ART CRUSH INTERNATIONAL Jozefien Buydens & Svea Vikander

What a ride! ART CRUSH INTERNATIONAL's first season is coming to an end. It's been wild, adventurous, lovely and above all, very cozy. Join Svea and Jozefien in this season finale as they reminisce and relive all the crushes they've had so far. Which artist served the best snacks? What backstory surprised them the most? What was the most emotionally challenging interview and which one was the most physically demanding?

ART CRUSH INTERNATIONAL will be back on August 31st with many more crushes - Ana Teresa Fernández (https://anateresafernandez.com/) is our first crush of season 2! - and CRUSHED VELVETS, in which we debunk misconceptions about artists and give Svea a chance to process her feelings.

Have a healthy, safe and lovable summer!

Onward! To East Oakland where artist-physician-writer Lorraine Bonner sculpts clay in the house that was once her mother’s home. Lorraine shows us the space, now converted completely to a studio-gallery, and talks about growing up in Queens, moving to rural California in 1970, moving to Tanzania with her husband so they could have their baby in an African socialist country, and studying Medicine at Stanford with two small children at home. Bonner’s work addresses personal, societal, and environmental traumas including racism, abuse, and torture through figurines and abstract shapes. How does she navigate such heavy topics without buckling under their weight? Why doesn’t she want to be a doctor anymore? What does it mean to “redeem” the colour black?
All this and more. Plus cat.

Lorraine Bonner's website: https://www.lorrainebonner.com/
Follow Lorraine on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100009601983966
Visual tour and transcript of this interview: https://artcrushinternational.com/lorraine-bonner.html

Learn more about the East Bay Open Studios: https://eastbayopenstudios.com/

Our Beautiful Online Thing of the week: the Rhoda Kellog Child Art Collection: http://www.early-pictures.ch/kellogg/en/

Follow ART CRUSH INTERNATIONAL on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artcrush_international/

Jozefien and Svea are fed up with misconceptions about artists and in this series, called CRUSHED VELVET because it sounds good even if it makes no sense, they're setting the record straight. There's more to life than making art. There is, for example, trauma, sexism, capitalism, haikus, and other funny things.

THIS EPISODE'S VELVETEEN RABBITS:
When you were depressed, did you make better art?
Would it be worth it to be an artist if it meant you were necessarily depressed?
Have you known happy artists?
How does the idea of the tortured artist affect people (artists and the poor schmucks who love them)?
With what can we replace the idea of the tortured artist?

And they'd love to hear your feedback and experiences. Let us know on Instagram, at email, through our website...

Look up Svea's 'How Poems Work' project: http://howpoemswork.blogspot.com/

Watch the documentary "The B-Side: Elsa Dorfman's Portrait Photography" on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/watch/80145699?tctx=0%2C1%2C%2C%2C%2C

Herman Van Rompuy is the former Belgian Prime Minister who writes haikus. This is the one he wrote in 2018 for the Engelenburcht in Tildonk, Belgium: "Als wapens zwijgen, hoor je in de stille tuin, de wind en de vogels".

Extremely Crushable Keats: “Do you not see how necessary a world of pains and troubles is to school an intelligence and make it a soul?”

We climb and descend the hills of Potrero Hill in San Francisco - in high heels of course! - as we search for Sofia Shu's secluded studio. We're mesmerised by Sofia's meditative, spiritual, detailed abstract paintings and wall hangings. Sofia serves us a delicious vegan latte and talks about growing up walking through snow tunnels in Siberia, learning English by tending bar in NYC, ending up in the Bay Area, and meeting her sweetheart prince. We love her love story and you will, too.

Sofia Shu Studio online: https://www.sofiashu.com/
Sofia on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sofiashustudio/
Pictures of Sofia's hometown Nefteyugansk: https://www.google.com/search?q=nefteyugansk&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=ALeKk037A7y-P3VanCUSJ5OgOymov5sMyQ:1624458540658&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiwhpLS-63xAhVvoosKHebMDc4Q_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=1410&bih=792

Beautiful Online Thing: the Norwegian Sexguiden: https://www.nrk.no/spesial/sexguide 

ART CRUSH INTERNATIONAL on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artcrush_international/
Suggestions? contact@artcrushinternational.com
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Hop into our car to East Oakland where we’ll meet textile artist Richard Jonathan Nelson at his friend and fellow artist Jamee Crusan’s place. Richard talks about being a black, queer man in the US, how his mother and aunts encouraged him to make textile art as a child and how language plays an important role in his life. What’s a hand baby and who brought the Kudzu? Richard tells us all.

Richard’s website: http://www.richard-jonathan-nelson.com/
Richard on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rich_nels/
Visual tour and transcript of the interview: https://artcrushinternational.com/richard-jonathan-nelson.html

Check out Jamee Crusan, artist and good friend of Richard Jonathan Nelson. Her work Black and Blue/Lack and Lure is our Beautiful Online Thing of the week: https://jameecrusan.com/new-index#/black-and-bluelack-and-lure/

Learn more about
the Gullah Geechee people: https://gullahgeecheecorridor.org/thegullahgeechee/
the South Carolina Lowcountry: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Carolina_Lowcountry

Get ready for our next crush, Ana Teresa Fernández: https://anateresafernandez.com/

Follow ART CRUSH INTERNATIONAL on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artcrush_international/
We’re on YouTube! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcIyQdD132sdIc23PO8k0vA/featured
Send love letters to contact@artcrushinternational.com

Join us on a trip to the harbour of Ghent, Belgium, where we meet Linde Carrijn and Maxim Storms, the avant-garde performance-duo known as BRIK TU-TOK. At their light-filled studio in an old red-brick factory we marvel at BRIK TU-TOK's handmade fashionable costumes, colorful accessories and extraordinary DIY music instruments. What's the Giggle Gallery, and can we come? Welcome to our crushes' bizarre, but fascinating universe!

BRIK TU-TOK on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/briktutok/
Watch BRIK TU-TOK's music videos on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_kFfBUcDuc91hHBISrM26A
All music during the interview is by BRIK TU-TOK. 'Worse' plays at 14'25", 'Cheap Trip' at 20'24" and 'Badass' at 26'40".
Visual tour & transcript of the interview: https://artcrushinternational.com/brik-tu-tok

Look up atelier Pantserschip, the collective of makers that's now housed in the old red-brick factory of I. Mahy & ses fils: https://www.instagram.com/atelierpantserschip/

Beautiful Online Thing: NauticalWaters on Etsy - https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/NauticalWaters

Our next crush! Shirley Watts of Natural Discourse: https://naturaldiscourse.org/

ART CRUSH INTERNATIONAL on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artcrush_international/
Send your fan mail to: contact@artcrushinternational.com