Kay Bloom – Full Time Coffee Painter!

Something that caught my eye while reading about Kay Bloom is that she lists her occupation as “full time coffee painter.” This is something that has eluded me for some time now. I'm very impressed that she is able to make a living at painting with coffee.

After coming across Kay Bloom's video on YouTube I made a visit to her MySpace page – www.myspace.com/stainedcoffee to learn more about this artist. Kay keeps an impressive collection of images ranging from coffee related subject matter to iconic portraits to ethnic history.

From Kay Bloom's MySpace Page

KAY's Blurbs – About Me: 

“I started entering art contests at the age of 9 despite my mothers disapproval. I entered several contests and won first place. I finally told my mother at the age of 15 I had been competing in art contests but before she could get angry I showed her all the money that I had won. We had very little money at the time and I had made enough money to buy the extra things that we needed. From that point on my mother was very supportive of me spending time practicing my art and entering contests.”

“I like creating art with many mediums charcoal, acrylic, pastel, pencil, and my favorite coffee. I started experimenting painting with coffee at the age of 20. As a kid I had helped my grandfather pick and dry coffee. Once I was in college I had so little money that I need to experiment with alternative mediums. Coffee was a perfect choice of paint. The oil in the coffee help to give the paintings a shine and textured look. I think the coffee gives my paintings a renaissance feel and accentuates the sole of my subject matter.”

Check out this coffee artist and enjoy her work! I hope she keeps up the great work!  All images posted in this article are copyright by the artist Kay Bloom.

More Info on Coffee Painting

For more information on painting with coffee and the artists who use coffee as an artistic medium subscribe to the Blog and continue reading! Ezju also keeps his studio Website at http://www.nosuchanimal.net

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16 pictures created by Instant Coffee

I found this article about Vancouver's Main Street route are being invited to choose a piece of artwork that will be painted on the outside of a No. 3 bus plying the route later this year. Unfortunetly it had no pictures of the Instant Coffee pictures! Maybe if they win they'll be published!

Buses to become mobile works of art for Main Street's 'art corridor'

By: Gerry Bellett, Vancouver Sun
Published: Monday, January 12, 2009

Members of the public riding buses on Vancouver's Main Street route are being invited to choose a piece of artwork that will be painted on the outside of a No. 3 bus plying the route later this year.

A series of 16 pictures created by Instant Coffee, an artist collective that works out of Vancouver and Toronto, have been installed in the advertising panels of a trolley bus and people are being encouraged to text message their choice to 604-779-0008.

The contest is part of a public art and neighbourhood street improvement program for Main Street, sponsored by TransLink and the city of Vancouver, that has been running for a number of years.

As part of the program another No. 3 bus, decorated with Afghan blanket panels, has been on the route since mid-December, said TransLink's Judy Rudin.

"The idea is to create an art corridor along Main Street and one part of this is using a bus as a piece of artwork," she said.

The winning artwork will be announced at the opening launch of 88 BLOCKS -- Art on Main, on Jan. 17. Rudin said the program will feature five planned artwork exhibitions on three trolleys serving Main Street, as well as artwork being installed at various points along the route.

© The Vancouver Sun 2009

artdc.org - coffee, art, coffee anyone?

Washington, DC Metro Arts forum is hosting a fun little contest or mini-event. The information and link to there forum is listed below. Given my chosen medium and subject matter this fits right up my ally!

I've reposted the information below. You can find the original article posted here . . .

We’re curious. Have you ever made art out of coffee based materials. If you haven’t, we’d like to see what you can create. Call it a challenge. No prize or real reason, other than the fact that we think creativity is cool. If you think creativity is interesting, make some art out of coffee based materials, beans, grinds, coffee machines, or something, and reply with images here:

http://artdc.org/forum/index.php?topic=10971.0

We’re not looking for images of people drinking coffee, but actual art made with coffee.

Further, we’d like to hear more about art made from recycled materials, if you work in recycled materials, please do post about it on the forum, or send me a message about it at jesse@artdc.org

Cheers,

–Jesse
jesse@artdc.org

I did go to the ARTDC link above and registered with the forum in hopes of uploading some of my coffee painting images. Alas I'm still waiting for my e-mail confirmation allowing me access to the forum. Poot! I hate waiting! I'll keep you posted on how long it takes and when my work will be up.

Some of the images on the forum didn't fit the ask for parameters but fell into the coffee motif. A couple images did what they asked . . .



Comment by the artist:

"One of my thousands of unfinished/"gestating" pieces, made with a lot of coffee and coffe grounds as well as tereyaki sauce, whiskey, pastel, watercolor, and arcylic on a lithograph on rice paper."

Comment by the artist:

"not sure if this will count - but i wasn't happy with the stark whiteness of the cheesecloth i used for this piece. so i took my used coffee grounds, some tea, and worcestershire sauce, to give it a bit of color (i wanted to use natural!)"

Once I get the e-mail confirmation I'll upload some images like these!

The Morning News

Open Mic Night (at the Cafe)

. . . at the Cafe

Late Night Drip

Child of Seattle

For more images like these and information on Ezju the Seattle based coffee artist please visit his Website at www.nosuchanimal.net