You can’t think about New York City and not think about the incredible history of artists that have defined and redefined art through the ages. This year Kevin and I are cohosting the Brooklyn Artists Ball after-party, so the rest of this week we will be doing studio tours here of a few of the artists, all based in Brooklyn, who are creating special pieces to be on exhibition at each of the guests’ tables for the museum’s annual fundraising event.

When Alison Elizabeth Taylor opened the door to her studio in Brooklyn’s East Williamsburg neighborhood, you couldn’t help but first notice her burgeoning baby bump. This is an important thing to point out only because, once familiar with her work, you quickly understand how labor intensive it is. The end product, an intricate collection of wood pieces, starts from a sketch, then a wash painting, on to a graphite drawing, followed by an ink drawing, until finally the actual textile piece begins.

We asked Alison what brought about her working with wood and she showed us this portrait of a friend’s child she created with contact paper from the 99 cent store. From there she expanded into larger compositions using the same material until she discovered Studiolo at the MET which inspired her to begin working in this natural medium.

I love finding out what inspires other artists…not so surprisingly, Alison finds a lot of inspiration in nature and at parks. For the Brooklyn Artists Ball, she went right to the source for the subject matter of her installation. She visited the Brooklyn Museum and went to all the different sections, realizing she wanted to unify the different subjects of the museum through her work. Using only four or five different woods helped keep the collection of 19 pieces cohesive and put her work into a common visual language with abstracted contour forms inspired by the different sections of art the museum displays.

Come see all of us at the Brooklyn Artists After Party! You can purchase tickets here!

See the studios of other Brooklyn-based artists: Emily Noelle Lambert, FAILE, and José Parlá!