Interesting Times

I am chuffed. The news is terrible right now and the air in Philadelphia feels like wet sock, but yesterday evening the Firehouse Art Center posted this little video and ever since then I have had a very specific kind of happiness blooming in my heart that is pretty much summed up by that great British understatement of a word.

Here it is. The pieces shown are from my Saga Series, and they are part of  their Interesting Times exhibition.

This video thrills me largely because there are three pieces on that wall. I paint these pieces so that when they are hung end to end they flow together. I carefully make sure that the colors in left edge of each new piece line up exactly with the right edge of the last one, but I can only hang two of them at a time in my studio, so I've actually never seen them all in a row before. They work just like I'd hoped, and I couldn't be happier to see how beautifully they were installed.

I'm also delighted to see them out in the world. These pieces take a long time, and although I've shown them to people in my studio, this exhibition is their first. The curator, Brandy Coons, did a great job of picking the other artists in the exhibit. Kathryn Jill Johnson and Robin Hextrum both make wonderful work. If you're in the Boulder area, check it out!




I've written in past blog posts about Saga 1 and 2, but I didn't have time to post about Saga 3.


Samantha Simpson, Saga 3, Ink and watercolor on paper, 92" x 51", 2018

There is a lot happening in this piece and you can see details on my website here. 

One thing that people might not guess is that this piece references Monet.




Call it a remix.



Samantha Simpson, Saga 3 detail, Ink and watercolor on paper, 92" x 51", 2018

If you're interested in seeing updates on work in progress, please follow me on instagram! I'm slow about updating this blog but I'm better over there, where I post as the_drawist.  There are even details of Saga 4, which I'm working on right now.













*I am Canadian, so I feel I'm entitled to be chuffed by virtue of our association with the Queen.

Still, still, I mean it, After All

My book is here!

It's finally done and I'm so happy about how it came out- I've been working on it for over a year, on and off, trying to figure out how to translate my  text heavy images into the book form. It's a project I was very interested in because for a long time I've been thinking that my work lies somewhere between painting and writing. Many of my pieces have repeating characters and themes and several of my images work as chapters in on ongoing narrative, rather than conclusions in and of themselves.

 It's very satisfying to have this series of pieces in a book format, all together, in sequence, with the important text readable in the correct order.  The book is 144 pages long and the images are large and only slightly less vivid than the originals. I love it. You can take a look at the first 15 or so pages by clicking the little image below, which links you to a little preview of the book on Blurb, the print-on-demand site where I had the book made.

Still, Still, I Mean It, After All

By Samantha Simpson

If you'd like to purchase a copy, you can do so at that link too, but be warned: the softcover version is totally beautiful but way more expensive than what you'd pay for a similar book in a bookstore. This is what happens when one can't get thousands of copies of a book published in China. There is an ebook version available as well, and I get about the same amount of money from sales of either book, so if you're interested in supporting what I so by buying a book, do what fits your budget. If you are a huge fan and would like a personalized copy, please email me at sam@samanthasimpson.com and I will make arrangements to send one your way!

Saga 2

Saga 2 is up on the website! I'm in the thickets of Saga 3 right now, but I still love working large. Saga 2 is seven feet eight inches long. Here is a tiny picture of the huge painting. You can see it bigger on my website.

There are are some funny references in the piece. The black ship on the right is the U.S.S. Constitution, and the one on the S.S. United States, which is a sad wreck of an ex-cruise ship that is docked across from IKEA in Philadelphia. There are several recognizable political figures in the painting (many of them show up as a well-dressed species of invasive aquatic sponge) and the flowers from Saga 1 , which I came to think of as hysterical media beasts, have weaponized their speech. These paintings connect end to end, and they are meant to be read as one big narrative, from left to right.

I post pictures of my work in progress on Instagram a fair amount now (I'm the_drawist), and there's a nice picture of Saga 1 and 2 together there, as well as a few shots from a wonderful show I saw at the National Gallery recently: Outliers and American Vanguard Art, which was so, so good.

Politics (In the Weeds with Snakes and Saga 1)

I'm working on a series of paintings that are more explicitly political than what I've made before. In The Weeds With Snakes, from earlier this year, is very clearly about a personal reaction to the election. The content of this piece is impossible to see at a small size but you can click the link above to see details.

And this, below, is also an allegorical response to the current climate. It's also huge: it's an 8 foot watercolor and ink painting on paper. I love making giant watercolors, and I'm well into making the next one in this series. I'm going to make several of these large pieces. Each painting will continue the action the one before it, and the edges will match, so images flow from painting to painting. I've titled the first one of these paintings Saga 1, but I may well change that title as I get more of the series done. You can see more of Saga 1 on my website, here.

Samantha Simpson, Saga 1 (Working Title), Ink and watercolor on paper, 96" x 51", 2017

The large sequential pieces are based loosely on the saga of the Danian war that winds around Trajan's column in Rome.

I've been lucky enough to teach in Rome a couple times, and when I'm there I always visit the huge hole in the ground that surrounds Trajan's column. You can't easily get right up close to the images that wind around the column, but there is a long set of informational displays that show the images unwound in one long line. I'm always moved by those pictures. I know very little about the historical context of what I'm seeing, but it feels like a message from a lost society about the cost of a battle. It's a victory column with a message: we did this. Don't do it again. If you're interested, there's a great website that shows the images here. You can see details of my work on my website or on instagram, where I post in-progess shots of what I'm up to from time to time.