Visiting Artist : Bobi Lee Bosson
Artist: Bobi Lee Bosson
Media: Screenprints, sculptures and painting
Website: https://bobi-lee.com/work
Instagram: barbieleeboss
Bobi Lee Bosson started drawing at a very young age but did not receive formal training until college. She went into art school as an animator but found out it was not her passion because she loved making sketches with lots of details. She then moved on to take painting classes and eventually expanded to sculptures and screenprints. Her art style tends to give messages on social and environmental issues, however, she does not define herself as that kind of artist.
Bosson creates paintings that emotionally drive her. Inspired by Monet, Manet, and Degas she uses their impressionistic style to create messages of her own. Based on the ideas of performance and prositution, she uses many dark colors to create the background and single bold shades to make certain parts of her work stand out. Additionally, she uses big canvases to get easy first impressions when viewers see it from a distance. On her “for the love of drag series,” she uses curves and lines to create drag artist portraits to share her love for performance, lines to make her work “Roxanne” stand out from the background and then curves and lines to create a female body on her “Jules” piece.
Because Bosson was away from painting for a bit to work on screenprinting, she decided to go back to it and started a series called “for the love of drag.” She started becoming involved in the drag community and wanted to give an homage by creating works of the artists she had the opportunity to learn about. Bossons asks each of the artists she meets, “how do you want the world to see you,” and then receives photographs for her to paint. Her series celebrates these people who put their artistry out on a platform for the world to see and loves how different drag queens provide images that either share their full or partial transformations.
Bosson is a very unique artist because when I think of the word artist, they normally create works that show the beauty of the outside world, but she uses her voice to inform viewers of issues that are current. Additionally, artists I learn about have one source of media they use but she has different ones that express unique messages. Using different mediums to create homages, she bases her art on topics that can receive high criticism but her ability to express her thoughts and opinions about these issues shows how powerful and brave she is as an artist.
