Home to painters, sculptors, ceramicists, mixed-media painters, costume designers, jewelers, and performance artists, the Artist Enclave in Historic Kenwood enables creatives to live, work, and teach from home.
Tour
On Saturday, March 19, and Sunday, March 20, between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m., the Enclave opens home-studio doors to demonstrations from 25 artists during the fifth “Artists Studio Tour — Artists at Work.” This free, self-guided event invites guests to explore 18 different studio demos while witnessing various evolutions, styles, and processes artists use daily.
To plan your tour, Kenwood Gables Boutique Bed & Breakfast at 2801 Seventh Ave. N will have pamphlets and maps detailing each of the 18 stops (Woodfield Fine Art Gallery at 2323 Central Ave. will also have maps during open hours, on Saturday only). Green Bench Monthly spoke with two artists who have demos on the tour.
Artist: D. YaeL Kelley
From selling painted and laminated textbook covers to classmates when she was 14 to hosting art shows internationally, D. YaeL Kelley now focuses on organic expressionist paintings and impressionist portraits she creates in her home studio.
“What you’re looking at when you look at these paintings is transparent oil-glazes,” she said. “You’re looking at 100 layers of paint. Each one is individually sectioned off, and I mix a lot of my own pigments.”
Kelley plays around with iridescent colors and resistance colors so viewers can see different colors from different angles, but also so the paintings change throughout the day. Kelley is less focused on capturing a specific object in her work and more about evoking a feeling, or meaning.
“There comes a time when you say, ‘I’m interested in what makes your face, what movement makes your face, what balance of color and light and shadow [makes your face], and I don’t necessarily need it to be your face anymore.’ I need it to be the color and the pattern and the movement that implies a certain feeling you get when you look at a person,” Kelley said.
Artist: Luci Westphal
Originally from Hamburg, Germany, documentarian and photographer Luci Westphal moved to Kenwood in 2020. Although she is new to the community, she took a leadership role on the tour committee.
“The studio tour for me is really big on a personal and creative level,” she said. “That I’m embracing the idea that I am an artist and not just a documentarian, and that I will be standing on my own in a space and inviting people to see my work. That’s a pretty big deal to me.”
Westphal’s studio stop on the tour includes demos of her nature photography, which she prints on metals that can withstand Florida’s harshest weather conditions.
Her newest photo series showcases the intersection of nature, industry, and urban environments. “It draws attention to things that are already around us and reminds us that they are here,” she said. One example she used was the manatees at the power plant in Apollo Beach. “I’m exploring the idea that nature can still thrive in urban environments, and it’s, again, drawing attention to nature.”
For more information on the Artist Enclave visit www.historickenwood.org/artist-enclave
For more about the tour visit www.historickenwood.org/artist-tour
