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36 May 2017 | [El
AtlantalNtownPaper.com
Art in the Neighborhood: Candler Park
By Isadora Pennington
Just a few miles east of Downtown sits Candler Park, which was established in 1922 when the land was donated to the city by Coca Cola co-founder Asa Candler. The area is
incredibly popular with families and young adults, making it a relatively peaceful and quiet community. A small retail district on McLendon features a few family-friendly restaurants, a
market, coffee shop and shops, while the proximity to more bustling parts of town, such as Little 5 Points and Decatur, allow for it to be an incredibly accessible neighborhood for young
creatives. Here are a few of the area’s visual artists who shared their stories with INtown. For a longer version of this story, visit AtlantaINtownPaper.com. [El
ROSE M. BARRON
Multi Media Artist, Part-time Professor of Foundations and
Photography at the Art Institute of Atlanta, rosembarron.com
'riginally from Indiana, Barron moved to
South Carolina when she was a teen. “I fought
it for a while, but I ended up coming around.”
Growing up, she spent a lot of time painting
and drawing with her older sister. Later, she
moved to Athens to attend the University of
Georgia to get her BFA in Graphic Design. She
enjoyed working on logos, but found some of
the work to be tiresome and repetitive. “I didn’t
like it, most of it was kinda grunt work,” she
laughed. As the industry turned more to digital
work, she lost interest.
Barron married her college sweetheart
and had a family, spending much of her time
pursuing other creative projects. She was also
teaching full time at a private school, but took
a leap and enrolled at Georgia State University
where she got an MA in Art Education, and
later got her MFA in Photography at SCAD
Atlanta, where she also took foundational arts
and printmaking.
These days, Barron spends her time both
teaching and on her photography projects. “I
take classical art pieces, work with symbolism,
find stories and folklore allegories, and mix
them together to build a set like a film still.”
Her pieces are larger than life photographed
portraits that she then colors by hand, mixing
old techniques and new technology in a
refreshingly new way. of the Madonnas,” she
said, referencing one of her recent series. “I’ve
been taking a darker turn and branching out
into what I’m calling now the Madonnas,
Monsters, and Saints.”
ve definitely dabbled in many,
many things throughout the years,” said Christy
Bardis Petterson, a textile designer and artist who
works in Candler Park. Though organizing Indie
Craft Experience (ICD) and being a mother are
commitments that take much of her time, she has
always felt a strong drive to make art. “For many
years I was doing both; making things to sell them
and also organizing events and I had a full time job,
and at some point you have to realize you have too
many irons in the fire.”
After a hiatus, Petterson is back to her love for
textile design. “I always come back to printmaking,
no matter what I was working on.”
The designs that Petterson produces harken back
to classic techniques, which have always fascinated her.
“I’ve gotten into Adire Eleko, which is an African resist
technique, and I’ve been doing that with Indigo,” she
explained. “They are definitely sort of primitive. I’ve
also in the last year gotten into Shibori dyeing with
Indigo, Shannon and I got into that together, and I’ve
been teaching workshops in that,” she said.
Shannon Mulkey Green is Petterson’s business
partner at ICE, and they also work together in the
education department at the High Museum, that
are handcrafted. Teaching is a new thing for me, I
started working at the High about three years ago,
and I had dabbled in teaching previously but it is
the first time I’m doing it really seriously,” she said.
Currently, you can see Petterson’s work and
learn alongside her at workshops at the ICE
headquarters in Candler Park.
ANTHONY "ANT" SIMS
Animator and Illustrator at Misc. Entertainment.
Misc888.tm blr. com
draw reflections of things I see every day, just
life and living,” explained Ant Sims. For him, the push
to create is constant. “When you have a vision, you
just feel obligated to share it with other people.” His
animations are rich in color, heavily character driven
and steeped in surrealism.
While he has always been an artist, he’s walked a
winding path to find himself where he is today. Once a
student at Georgia State in the Journalism program, he
quickly determined that he needed to change paths and
dropped out to pursue animation as a self-taught artist.
“I didn’t finish, but it’s cool. Animation should have
been my major in the first place. I thought I wanted
to be a journalist but art is my first calling, it’s my
passion.”
riginally hailing from Marietta, William Massey
is somewhat of a celebrity in the local art world. Many
know him for his large-scale assemblages that have
popped up on the BeltLine, as part of four years of
Art on the BeltLine, under the overpass near the skate
park. “It’s just such a cool little haven,” he said, noting
that having some kind of shelter has been necessary for
displaying his sculptures.
Massey has admittedly been very affected by some of
his travels when it comes to his artistic pursuits. “I went
to Europe right after graduating from Valdosta State,”
he explained, citing that he had completed two and a
half years of classes in Communications and Business. “I
was miserable. I hated it. I thought, I like to doodle, I’ll
just do art. I’d rather be happy than rich.”
WILLIAM MASSEY
Found Art Sculpture and Assemblage Artist.
WilliamMasseyArt. com
CHRISTY BARDIS PETTERSON
Textile Artist, Co-founder of Indie Craft Experience.
Instagram: @christybardispetterson