Artists

Brianne Janes

Brianne Janes has lived and painted the Cerrillos Hills and surrounding areas for over 10 years. The love of this land is palpable in her work. She  chases movement and light in her vehicle waiting for the perfect place to pull over and start painting. “It is like lightning through me when I find that perfect scene to paint. I paint fast and feverishly, using palette knives in  brushes in both hands to accomplish the expression I want to make before  the cloud or light changes. It is truly exhilarating. Painting for me is an  expression of my connection between myself and Mother Nature” 

A fine-art minor from Colorado Institute of Art, Janes’s career defining moment came at a five-day workshop in Montana  where she painted from sun up to sun-down with seasoned masters Harry Orlyk and Louisa McElwain. She would later  mentor under Santa Fe artist, McElwain, after moving to New Mexico in 2010. Learning from her to approach the canvas  with boldness, harnessing the deep connection of spirit and the land, allowing her to be a conduit.   While the beauty of the New Mexico light and landscape always inspires Janes, she finds special satisfaction in commissioned pieces, on-site or in studio. “It is a true joy to give a landowner an original painting of a place that holds special meaning to them,” Janes says. “I feel that I am honoring the land and their memories.

For over 11 years, Brianne has been busy both in the studio and plein air painting. Janes’s impressionistic-style coupled with her impasto techniques produced her most exciting body of work to date. While the Reverie collection features landscapes, Janes enjoys painting trees and trucks as well. She welcomes being contacted for custom work.

www.briannejanesstudios.com

Diana Ruth is a fiber and textile artist/educator. She achieved her BFA from Texas Tech University focusing on jewelry design and metalsmithing in 2014. In 2020, despite the global pandemic, Diana achieved her MFA from Kent State University focusing on textiles.

Her research is focused on natural dyes and our relationship to the environment; spiritual beliefs; human rituals, particularly surrounding death; liminal spaces and experiential viewership.

The Diana Ruth Designs brand consists of limited release wearables and collections for the home. The works she creates are inspired by her travels, particularly when she lived in Japan, her Lithuanian heritage and the landscape surrounding her. Custom pieces are welcome and encouraged!

https://thedianaruth.com/

Sue is the craftswoman behind Taliswoman Metal Studio and joined Alchemy Studio just before the holidays in 2021. Inspired by her paternal grandmother who became a silversmith in the 1960's through courses taught at the Cleveland Institute of Art, Sue has been creating her entire life. She states that in the fourth grade that the only thing she wanted to be in life was an artist. Sue has explored many different mediums along the way ~ drawing, sculpture, photography, mixed media and finally settled back into metalworking and jewelry design after a twenty year hiatus from the metal studio.

Each Taliswoman piece of jewelry is made completely by hand at Sue’s studio in Madrid, New Mexico. There will be slight variations to each piece within a production series that add to the uniqueness of your purchase, therefore each piece is usually numbered within a particular series. Sue works primarily in patina-polished sterling silver and a variety of stones, including local Cerrillos Turquoise.

www.taliswomanshop.com

Laura’s work focuses primarily on movement and the understanding of bodies in motion. She uses clay coils to express and materialize these ideas and concentrates on solids and voids to achieve a delicate and feminine quality. Different processes of nature that she witnesses influence her organic figurative sculptures. Coils lend themselves to manipulating space and add a lifelike quality to these works. Laura believes that we, as humans, often lose sight of the here and now due to conscious and unconscious limitations imposed on us by our past that hangs on to us like second skin. Through growth and motion we strive to overcome these obstacles mirroring many of nature's own processes. These clay sculptures are the medium through which she is able to synthesize and express these ideas.

Laura has been an active member of the Santa Fe ceramic community since 1995. She began her studies at Long Island University and pursued Fine Art at Parson School of Design and Art History at the American University in Paris before moving to Santa Fe, New Mexico where she earned a BFA from The College of Santa Fe. She has exhibited work in Paris, New York, Japan, and Santa Fe. Bilingual in Spanish, she was born in Spain and lived in many countries in Latin America as a child before moving to the United States in 1991. Laura found her roots in New Mexico where she currently resides with her husband and two children.

www.laurahuertas.com

Bianka Groves is a New Mexican ceramic artist who has studied ceramics all over the country along with teaching pottery at Baltimore Clayworks, Northern Clay Center in Minneapolis, & Santa Fe Clay. Her work is thoughtfully functional and has the ability to complete the elegance of any interior space. The polished composition of her designs are an ode to the simplistic repetition and studies of minimalist design, architecture, and landscapes. When she’s not making pots out of her backyard home studio, you can find her hiking in the desert with her dogs.

Working primarily in porcelain, throwing on the pottery wheel, Bianka’s surface designs are part of an inlay technique similar to tattooing. A pattern is gently carved into the surface of the freshly made unfired pot using acupuncture needles, tattoo needles, or x-acto blades. Once the composition is complete, a black slip, (or watered down dyed clay), is applied to the body of the piece and sinks into the cut drawings. The excess slip is cleaned away leaving the inlayed design. Once the pots are fired to 2350 degrees, they’re polished with multiple stages of diamond sanding pads going all the way up to 800 grit which leaves a silky matte finish. Bianka also features a rare collection of work with gold or silver luster. These unique art objects are finished through a process of taking real gold or silver particles suspended in an oil, sap, or resin, then fired in a third firing up to about 1300 degrees. The organic materials melt away leaving the precious metal solidified on the surface.

https://biankagroves.bigcartel.com

Leigh is the artist behind Big Sky Fiber Art. She grew up in a family of artists, educators, and farmers on a cattle ranch in Montana. She spent most of her adult life in the Pacific Northwest and moved to New Mexico from the rainy Oregon coast 5 years ago. She has been creating art since she was a small child and has explored painting, film and digital photography, landscape design and installation, jewelry making, and film production and set design. She is continually inspired by her travels in Latin America and Thailand, road trips off the beaten path, and the natural environment. She now lives in Santa Fe where she creates her bold, one-of-a-kind hand woven tapestries and spends time exploring with her crazy rescue animals.

