Stephanie Levy

Stephanie Levy is an American artist/illustrator and is a native of Memphis, Tennessee. She no longer lives in America and has now been living in Germany for the past 11 years. She studied art at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville and at the University of the Arts in Berlin, Germany, where she received her Bachelor of Fine Arts and Master of Arts degrees.

After travelling widely in Europe, Stephanie settled in Munich, Germany in 2005 with her husband and daughter. She works as a freelance artist and illustrator and teaches English to ambitious Germans in her spare time. Stephanie has exhibited her work in galleries and cultural institutions throughout the world. Her work can be viewed in private and public collections in the USA, Canada, Australia, Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Switzerland, Hong Kong, and Japan.

What i think appeals to me most about Stephanie's work is the variety of materials that she uses. For example in some of her collages and paintings she incorporates materials such as Japanese origami paper and gold leaf. All of her works are originals and predominantly use handmade paper, canvas, or wood as supports. The main subjects of her work are interior settings, and often to source ideas she gathers images from, IKEA catalogs to old issues of Better Homes and Gardens.

If you briefly scan over some of her work that she has produced it is immediately apparent that an interior theme occurs quite repetitively. One of the reasons i discovered for this particular theme is related to her personal history. Her grandfather was a descendent of four generations of Irish carpenters, and the house that she grew up in was designed and built by her grandfather. One of her favourite acitivities at night, was to sit at the dinner table and draw house plans for imaginary or “fictional” houses. It may be no surprise then, that now as an artist she still create images of fictional ones.

I especially like the lightbox image with the translucent materials mounted on the lightboxes. It is surprising how much the collages can be transformed when placed in a different environment. Compared to the rest of the images these light box images appear to have a very unusual but modern feel. This i find interesting, as it goes to show that the placement of art or if you like its environment, has a very profound effect on its aesthetic appeal and has it is perceived by its audience.