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Meet the Social Connecting Campaign Artists

Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art will be closed Monday, May 13, to prepare for the visit of Antiques Roadshow. We will return to normal hours of operation Wednesday, May 15.

Learn more about our Social Connecting Campaign and Community Engagement efforts.

Leana Fischer

Leana Fischer, is a watercolor artist, designer, and owner of the stationery and gift brand May We Fly. She began her career in the field of architecture, but transitioned to working full-time as an artist in 2016.

Leana Fischer

“Daffodils are always the first to arrive, the brave ones who can’t wait to announce that spring is here. They were made to blossom when frost may still come, and cold winds; before it is safe. And yet they stand, bright and tall, facing all that may come, together.”

Daffodils by Leana Fischer

 

Hannah Newsom Doyle

As a biracial Asian American, Hannah Newsom Doyle’s illustration work is dedicated to representing diversity and giving a voice to marginalized groups. Working in a variety of mediums digital, watercolor, and gouache, her work is characterized by her use of color, personality and her ability to convey a narrative.

Hannah Newsom Doyle

“The idea for the design came from thinking about how togetherness is built out of shared experiences. So many hands go into creating one object or one experience, and so much of our experience when we build on a community results in growth, whether that growth is individual or communal, but usually both. None of us do anything truly alone.”

Doyle postcard

 

Kenny Arredondo

Kenny Arredondo is an artist of life in its science and love, creating for liberation through visual, social, written, and sculptural mediums. Springdale residing, Kenny loves abstract, soul, surreal, raw, vibrant, indigenous, and metaphysical art.

Kenny Arredondo

Nurture by Kenny Arredondo

“The meadow and infinite trees into the gravitating sun to me comes from a divinely felt and vaguely remembered place in a dream, another world, or perhaps afterlife.

‘Nurture’ had to be about Nature and eye was very excited and happy to deliver that presence.

Eye wanted to deliver an angelic sense of balance with the positioning of everything, with a heart in the center to give to you love, and vibrant colors and motion to enjoy looking at.

The spirit and symbolism in this piece capture the collective human spirit to offer medicine, transformation, and illumination, in chaotic-order to support making this experience ______ for you.”

 

Arrendondo postcard

 

Tram Colwin

Tram is the artist and designer behind Tram Colwin Art, where she creates custom watercolor artwork, prints, and stationery and home goods. Over the past three years, her business has expanded to include workshops, where she gets to combine her love of art with the fun of teaching it to others. She is based in Fayetteville, AR.

Tram Colwin

“Rooted in the ground, connected to nature, hands stretch out, longing for togetherness and community. Roots forming hands, hands forming branches, shows our connection to nature and the connection we can find with each other through it.

The symmetry of the tree and its leaves represent a harmony and balance found only in nature, but something we can strive for nonetheless in our community through working together and seeing the value of each individual.”

Tram Colwin postcard

 

Kinya Christian

Kinya Christian is an interdisciplinary and multimedia artist, mother and wife. Her work is reflective of my experience as a Black woman and what she finds beautiful— a wish for her expressions to educate, enlighten and engage.

Kinya Christian

“It’s based upon the Redwoods in northern California. I was inspired by Pando, and I find the wandering Redwoods majestic in their own right, ripe and gnarly for adding ‘faces’ to. The Pando aspen grove is the largest living organism, with it’s shared root system. Basically, we’re all connected right now, we aren’t alone, and we need to start thinking of ourselves as a collective living organism. We need each other, and we are not alone. The sun shines down, here as a ‘mother’ needed for life and certainly a beacon of ‘hope’.”

Christian Postcard

 

Matt Miller

Matt Miller’s artwork, rooted in drawing and painting, combines geometry, scientific knowledge, and ancestral wisdom. His practice seeks to understand the interconnections of human behavior in the present world that co-exists within nature and the cosmos.

Matt Miller

“Unified, not divided we dance the greatest dance
We collaborate with each other only to enhance
Together we weave essential patterns
We end where we began
Celebrating love & connection
Together we dance”

Matt Miller postcard

 

Octavio Logo

Octavio Logo is a visual artist whose work explores a wide range of topics and techniques, including graphic novels and printmaking, painting, bookbinding, mural, sculpture, and installation. Logo’s passion for the arts emerged from one of the world’s most powerful public art traditions, Mexican muralism, a daily part of life in Logo’s native Mexico City.

Octavio Logo

A blind portrait of my family, made in a single time by blind drawing.”

Logo postcard

 

Stacy Bates

Stacy Bates’s (Stacy Bee Art) work mainly specializes in creating pen and ink illustrations, along with murals, that combine her two favorite styles – drawing and printmaking. It has a vintage storybook look that often includes symbolism and storytelling throughout.

Stacy Bates

“My work features some of our essential workers comforting each other the only way we can right now — through technology. Their display of comfort and compassion shown here helps to drown out the curved charts we’ve been surrounded by since the pandemic started. You see a set of essential workers shown here — a cashier, a police officer and a doctor — all of whom play an integral role during our daily life, especially during the pandemic. We see them supporting and offering comfort to each other, as a symbol of how the rest of the world is supporting essential workers at this time.”

Stacy Bates postcard

 

Alan Rodriguez

A self-taught visual artist that started with street art and graffiti-style illustrations. Moving my skills towards murals and fine arts with murals at Terra studios and making paintings for St Joseph’s Catholic Church where I am a member of the parish. In recent years I have dedicated my free time and focus to community building and activation. Working with the evening reporting center, teaching art to teens going through the juvenile court system.

Alan Rodriguez

“Spending time with my grandmother was the most grounding experience of my life. During this time of COVID-19 I know I miss being out at the park. Most importantly, spending time with family, especially my grandmother.”

Rodriguez postcard