, The Journal, Lotus Eater, The North, Staple, Vine Leaves) and the U.S. (Ardor, Blast Furnace, Flyover Country Review, Literary Imagination, Lost Country, Mezzo Cammin, Rat's Ass Review, Tulane Review). Thompson has creative nonfiction in KYSO Flash and Leopard Seal; short fiction in Best New Writing 2014; and video remixes online.
Milkweed
Keren J. Weyant
Although a novice photography, Karen J. Weyant has published poems and prose pieces in many literary journals including The Briar Cliff Review, Cave Wall, Chautauqua, Cold Mountain Review, Copper Nickel, Poetry East, Punctuate, Rattle, Spillway, Storm Cellar, Waccamaw, and Whiskey Island. She is the author of two poetry chapbooks, Stealing Dust (Finishing Line Press, 2009) and Wearing Heels in the Rust Belt (Winner of Main Street Rag's 2011 Chapbook Contest). She teaches at Jamestown Community College in Jamestown, New York. When she is not teaching, she explores the rural Rust Belt of northern Pennsylvania and western New York.
deeper into the swamp
christopher woods
Christopher Woods is a writer, teacher and photographer who lives in Chappell Hill, Texas. His published works include a novel, THE DREAM PATCH, a prose collection, UNDER A RIVERBED SKY, and a book of stage monologues for actors, HEART SPEAK. His short fiction has appeared in many journals including THE SOUTHERN REVIEW, NEW ORLEANS REVIEW and GLIMMER TRAIN. He conducts private creative writing workshops in Houston. His photography can be seen in his gallery - http://christopherwoods.zenfolio.com/
colony collapse
terry wright
Terry Wright is an artist and writer who lives in Little Rock. His art has been featured widely in print and digital venues, including “Chaleur Magazine,” “Glassworks,” “Queen Mob’s Tea House,” “Riddled with Arrows,” “Sliver of Stone,” "The Jet Fuel Review," “Third Wednesday,” and “USA Today.” Exhibitions include the 57th Annual Delta Exhibition. More work on view at cruelanimal.com.