Liz Blood is the one of three creatives profiled in a series featuring artists from Archer Studios. All three profiles may be found here on the TCC Connection website.
On June 3, for the first time since March of 2020, the Tulsa Artist Fellowship (TAF) Archer Studios, opened its doors to the public as part of the First Friday Art Crawl. TAF monthly invites the public to meet and visit with artists’ in their studios.
Walking into the open studio of Liz Blood, an editor of the recently published collection of creative writing, art and creative prompts named “Creative Field Guide to Northeastern Oklahoma,” the minimalist design of the space jumped out. The room had two chairs. A shelf filled with earmarked books, mostly compiled of nonfiction focused on environmentalism and feminist voice such as “When Women Were Birds: Fifty-four Variations on Voice” by Terry Tempest Williams. Right next to the books stood a glass coffee cup, and Blood remarked about how it helped her divert plastic waste from the landfill. Similarly, on the shelf hung a canvas tote bag.
On the art prints and objects in the room, Blood said, “It’s there for inspiration for me to create.”
Blood explained her writing: “My nonfiction—typically essays—deals with themes of memory, loss, and place. I also love to write about contemporary art because it often reflects back to us what we’re seeing happen out in the world, or what we see but don’t understand. I hope, in all my writing, that I communicate some of the complexity of the world. There’s so much we don’t know and too many people who pretend to have all the answers.”
As with the books on the shelves and the nature-based prints, the “Creative Field Guide to Northeastern Oklahoma,” is about biodiversity and the ways people interact with it. The guide covers Oklahoma’s trees and plants, fungi, arthropods, mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians, fish, weather, and ecoregions.
Sly Alley, Alexandra Muños Avelar, Shane Brown, among others are contributors for the guide.
Blood explained, “I enjoyed participating in the Open Studios because I was able to share my practice with people in the community who I didn’t previously know, or who didn’t know of my work.” Blood, who has been with TAF since 2019, feels fortunate to have support for her work and the projects that have grown such as the field guide.
Blood mentions how the visual art on the walls can be misinterpreted by the studio visitors, “but none of it was created by me… I think a few people were confused! Most of the studios in the TAF building on Archer Street are home to visual artists whose work is on the walls and in-process in their studio. You can see at once that they’re a painter and they’re a sculptor.”
Overall, she was excited for the next Open Studios program that will occur on the First Friday Art Crawl. More event information can be found on the Tulsa Artist Fellowship Facebook Page.
