Gwarlingo is a place where creative people can connect, explore, and share challenges, ideas, and resources. Gwarlingo is different because of its personal perspective, accessibility, and unique curation. Our articles offer you quality over quantity, clarity over clutter, and stories over sound bytes. At Gwarlingo, we share real conversations with real artists about ideas and process, as well as some of our own exciting discoveries. Our goal is to bring you the best work, period—regardless of its genre or popularity, while also having some fun along the way. Browse articles by category or just pull up the most recent in the list below.
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Recent Articles
Found Painting No. 102.7 (Alexandria, Virginia)
Walking through Alexandria, Virginia's Clermont Natural Park, park, a bit away from the playgrounds and baseball fields, you'll stumble on a singular underpass.
Books to Keep You Warm Over the Holidays
A selection of books from Sunday Poem Editor James Crews
The Pictures We Leave Behind
Artists are maybe uniquely situated for the posthumous book treatment because the images do so much of the talking, as opposed to a traditional biography.
Bradley’s Tinted Drawing Papers
Sifting through ephemera in a used bookstore, I stumbled on a beautiful "tinted drawing papers" sample pack for the years 1924 and 1925. Manufactured by the Milton Bradley Company, this pack (with its now somewhat faded papers) is a beautiful construction.
Ceiling by Design
Tucked away in a rural corner of America just at the edge of the woods sits a small, unassuming red house. It is a house like any other, decorated tastefully and well kept--with one very unusual feature. The ceiling, from wall to wall throughout, is plastered with stunning World War 2 era posters.
The Beauty of Boxes
Earlier this week, as I struggled to open a package from the mail, I sighed and wished that boxes were better designed. But with it being almost Thanksgiving here in America, I knew the stores would already be full of Christmas wares. And, accordingly, some very interesting boxes!
Malevich Moves!
Untitled by Liubov Popova (1917) / Suprematist Composition (blue rectangle over the red beam) by Kazimir Malevich (1916) / Proun GK by El Lissitzky (c. 1922) Please scroll down after reading this article to view the videos mentioned therein. Part of my joy [...]
Tom’s Tombstone
At Cleveland's Riverside Cemetery, you’ll find the grave of Thomas “TOM” Joseph Baran. Well, technically just the headstone as Tom is presumably still alive and kicking. An engraved headstone speaks (literally, it is written on) of art and aesthetics, noting Cimabue and Giotto. It also has pictures of Superman; Jesus (many Jesuses); a corner devoted to a beloved poodle Clare; spends some time on Hegel’s concept of Geist; and it contains several telescopes and countless other wonders.
I Spy With My Little Eye…
Maybe as a child you played the game “I spy with my little eye…“? Or on road trips, the license plate game? Or the letter game (things always get stuck on Q and Z)? I have fond memories of childhood trips driving across America whiling away the hours with things like these. I still love to wander, whether in the car or by foot, and am always on the lookout for new visual information...
The Beauty of a Cribbage Board
Holed up at the Wurlitzer Foundation in the early months of the pandemic, another artist taught me the game of cribbage. Cribbage was invented by the poet John Suckling in the early 17th century, and was featured in The Old Curiosity Shop by Charles Dickens. Today, it continues to be a favorite pastime for sailors, especially on American submarines.
Cleveland’s Trapped Tree
Walking through Cleveland this week, I stumbled on "Trapped Tree" in a quiet corner of the city. This unusual moment, until recently hidden by brush deep in the Ohio City neighborhood, became uncovered as a new greenway opened alongside it.
How to Draw America
Drawing by Joseph Kosuth Although I am not a teacher by trade, I have been fortunate enough to adjunct or lead a special projects class here and there. My favorite part of teaching has always been lesson planning. (This is one of many wonderful [...]
The Fire Hydrants of Taos, NM
What is the appeal of typologies? (Here, fire hydrants of Taos, New Mexico.) Is it bringing things across geography and squishing them together visually? Is it the delight of seeking and finding? Or maybe it is the joy at human inventiveness within specific limitations?
A Paint By (Only) Numbers
Erasure art is a special pleasure. Different from collage, which often assembles things from various sources, the act of making art through erasing depends on the form of the original to (some extent) staying intact. This week, we wondered what would happen if we erased the lines of a paint by number.
The Power of the Empty Page
For a very long time, I was obsessed with beautiful little notebooks and sketchbooks—Moleskins, Field Guides, Composition Books, you name it. The potential of an empty book is enormously satisfying. It sits waiting to be filled with art, ideas, to-do lists, poetry, particular projects, or anything else you can come up with.