Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection
The Backstory
New to Hasty Book List? Read about the fire that prompted this home renovation, here.
The Inspiration
When I posted about 5 Ways to Make a House Feel Like Home, a reader suggested that we hang our art early in the moving process. She said her home really started feeling homey once her art was hung. This got me thinking about our art collection, which we’ve been building for almost a decade. For a year our art was in storage as we lived in St. Louis and saved up for a down payment. We had it all moved into the new condo and most of it was hung on the walls when the fire broke out. I actually think this saved the majority of our art collection because almost everything that was on the floor was destroyed by water. Our art collection was professionally cleaned (smoke and water can do a lot of damage to art!) and is back in storage while we rebuild. I thought it might be nice to share some of our favorite pieces with you. I’m focusing this post on original art (and still I haven’t included them all for the sake of brevity), perhaps I’ll do another post some day on the prints we own.
The Steffes Store by Aly Ytterberg, Ytterberg Studio
For the holidays I reached out to artist Aly Ytterberg, a hard-edge painter based out of St. Louis, Missouri, to commission a special piece to give as a gift to my Dad. I told her about the Steffes Store which was in my family for over 100 years but was torn down in the summer of 2020. I gifted the original to my Dad for the 2022 Christmas and purchased a print for myself. Read more about my experience working with Aly here.
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
The Dapper Dogwood on Brandon St by Jenny McGee
The thing that really makes a new house feel like home is seeing our art collection on the walls. It was the first thing we did when we moved into the condo and that ended up saving most of our pieces that otherwise would’ve been destroyed by water (which destroyed everything that touched the floor including rugs and furniture.) This piece, The Dapper Dogwood on Brandon Street by Jenny McGee, is the first work of original art we ever purchased for ourselves. My favorite part is that it reminds me of my hometown (Dogwoods are the state tree of Missouri) and I love the texture provided by crushed freshwater pearls. Jenny remains one of my favorite artists and I visit her every time I’m back in Columbia.
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
Indiana Dunes by Holly Jackson
We picked up this piece by @hollyjacksonpainter_ on a weekend getaway to the Indiana Dunes several years back. We spent quite a bit of time chatting with Holly about her career as an artist, her influences and inspirations. This piece hung above a wooden console in our living room and I loved the way the browns at the bottom of the painting seemed to be lifted directly from that piece of furniture before dissolving into the blues of Lake Michigan. This is the next best thing to having views of Lake Michigan from my window.
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
Fullerton Bookclub by Katherine Corden
Fullerton Bookclub by Katherine Corden from her Shades of Chicago series. I saw this painting on Instagram and I knew it had to be mine - my favorite location in Chicago + a bookclub...I mean, it is hard to imagine that she didn't paint this with me in mind. I met Katherine at her adorable apartment (back when she lived in Chicago...she calls Traverse City, Michigan home now) when I picked up the painting and I've been a fan ever since.
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
Water Lillies by Susan Mauk
I couldn't afford this piece by Susan Mauck when I spotted it at her gallery in Indianapolis, but I also couldn't leave it behind. This was shortly after I finished grad school and had just started my career in academics. So I paid for half of it and came back after my paycheck was deposited to pay the remaining
balance and bring it home. It reminded me a bit of Monet with the lily pads but the thing I loved most was
the drip technique and that sort of unfinished feel.
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
Poppies by Kwang Cha
We discovered Kwang Cha at the 4th Street Art Festival in Bloomington, IN back in 2013. This is the only straight on photo of the painting I could find and I took it the day we hung it in our apartment, so once we get it back into our possession (it is currently being restored after the fire) I’ll have to take a better photo. The first thing that struck us was the texture created by the thick paint she uses to create the appearance of flowers. It is hard to tell in this picture, but the paint is THICKLY layered and creates the most beautiful 3D flowers with lots of depth and dimension. It is definitely one of those paintings you can stare at for some time and see nuances you hadn’t noticed before.
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
Color Explosion by Jane Matranga
Jane Matranga was my colleague at Indiana University. She had the most amazing painting above her sofa that I adored, one she’d painted herself…I kept asking her if I could buy it from her but she always refused. Eventually, I asked her to paint me one just like it. This was the first time I’d ever commissioned a painting and I learned A LOT in the process…it was quite the comedy of errors. She asked for a photograph for inspiration so I sent her one I took in Hawaii. She sent me a photo of the painting for feedback and it looked NOTHING like the painting above her sofa. It looked just like the photograph I sent her of Hawaii. I tried to explain that I really just wanted the abstract piece above her sofa. We went round and round and I was afraid I was going to offend her if I kept saying it wasn’t what I wanted. Finally I said, forget everything I’ve said and just paint me something beautiful. She came back with this. And I love it! (I’ll take better pictures when I get these pieces back!)
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
Sail Boat by Eric Maurus
The story of how we came to own this painting is one of my favorites. We were wandering a little shopping area while on vacation in Kauai and we saw a sign for an art gallery. As soon as we walked in, we realized they weren’t quite ready for visitors. But we were welcomed in anyway, even as they were touching up paint on the walls and hanging pictures. I started chatting with the gallery owner, Kirsten, about Kauai and the artists’ work in her gallery. After looking around the island and checking out several other galleries, I still had Kirsten and her gallery on my mind. We came back the next day and she recognized us immediately and welcomed us in again. We ended up purchasing this piece (the one above my head) by Eric Maurus, a French artist who lives half the year in Kauai and the other half in France. Turns out, we were Kirsten’s first sale in her brand new gallery, Black Dog Gallery, which is named after her dog. So can you imagine a more perfect art gallery for us to find our souvenir from Kauai?
At Home with the Hastys - Our Art Collection | Original Works of Art
Flower Series by Blue Geiger
Our most recent acquisition is this set of three floral paintings by Blue Geiger. Shortly after the fire, once we’d gotten settled into our temporary apartment, Blue reached out to me to ask if she could send me a painting to help decorate our very bland, very corporate apartment. I cried at the kindness of her offer. She told me to “like” the painting on her Instagram page that I wanted. Of course, I couldn’t decide so I liked three and told her to choose. She sent me all three. These are the only original works of art in our apartment and I adore them. They’ve brought me so much happiness in the past year. There is just something about an original work of art that makes a house feel more like home. I miss our other pieces, but these three works of art are doing their best to keep us afloat during this time.