For Leigh, weaving is a meditation practice, rhythmically layering multiple textures, colors and shapes - line by line- to create a modern take on the ancient art form. Each piece begins with a bold color palette and naturally unfolds as the colors flow into soft, tactile patterns. The tapestries blend many types of fiber including small batch, kettle dyed merino wool from Argentina, Color Core yarn from Love Fest Fibers, and an assortment of colorful and textural rope, wool, cotton, and hemp yarn from around the globe.

www.leighoviatt.com/fiber-art

Caitlin Rhoades grew up in Northern New Mexico finding inspiration from the subtle hues of desert colors and the profound expansiveness of the vistas. Working with clay is a grounding force and has remained part of her journey since she was a  child. During her prior career as a psychotherapist she found herself holding a container or vessel for people to feel safe and supported. Later she found this same theme weaving into her ceramic work.

Caitlin finds great joy in creating containers and vessels, a place for each to put into them what nourishes them most - whether it be food or flowers or dreams. Her hope in creating these vessels is that they will bring happiness, comfort and a feeling of home.  Caitlin currently works with cone 10 stoneware that is high fired in a gas kiln, giving each piece a unique, earthen feel. Her work is handmade with care, attention to detail and over 30 years of both success and failure, met with the joy of knowing someone will make it a part of their everyday use or weave it into their most special occasions.

www.caitlinrhoades.com

Mia Battaglia, the creator behind SeedCreatrix, currently resides in Pecos, NM. Her love for creating with seed beads started in high school, learning how to bead and create on her bedroom floor. This love carried into her adult life, birthing her business of SeedCreatrix, in addition Crane Wisdom Wellness, her other love - where she practices and teaches body work. Mia’s passion is found in identifying and/or organically creating patterns while staying in a dedicated format. She hopes you enjoy wearing these beaded adornments as much as she does creating them.

www.etsy.com/shop

Inspired by folk artists of the American southwest and expressionist painters including Kirchner, Matisse, and Gauguin, Alissa Mittl’s work interprets local flora and fauna in a unique, rhythmic style. Alissa received her BA in Studio Art and Art History from Florida State University. She has apprenticed for artists Sue Tirrell and Julie Guyot, and received fellowships to attend workshops at both Anderson Ranch Arts Center and Penland School of Craft.

Originally from southwest Florida, her work has shown both locally and nationally. Mittl completed two terms as a Ceramic Artist in Residence at the Mendocino Art Center in August 2018. She then spent a year teaching and making artwork as a long-term Resident Artist at the Taos Clay Studio in New Mexico. Mittl now lives, works, makes and sells her art in the historic city of Santa Fe

www.alissamittl.com              

Claire Patterson studied Metalsmithing at Cal Poly Humboldt in Arcata, CA. From her birthplace in the Bay Area, to Chicago, to her current home base in Albuquerque NM - her jewelry line, known as CINDRE, has grown over the years and finally taken on a life of its own as her full time endeavor.

Claire creates genderless pieces for the love of self adornment at accessible price points - completely made by hand. Focusing primarily on mobile, architectural forms and maximal minimalism, CINDRE jewelry utilizes recycled Sterling Silver alongside sparkling 5AAAAA Cubic Zirconia stones. These stones are set in tubing, which creates both an unexpected sparkle as the wearer moves, as well as visual weight without much physical weight, since the forms are hollow. Vermeil pieces feature a thick 24K Gold plating over Sterling Silver. All Sterling Silver utilized is recycled and sourced locally in Albuquerque with Rio Grande jewelry supply. All 24K Gold Vermeil plating is completed by Theta Plate, also local to Albuquerque. The stones utilized are sold solely “to the trade” as a diamond replacement for fine jewelers, lab created in the US by a family run, Georgia-based manufacturer. Every step in the CINDRE process is executed by hand, by the artist - every delicate solder joint, every jump ring, every set stone - nothing is ever cast or mass produced.

CINDRE has been featured in Albuquerque the Magazine, traveled with West Coast Craft & Renegade Craft Fair, and is sold in shops across the Western United States

www.cindre.shop              

Annie Moon is the designer and artist behind Elemental Alchemy Beadwork. Adorning the human body has always been a passion of Annie’s since youth. Annie loves to see how the additions of color and texture to the body can completely shift the archetypical energy of individuals; both how they are perceived by others in their outward expression, and also how they perceive themselves.

Elemental Alchemy Beadwork is the process of absorbing the colors and feelings of the natural world that surrounds us and then weaving memories of these moments with her hands. As an artist, Annie is witnessing each moment while also being part of it, as well as part of the landscape. With nature as her muse, Annie brings this intentionality into her weavings. Annie’s hope is for you - the recipient of these pieces - to feel this medicine, this little love letter to the Creations, this reminder that we are actually part of this earth rather than separate. This is what Annie calls the Alchemy of her work.

www.etsy.com/shop             

Tracy Ryan is a ceramic artist with a strong love for the practice of hand building and altering thrown forms. Porcelain is her clay of choice, taking her dramatic and vibrant glaze colors and forming her organic statement bowls.  Tracy Ryan is always experimenting with color and textural impact in her career as a hairstylist, in design, and now in her ceramics practice.  She creates in a local studio in Santa Fe. 

https://www.instagram.com/tracyryanatlast/        

Bio coming soon

https://www.sarahehodzic.com/